The Drums are an American indie pop band from Brooklyn, NY with members stemming from the shortlived

band Elkland (formerly Goat Explosion). The band is currently on the Moshi Moshi/Island (UK), Universal (AU) and Frenchkiss (US) labels.

Formation
Founding members Jonathan Pierce and Jacob Graham first became friends as children, having met at a summer camp. Soon after their first meeting they formed the electro-pop group Goat Explosion, touring in North America. The two separated for several years: Pierce formed indie pop group Elkland which quickly gained attention and was signed by Columbia Records; meanwhile, Graham formed 'Horse Shoes' which was signed by Shelflife Records. Eventually, having both grown tired of electronic music, they decided to switch from synthesizers to guitars, and formed The Drums in 2008 in Kissimee, Florida. They then moved to Brooklyn, New York in spring 2009, wherein they 'hired on' drummer Connor Hanwick and guitarist Adam Kessler and had their first gig all within a week of arriving in Brooklyn.

Career
In December 2009, the band were shortlisted as one of the 15 music acts for the BBC Sound of 2010. Subsequently, they placed at #5 in this list on 4 January 2010. The Drums also appeared in Clich Magazine's December '09/January '10 issue. The article featured an exclusive interview by Executive Editor Miguel ngel Jimenez and drummer Connor Hanwick.[1] In NME's first issue of 2010 they were named number 1 in the magazine's top tips for the year as well as in Clash Magazine's Tips for 2010. The Drums were also voted "Best Hope for 2010" in Pitchfork Media's 2009 Readers' Poll.[2] In February 2010, the band played venues around the UK on the 2010 NME Awards Tour alongside The Maccabees, Bombay Bicycle Club and The Big Pink, going on to play support band for Florence and the Machine's 2010

Cosmic Love tour.[3] In June 2010 they played as one of the support bands for Kings of Leon in Hyde Park, London. On May 7, 2010, they appeared on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross where they performed "Best Friend". On September 16, 2010, it was announced on the band's Facebook page and website that guitarist Adam Kessler had left the band.[4] After the disaster in Japan, the Drums released the single "The New World" on April 11, 2011.[5] On May 5, 2011, it was reported by the NME that The Drums had expanded their live line-up to include Chris Stein and Myles Matheny (of Violens).[6] In June 2011 drummer Danny Lee Allen (We Are Scientists, Youth Group) joined the band, replacing Chris Stein. The Drums released their second album Portamento, on September 5, 2011. They also revealed that they almost split at the end of June due to stylistic disagreements.

Influences
The band cite their major influences as The Wake, The Smiths, Joy Division/New Order, The Tough Alliance, The Legends, The Shangri-las, The Embassy and Orange Juice.[7] Graham also mentions that reverb in general has played a major role in their sound: "...If reverb didn't exist we wouldn't have bothered trying to start a band."[8]

Bio
Emerging from Brooklyn via Florida in 2009, The Drums initially caught the ear of the indie world with their Summertime! EP. It was an escapist collection of beach pop fantasies; tracks suffused with a wistful, longing nostalgia that never pandered to cheap sentimentality. Their rise, particularly in the UK, was meteoric. Early buzz led to a prestigious spot on the BBC Sound of 2010 shortlist, followed in short succession by a slot on the Shockwaves NME Tour in 2009, and the publications Phillip Hall Radar Award in early 2010, well before the albums release that summer.

