DID YOU KNOW? The name of the band derives from Bastille Day which is celebrated on 14th July and is the same day as Dan Smith’s (lead vocalist) birthday.
Bastille are a British indie band which were formed in 2010. The group began as a solo project by lead vocalist Dan Smith, but later expanded to include keyboardist Kyle Simmons, bassist and guitarist Will Farquarson and drummer Chris Wood. The band debuted in summer 2010 with their limited edition 7” single that featured the two tracks “Flaws” and “Icarus”. These were released through London-based independent record label Young & Lost Club and out of the 300 copies pressed, fortunately for them found its way into the hands of Alex Baker, presenter of the unsigned/independent artists radio show on Kerrang Radio and after supporting the band on air their audience started to grow.
After an independently released debut single and a self-released EP, the band signed to Virgin Records in 2011. The bands first official single “Overjoyed” was released on April 27 2012 and following its video premiere, popular music publication, Q Magazine introduced the track as its ‘Track of the Day’ on 7th March 2012.The second single released from the upcoming debut album, “Bad Blood” was the eponymous track, “Bad Blood”. The song was the band’s first entry into the chart and moderately charted at number 90 in UK top 100. Following this they were named ‘New Band of the Day’ by newspaper “The Guardian” in July and performed at Reading and Leeds Festival and supported British singer-songwriter Emeli Sande. Their third single of the album, a re-release of their first 7” non-album single “Flaws”, was a commercial success which earned the group their first position in the UK Top 40, debuting at number twenty-one.
In late 2013 to 2015 the band started playing new songs and did a lot of touring. They had their producer on tour with them so would work on the second album in between shows. They featured on the Band Aid 30 version of “Do they Know It’s Christmas?” in November 2014 and was also nominated for “Best New Artist” at the 57th Annual grammy Awards but lost out to artist Sam Smith. They did not release this album until 2016, but released an independent single called “Hangin”. Their second album “Wild World” released on 8th September 2016 reached number one on both the UK and Scottish album charts.
Article by Candice Eastman.
He discovered the gem when he was 12 years old and still has it now, claiming it to be why he fell in love with music. He likes to play disc golf when he's not writing about music. He is a one-of-a-kind individual who is always the first to bust out his air guitar on the dance-floor.