The Maccabees

Though based in Brighton, all five members of the Maccabees grew up in South London, where singer Orlando Weeks and drummer Robert Dylan Thomas attended school together. Though the friends would often write songs in Weeks' bedroom, it wasn't until 2003, when they were introduced to guitarist Hugo White, that the band began to take shape. Soon bassist Rupert Jarvis joined, as well as Hugo's brother and fellow guitarist Felix. A relocation to Brighton occurred when Weeks went there to study art, but after only a year he dropped out to concentrate fully on the Maccabees and their music. The group's first single, X-Ray, was released on Promise Records in November of 2005, and thanks to a strong XFM-Radio showing, the Maccabees were able to garner opening spots on an Arctic Monkeys tour. Fierce Panda picked up the second single Latchmere, issuing it in the spring of 2006. The band's full-length debut, Colour It In, came out on Fiction Records a year later. Thomas left the band in 2008 to go into rehab; Sam Doyle was recruited to step in behind the kit. For their second album, 2009's Wall of Arms, the band worked with producer Markus Dravs, who also collaborated with the Arcade Fire. Main stage slots at the Reading and Leeds Festivals would follow, then the band took two years off to write and record. The results, the album Given to the Wild and its lead single "Pelican," arrived in early 2012.