- Morning Parade
-
Morning Parade 
Background information Origin Harlow, Essex, England. Genres Alternative rock, Indie Rock Years active 2007- present Labels Parlophone Associated acts Coldplay, Blur, Anotherstory, Wing Commander Website Official website Members Steve Sparrow
Chad Thomas
Phil Titus
Ben Giddings
Andy HayesMorning Parade are a five piece band from Harlow, Essex. It comprises Steve Sparrow, lead vocals and guitar, Phill Titus, bass, Chad Thomas, guitar, Ben Giddings, piano/synths and Andrew Hayes, drums. They make rock tracks with a distinct 90s dance anthem influence.
Contents
Formation
The band have been together since 2007. Steve and Phil met whilst at school and even worked together as labourers. They met Chad at college and were three of the members in another band called Anotherstory.[1] The members all met at college between 2000 and 2004. Steve was the lead vocalist and also played the piano and guitar, Phil was the bassist and backing vocalist and Chad played the guitar and piano. The other two members were Mike Pope, who played guitar, and Charlie Gadson the drummer. They played experimental/ alternative rock, inspired by artists such as Elbow, Radiohead and The Stills. Their first single was 'Traffic'. The band split in 2007.
Steve (in between Anotherstory and Morning Parade) toured the local scene of Harlow and Bishop's Stortford, with footage of him playing acoustic versions of some of his songs still available on You Tube. During this time he became aware of Andy and Ben, who were to become the final two members of Morning Parade.[2] They had all previously been in other bands so to begin with they spent their time away from the public eye, writing songs. When they did eventually start playing gigs, it took less than 20 before they were approached by a record label. Not feeling that they were ready yet, the band ignored these early approaches. They were eventually persuaded and in May 2010 signed to Parlophone, a major British label, which includes artists such as Coldplay and Kylie Minogue[3]. They signed their deal on the roof of an EMI building.
The name came about from the days when Phil was working as a plasterer and Steve his labourer. It used to require early mornings and travelling to get to their various jobs. They referred to this as doing the 'morning parade'. They also say the name refers to the transition period between night and day.
Critical Acclaim
Morning Parade have an album to be released in 2011 and have so far released one track off that album, "Under the Stars" which was played on Zane Lowe's show on BBC Radio One,[4][5] and released on November 29, 2010. It was also featured on The Vampire Diaries. The band released the video for Under the Stars on December 2 on You Tube, which was first shown exclusively on The Sun's website on November 30.[6] The song has been played on Radio 1, BBC 6 Music, XFM, Absolute Radio and Q Radio.[7]
Morning Parade have so far released their first single, "Under the Stars". Their second single will be "A&E" and is to be release in February. It will include "Marble Attic" as a b-side along with two remixes. Other songs they have performed have been "Headlights", "Seasick", "Us And Ourselves", "Born Alone", "Speechless", "Carousel", and "Pieces". The b-side to "Under The Stars" is "Monday Morning", played live for the first time at The Square, Harlow,at the band's homecoming gigs.
They have also received praise from MTV [8] and Vogue.[9]
Their so far unnamed debut album will be released in 2011. The single 'Under the Stars' has already been released off that album as well as B-sides 'Monday Morning', 'In the Name' and 'Your Majesty'. They have been recording the album at the '13 Studios' owned by Damon Albarn and been working with longtime Blur collaborator Jason Cox.[7]
Shows
On November 29, 2010 they announced their 2011 UK tour.[10] They played a number of shows throughout the UK. They then progressed to tour Europe, including Holland, Germany and Spain and have been touring Europe with The Wombats. They confirmed a few European festivals they will be playing in the summer and have played one of the biggest festivals in the UK, The V Festival in Chelmsford, just only a few miles away from the bands hometown (Harlow). They sadly had to pull put of the Pukklepop Festival [11] due to safety concerns, a stage collapsed while they were travelling down there to play and several people were killed. [12]
Songs
With no album tracklisting of yet many fans are wondering what tracks may be or may not be on the album, according to their setlist.fm site [13] (which is run by the same person as their 'Street Team'), see that for further info. One bit of interesting news has been the different style they play 'Headlights'.
Album
On 12 May 2011 the event for the Scala show was re-scheduled, speculation was thrown around for a few hours to why this happened. Later on that day the band sent out an email telling all, it was moved from 9 June 2011, to 26 September 2011, this was so that people would be able to hear the album before it came out. So the album is due to be released mid-September 2011. As an apology the band released 'On Your Shoulders' upon the masses in the same email. This song will not appear on the up-coming album. Speculation has been thrown upon them as to who they are recording the album with, Paul Epworth was the fans favourite as he lives near the band, but this was overturned when Epworth announced he is recording the new Florence & The Machine album. On the 18th of July 2011 the band gave away a free song 'Close To Your Heart', it is still unclear to whether this will be on the album. It has received praise from various blogs and websites. [14]
The first official announcement of any track came on the 22nd of August 2011 at 11:00 BST, 'Monday Morning' was streamed for the first time as the full album version. Dave Kosten has changed it all around with broken beats and more layers. 'Blue Winter' is the second track to be streamed, this sounds all racey and really upbeat. The third track to be streamed was 'Carousel'. Lead singer Steve Sparrow said they wanted the song to be 'haunting, disorientating and euphoric all at the same time whilst making sure we didn't go overboard and find ourselves unable to re-create it live'.[15] Videos on online show that Steve originally played the song with an acoustic guitar but for the album recording they confirmed that they had gone electric. The last date the 26th of September is their headline show at The Scala, London. [16]
Speculation about album tracks are starting to come true, they have released 3 tracks so far in a deal with gigwise.com, and the tracks that have appeared as 'teasers' are (so far)... - Blue Winter - Carousel - Monday Morning - Under The Stars * - Speechless
- Not official yet but you can hear it in the background of the introduction to the teasers on their soundcloud.
Discography
Singles
Year Single Peak chart positions Album UK 2010 "Under The Stars" – Non-Album Track "In The Name" (Vinyl release) – "Your Majesty" (Vinyl release) – 2011 "A&E" – "On Your Shoulders (Limited to 300 copies) " – "Us & Ourselves" – Us & Ourselves (Album) References
- ^ www.last.fm/music/anotherstory
- ^ i-ntroducing Morning Parade | i-D Online
- ^ [www.joinerslive.co.uk/product.php?xProd=1336&xSec=1]
- ^ BBC - Radio 1 - Zane Lowe - Home
- ^ Morning Parade Aim for the Arenas - Spinner UK
- ^ Parade around Under The Stars | The Sun |Showbiz|Music
- ^ a b Morning Parade interview - Steve Sparrow, Chad Thomas, Phil Titus, Ben Giddings, Andy Hayes - Music-News.com
- ^ Morning Parade Interview | Morning Parade | News | MTV UK
- ^ [1]
- ^ Morning Parade Announce UK Tour - Xfm
- ^ http://twitter.com/#!/morningparade/status/104306576864718848
- ^ http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/18/pukkelpop-belgium-festival-killer-storm
- ^ [2]
- ^ http://its-all-indie.blogspot.com/2011/07/track-of-week-morning-parade-close-to.html
- ^ http://www.gigwise.com/morningparade
- ^ http://www.gigwise.com/morningparade
External links
Categories:- Music from Essex
- Parlophone artists
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
