Athlete

Athlete are an Ivor Novello Award winning English post-britpop band formed in Deptford, London, comprising Joel Pott (lead vocals and guitar), Carey Willetts (bass and backing vocals), Stephen Roberts (drums and backing vocals) and Tim Wanstall (keyboards and backing vocals). Recently, the quartet have recruited Jonny Pilcher of Weevil as a live guitarist.
The band had a brief period ofhigh-profile domestic success in which their debut album Vehicles and Animals was a platinum seller in 2005 after a 2003 release and Mercury Music Prize nomination, with this followed up by Tourist which reached #1 and sold over 500,000 copies allowing this album to also go platinum.
Joel Pott in 2011 announced on Absolute Radio, that the band are writing new material for a 5th album, but in the meantimemay participate in various side projects before recording at least one or two more albums before splitting.
Contents[hide] * 1 History * 1.1 Formation (2000-2001) * 1.2 Critical and commercial success (2002–2006) * 1.3 Later releases and artistic development (2007–2010) * 1.4 Future plans (2011-present) * 2 Discography * 3 In popular culture * 4 References * 5External links |
[edit] History
[edit] Formation (2000-2001)
Friends since the age of fourteen, Athlete took their wide ranging influences such as Grandaddy and The Flaming Lips and started jamming and practicing in the basement of The Bear, a pub which was converted into a church and sandwich bar, on Deptford High Street in 1999. They began recording there, before sending demos out.
Their debutsingle "Westside" released in 2001 was a hit, garnering airplay on BBC Radio 1 and paving the way for another single, "You Got the Style" which cracked the Top 40 in June.
[edit] Critical and commercial success (2002–2006)
Signing with Regal Recordings, the band released their first single in February 2002. The band came to prominence in 2003 with their debut album, Vehicles and Animals,producing popular singles such as "You Got the Style" and "El Salvador". The album earned a Mercury Music Prize nomination and went on to sell over 250,000 copies. They played their first live session on UK radio on the Dermot O'Leary Show on BBC Radio 2.
Their second album, Tourist, reached Number One in the UK Album Charts in its first week, following the huge success of single "Wires". The song wasbrought around when the lead singer's newborn baby was rushed to intensive care after a premature birth, and in 2006 it won them the Ivor Novello Award for "Best Contemporary Song". In the UK charts, the band has frequently been frustrated by singles just missing out on top 40 placings, due to inconsistent support by music television channels and radio stations.[citation needed] For instance,certain songs, such as "Wires" and "Half Light", were played up to 10 times a day on larger UK radio stations, yet other singles such as "Westside" and "Tourist" received little to no radio play whatsoever.
[edit] Later releases and artistic development (2007–2010)
On 10 June 2007, it was announced that the title of their third album would be Beyond the Neighbourhood.[1] The album was mixed by BenAllen and Michael Brauer, who also worked on Tourist. Released on 3 September 2007, Beyond the Neighbourhood was a self-produced collection of low-key songs, viewed as a disappointment by some,[2] and an interesting sidestep by others.[3] It entered at #5 on the UK album chart. Singles included Beach Boys-influenced "Hurricane", charting disappointingly at number 30, also "Tokyo" which missed theTop 100 (number 198) and "The Outsiders EP", which didn't chart at all.

Athlete at the Academy, 2007
They embarked on tours of the UK in late 2007 and early 2008 in support of the album. They also played during the 2008 TT motorcycle racing festival on the Isle of Man.[4]
Black Swan is the fourth disc produced by the band. Athlete recorded this album while temporarily unsigned. American...