Jukebox Collective

Wednesday sees Steve joined in the studio by Jukebox Collective, his New Favourite Band. - BBC 6 Music

We hated this bouncy Jamie T esque number on first listen, but in time the Super Mario-inspired bleeps and hook-heavy vocals grew on us. - The Independent

Here we have the first band to be confirmed at this years festival: The Jukebox Collective!
Combining a fusion of Indie-fied Disco House, these guys know how to get people to party, having already been referred to as one of the finds of 2010, 2011 seems like this could be the year to propel them into more mainstream territory. Please take the time and have a look and what youre going to be dancing to this year. Click the video below and you can see what the people from 'Axe' thought by using their track for a rather interesting advert ting! Merci n that! - Little London Fields Festival

Hotly-tipped Jukebox Collective will release a brand new single, ‘Icon Parade’ on 9 August (Supremo Records). This follows the success of ‘Lost and Found’, the first song the band recorded, self-produced and self-released, which won them a flurry of blog-buzz and a Top 15 entry into the Hype Machine chart.

Jukebox Collective came together in a serendipitous meeting between guitarist Greg and vocalist Kev. Greg was born in Apartheid-era South Africa, where access to music was limited, so he looked abroad for influence (“it wasn’t all Paul Simon,” he notes wryly, acknowledging that that might have come in handy during the Afrobeat resurgence of recent years). Now living in Hackney, Greg met Kev – who is actually registered blind - by chance, after two separate musical projects had ended. They quickly hit it off, and began writing and recording together. The name ‘Jukebox Collective’ emerges, then, as a neat summary of their everything-in-one-pot approach to music, not to mention the strange sequence of events that saw them form.

Having fallen in love with Factory Records, ‘Icon Parade’ is similarly inspired by this sense of the DIY: specifically, the sheen-free production and all round genius of James Murphy, and the DFA collective in general. On ‘Icon Parade’, Jukebox Collective add their own peculiar twist to this ‘Disco Punk’ sound, mixing up sharp guitar with driving synths, and dramatic tempo shifts against an arch, charismatic vocal delivery.

Though, musically, ‘Icon Parade’ sounds as if it’s just stumbled in from a boozy night out in New York, the song was largely recorded in the band’s East London bedroom: the band, in their own words, “mistrust” studios in general. Lyrically, again, London leaves its traces on ‘Icon Parade’. Guitarist Greg explains: “the song is about a neighbour who keeps getting hassled by these kids, and ends up going a bit mad. The idea behind ‘Icon Parade’ is him making all these floats of American heroes, like you get in parades, just to distract himself from the abuse. So the song is supposed to sound quite paranoid.”

Jukebox Collective will announce plans for further releases shortly, whilst completing work on their debut album. They will also play the following London dates surrounding the release of ‘Icon Parade’: - Alt Sounds

Jukebox Collective is four friends from East London who dabble in guitars, synthesizers and all sorts of percussion. Taking influences from the DFA camp, they take shades of The Rapture and LCD Soundsystem and add shouting vocals to make pop-edged electronica.

Look out for these gentlemen to release their 2nd single, “Icon Parade”, in July of this year, in the meantime preview the single below as well as their other tune “Lost & Found.”

enjoY! - Boom Boom Chik

The name may sound like something out of the 1950's, you’d expect something barbershop about them, but you’d be wrong.

If you wanted a simple way to describe it’d be “in the vein of LCD Soundsystem and The Rapture“, which is actually a pretty good way to describe them. They’ve explained themselves a little differently, using lovely equations.

“Kev (K) and Greg (G) knocked out some demos (D) in Gregs bedroom in 2008. Informal drinks (dr) and music making (M) evenings at most.

Kev and Greg (KG) later decided that two sets of hands were not enough and invited friends Josh (J) and Nick (N) to form a proper band with them.

Jukebox Collective was thus born.

