| Future Islands is an American synth-pop band based in Baltimore, Maryland, comprising Gerrit Welmers (keyboards and programming), William Cashion (bass, acoustic and electric guitars), Samuel T. Herring (lyrics and vocals), and Michael Lowry (percussion). The band was formed in January 2006 by Welmers, Cashion and Herring—the remaining members of the performance art college band Art Lord & the Self-Portraits—and drummer Erick Murillo.
Future Islands came to prominence in 2014 with their fourth album Singles released by 4AD. Its lead single "Seasons (Waiting on You)" was considered the best song of 2014 by Pitchfork, and NME and its performance at the Late Show with David Letterman in March 2014, became the most-viewed video on the show's YouTube page.
2003–2005: Origins – Art Lord & the Self-Portraits Sam Herring and Gerrit Welmers grew up in Morehead City, North Carolina, two streets away from each other, and attended the same middle school in Newport, North Carolina. They became friends around 1998, when they were in 8th grade. Herring had started making hip-hop music when he was 13 or 14, while Gerrit was a skater with interests in metal and punk music who bought his first guitar at age 14. Having different musical backgrounds, they did not consider making music together during high school. William Cashion started playing guitar when he was around 13, having had a couple of bands as a teenager in Raleigh, where he commuted to high school from Wendell, North Carolina. In 2002 he enrolled in the painting and drawing program at East Carolina University and had drawing classes with Sam Herring. Meer... |
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The idea to form a band came while Cashion was helping Herring study for an art history exam. They invited local record shop personality Adam Beeby to play rhythmic keyboards and fellow art student Kymia Nawabi for percussion and backing vocals. After a tumultuous debut on Valentine's Day February 14, 2003, at Soccer Moms' House, Herring also invited Welmers to join the band. Only Cashion and Welmers already played a musical instrument—the guitar—but Cashion took the bass and Welmers the keyboards, for a Kraftwerk-inspired sound.
Sam Herring played Locke Ernst-Frost, an arrogant narcissistic artist from Germany, Ohio, dressed in a 70s-inspired white suit with slicked-back hair, and a heavy German accent. The character's name originally was meant to be Oarlock Ernest Frost but it got shortened as a reference to John Locke, the religious poet; Max Ernst, the artist; and Robert Frost, the American poet.
The band quickly gained a local reputation and started touring the underground venues in the Southeast, playing shows with North Carolina acts like Valient Thorr and Baltimore artists such as Height, Videohippos, OCDJ, Nuclear Power Pants, Santa Dads, Ecstatic Sunshine, Blood Baby, Ponytail and electronic musician Dan Deacon whom they met during a show on May 26, 2004.
Nawabi who was already a senior when Cashion, Herring and Welmers were freshmen, left the band to prepare for her graduation project in June–July 2003. When Adam Beeby had to leave Greenville in September 2005, the remaining members dissolved the band.
2006–2007: Formation – Little Advances When Art Lord & the Self Portraits disbanded in late 2005, its members forgot they had discussed with alt-country band The Texas Governor the possibility of touring together. Future Islands was formed in early 2006 to keep that commitment, with an original line-up consisting of Cashion, Herring, Welmers and Erick Murillo—bassist for The Kickass —who played an electronic drum kit. Already as Art Lord & the Self-Portraits, the band wanted to change their image and took this opportunity to do so. William Cashion stated: "Me and Gerrit had been talking for a while about how we wanted to get rid of the gimmick. We wanted to be taken seriously. Our songs had outgrown the gimmick that the band was made on. The songs were starting to deal with bigger, personal, universal themes. We wanted to be taken seriously." The band played their first show on February 12, 2006, at an anti-Valentine's Day party in a venue called the Turducken house, opening for about a dozen bands. After writing 6-7 songs in only one week, they had to come up with a new name quickly, narrowing it down to two choices—Future Shoes and Already Islands—and combining them into one. Future Islands self-released the EP Little Advances on April 28, 2006, which they recorded in March 2006. Meer op wikipedia... |