Surfing The Void
It's been three years since Klaxons burst onto the music scene, injecting a dazzling and much needed moment of rave hedonism into the midst of indie tedium with the truly original and enormously influential Mercury award-winning album Myths Of The Near Future.
Now they are back with the eagerly awaited follow up. Produced in LA by US rock legend Ross Robinson (Sepultura, Slipknot, At the Drive In, The Cure) and written over the course of a three year long musical journey, it's a brilliantly diverse and engaging alternative rock record.
We were given a taster of what to expect - or perhaps what not to expect -with the teaser track 'Flashover' being streamed on www.klaxons.net last month.
Now it's time for the full sonic explosion.
Myths Of The Near Future
In less than two years the Mercury Award winning Klaxons have gone from a nebulous but strangely spot-on 'concept' combining indie-rock with early 90s hardcore rave to a fully fledged members of the indie rock establishment, a band that burst with original ideas, a untouchable creative vision and a sound that they can truly call their own.
Jamie Reynolds (26) grew up on the council estates of Bournemouth and Southampton. By age twelve he was already drinking and smoking weed and, by thirteen, hanging out with lads five years older. A group of them asked him to be bassist in their nascent indie band, Thermal, and a few bass lessons later Jamie's band were supporting heavy-hitters of the time such as Mansun and Heavy Stereo. The big break never came, though. When they went to record Thermal's breakthrough single they discovered the lead singer couldn't sing and the band split up. Jamie was gutted and threw himself into partying. He studied philosophy at college but his heart wasn't in it and he dropped out, spending the next eight years working in record shops "giving people hassle for buying records I thought weren't cool."
Like Quentin Tarantino, the video store clerk who dreamed big, however, Jamie spent these years plotting, drinking in musical knowledge, and planning. Things came together spectacularly when he moved to London and was made redundant. He spent his redundancy money on studio kit and hooked up with Simon to form a group called Klaxons (Not Centaurs), named after a line from early twentieth century art text The Futurist Manifesto.
Simon Taylor (24) grew up in Stratford-upon-Avon. Although he was into indie music he was also listening to 'Dance Nation' compilations and going to youth club happy hardcore discos. He asked James, who was in the year below him at school, to teach him guitar, then he headed off to do Fine Art at Nottingham University. It was there he embraced the jagged sounds of Josef K and the Fire Engines and made drunken late night plans to form a band with the boyfriend of one of his housemates, one Jamie Reynolds.
James Righton (23), meanwhile, worked every summer on the boats in Stratford-upon-Avon, but was into music early because his dad's a musician. He went to Reading Festival at ten and saw Oasis at Knebworth aged thirteen. He enjoyed everything from Pantera to Radiohead but after studying history at Cardiff University he disappeared to Madrid to teach English and explore "these great weird techno clubs".
In late 2005 his old pal Simon persuaded him to come back from "his everlasting gap year" and join Klaxons. The chemistry of the three was immediate. They meticulously planned what they wanted to achieve and recorded the sci-fi prog-punk 7" 'Gravity's Rainbow', putting out 500 copies in hand-painted covers. The b-side was a version of long lost 1992 rave hit 'The Bouncer' (originally by Kicks Like A Mule). Jamie dropped the phrase 'nu-rave' to describe Klaxons' "bring the party" ethic and, hey presto, the balloon started to go up. By the time they did their frantically oversubscribed first gig it was already clear the band were onto something special. 'The Bouncer' isn't an electronic dance record at all, of course, but stuttering brutally Spartan rock that has more in common with Big Black or Fugazi. The point was that Klaxons, with their garish dress sense, lack of poseur mystique and desire to turn a concert into a frantic good time, were just what the self-absorbed post-Libertines London guitar scene needed.
An old-fashioned rave-style party at a school gym, with the location revealed at the last minute on a mobile number, sealed Klaxons' reputation. Hundreds were turned away and the dancing went on past dawn with no police interference. What followed was a platinum debut album, an everyman wide reaching single (Golden Skans), a hectic 12 months of constant world touring with career defining performances at festivals and of course the aforementioned Mercury Award 2007.
Klaxons, though, were always ready for it. They were never going to waste their opportunity and are eager to let the world hear the full palate of their capabilities on the debut album 'Myths Of The Near Future' produced by James Ford of Simian Mobile Disco. All three come from single parent families and have become a tight-knit gang of musical brothers who take all the hype with a pinch of salt, concentrating on making art that will outlast the fuss. They read voraciously and their lyrics, full of references to the writing of Richard Brautigan, Thomas Pynchon, JG Ballard, Alfred Jarry, etc, are a refreshingly far cry from the current trend for bus stop'n'chips social realism. Call them pretentious, if you want, but they'll merely say, "So what," and hammer into the next ballistic number.
With their stew of cosmic imagery, avant-garde awareness, dizzy melodies and raging energy, Klaxons became a cultural moment of 2007. "Light the bridges with the lantern," says Simon, ever wide-eyed and passionate, quoting from their song 'Forgotten Works', "You know something's going to happen."
It certainly did.
This biography was provided by the artist or their representative.