Their terrific self-titled debut LP, released in June, was bifurcated into a first half dedicated to more upbeat pop songs, and a second half revealing a darker, more introspective side of the band. A resounding success, the album has sold 200,000 copies globally to date (90,000 in the UK alone) and found the band touring relentlessly, playing triumphant sold out gigs worldwide throughout 2010 and 2011, including a 6 week tour of the USA and shows in Japan, Hong Kong, Australia, Brazil, Chile, Germany, France, Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Mexico and Indonesia, as well as a sold out UK tour, culminating in two nights headlining the London Forum. For the often difficult sophomore LP, the band sidestepped the pitfalls of a slump by recording it quickly, again self producing, often laying down tracks spontaneously in singer Jonny Pierces kitchen. Following the departure of guitarist Adam Kessler, drummer Connor Hanwick switched to guitar, and guitarist Jacob Graham picked up his more natural instrument of synthesizers. Titled Portamento, the new album, released just 14 months after their debut, reveals a band tugging lightly at the boundaries of their sound while still retaining their recognizable sonic signaturessweet rushes of melody, winsome lyrics, and brittle synthesizer sheens colliding with wiry Spector-esque guitar and bass lines. Pierces lyrics have also assumed a more starkly intimate, personal tone, evinced from the outset on opener Book of Revelations, with its brazen examination of religion, through the bittersweet closing love song How It Ended. Pierce explains The first EP there was this air of innocence. We were obsessed with vintage Americana sort of things. There were personal moments on the first album and EP, but it was very idea driven and conceptual. We wanted it to be cinematic. A scene from a movie, if you will. Now thats gone. The new album, its like every song is a scene from real life. I think from beginning to end its sort of autobiographical for me. I was able to be alone for a lot of this, and really write about myself. This new album touches on everything from my extreme religious roots to transgenderism to violence, and of course theres plenty of heartbreak stuff, which I couldnt get away from even if I tried. And the heartbreak is apparent on the tremulous In the Cold, and the aching If He Likes It Let Him Do It, as Pierce laments, Because it was a happy time/Now its winter time/And youre cold, until the chorus ascends to an eerily shrill wall of

synthesizers. But its never cheaply manipulative. These are songs devoid of cynicism, written from a self-involved place, according to Pierce. But after a certain point you have to be self-involved to some extent to make it stick. Connor Hanwick agrees with his assessment. There are songs like I Need a Doctor. Jonny and I wrote that, and I was like, wow, it was the first one that didnt feel lyrically detached. It was almost too personal. In the Cold is one that I love because the emotion in it is so real, adds Jacob Graham. Thats something that distinguishes this record from the last one is that I dont think we wouldve allowed anything that real to be on the first one. I guess the closest thing is Down By the Water, but that feels more cinematic like your watching a scene instead of feeling that way. In the Cold really goes there. Jonny has this thing about him where hes so capable of writing huge, banging choruses, Hanwick adds. He has such a knack for it that if its not that, its kind of the end of the world. So I kept saying to him, Why dont you just keep going with it? And he did on Money, and its a great single. Graham hints that the band became more detail oriented in the studio, and improved, focusing on the finer points of their sound. Its been three years and we are better. When you think about music as much as were forced to, you become more analytical about things, says Graham. When we were in the studio and even when we were mixing the record we were thinking a lot about the sounds. I think the first record had a very narrow palette of sound, and this one has a slightly broader palette. While the band continue to expand their sonic palette, one consistency has been their unabashed love for The Wake, whose influence is even more pervasive than on their earlier work. Id be sitting down with a bass guitar, and Id think, how can we do a bass line like The Wake? Its still a band that we cited on this record, even though our influences on this record definitely changed. Theyre just so good, enthuses Hanwick. But Im happy with the record, he adds. Weve progressed in the right way. There are some songs that Jonny wrote on there by himself. For How it Ended

and Book of Revelations, I wish Id been there. Not all the songs are balls out pop, but those songs are just Jonny doing what he does best. To accommodate the records sonic expansiveness, the band have swelled to a five piece live, augmented by two auxiliary members, including Myles Matheny of Violens and Papercranes on guitar and bass. Theyve also eliminated the backing tracks used for the bulk of their shows to date, thus lending their performances a more visceral, spontaneous feel, in line with the aesthetic of the album. The records titled Portamento, which is a 17th century Italian term that denotes a vocal slide between two pitches. For Pierce, it takes on an additional, personal meaning. Well its got some significance, he says. Jacob and I meeting as young boys with a shared love for Kraftwerk and Anything Box and Wendy Carlos, and these were all synth pioneers, and a common feature on old analogue systems was Portamento. It dictates the travel time from one note to another, and we have always thought it was a beautiful word. It seems to come in to play with how we have transitioned in the last year, losing a guitarist, reforming the band, our personal lives, and the actual sound of the album travelling from one thing to the next. In a sense Pierce is describing loss, nostalgia, redemption, vulnerability, and love, which could well be a checklist of all the things that make The Drums matter.