In mathematical terms:

K + G = KG

KG + (dr x M) = D

D + KG + J + N = Jukebox Collective”

They’ve got a single coming out too, ‘Icon Parade’, which is below, a sneaky download, but please if you like it, as with all our tracks on here, go buy it, or you could go see them live. They’re playing Proud on 16th June and Silver Bullet on 23rd.
- We Are Not A Rock Band

Take a listen to the jingle-jangle intro of “Icon Parade” by Jukebox Collective and an overwhelming sense of anxiety just might rattles through your bones. It’s really little wonder, though, as one key band member once explained: “the song is about a neighbour who keeps getting hassled by these kids, and ends up going a bit mad.”

And perhaps that’s the best way to describe this track – by declaring it also to be “a bit mad.” Consider that a high compliment, too, as it carries a faint sound of the chaotic post-punk revival that dominated some years ago, (remember the grimy guitar sounds of Bloc Party and Franz Ferdinand?) tied neatly together with a thumping groove and Futureheads-like vocal delivery.

Here’s a double bonus, this DIY band from England is strongly influenced by the disco-punk era from New York, and that’s a big giveaway that some rug will be indeed be cut by the time the 3:35 minutes of this pop-tastic tune concludes. Forget the narrative of the just released single, you’ll soon find that there’s really nothing to be nervous about. - There Goers the Fear

Tom has a session from Jukebox Collective, who were found through his Introducing Show. - BBC 6 Music

Does anyone have anything heavy we can use?” teases singer Kev Sewell in the south gallery at Proud. A petite brunette pushes through the crowd to hand him her bag. “Unless this weighs the same as a car or perhaps a small house, I don’t think it will work. Thanks though, that’s very kind.” Behind Sewell, the other members of Jukebox Collective struggle to hastily gaffer tape the house’s drum kit back together after its collapse during their second song of the night. This performance – a make-up gig for one missed back in December when Sewell, on his way to the venue, was mugged and subsequently hospitalised – also seems to be ill-fated. Until you hear their music.

On the scene less than a year, Jukebox Collective have developed their own distinguishing synth-heavy indie-rock sound: organised yet frenetic, with pulsing drums, ruffled guitar, and ethereal keyboards grounded against buzzing synthesisers. Half-sung, half-spoken, the majority of their tunes focus on escape. The darkly upbeat ‘Joie de Vivre’ mockingly dissects the need to escape from the empty lives of society’s mainstream, whilst ‘You vs Me’ tells the story of escaping a failed relationship. We’ve all been there, but thanks to Jukebox it’s now possible to dance as we bitterly reminisce.

Guitarist Greg Keenan, drummer Josh Williams and newcomer Nick Caulkett on bass – alongside Sewell – all contribute to a tight performance, creating an electrically surreal atmosphere. As their set progresses, the gallery fills with people leaving the nearby stables, drawn in by the band’s distinctive sound. The boys ignore six zealous photographers to focus instead on each other and the music; a refreshing break from the typical modern indie band obsession with getting noticed. By their final song, Sewell, Keenan and Caulkett have wrestled themselves into yoga-like poses, endeavouring to hold the drum kit together while still playing their own instruments. Meanwhile Williams bashes away, as Jukebox Collective finish a set that's simultaneously immaculate and packed with energy. - Spoondfed

Welcome back to The Recommender. Those regular readers will notice that we’ve changed up a little from previous posts. This time we plan to do one single recommendation at a time, rather than the traditional three, so we can focus more on each band and post more frequently. It’s all designed to improve the Recommender experience. One thing that will certainly improve it are the fantastic music selections such as Jukebox Collective. You will see in the below post, (Recommender 78), that we had located our new favourite band with The Tins. As amazing and adored as they still are, they’ve already had to be bumped off our metaphorical top spot by this new four piece from London. We suggest you put your ears back in the box and return to sender if this band don’t top yours too. Consider the liveliest of beats, frantic spiked guitars, awesome riffs and choruses that will have you dancing, clapping and singing along like you just had 10,000 volts up your ass! Think of the kind of guitar hooks and energy that The Rapture or Gang Of Four jammed out, or the more modern synth version that it evolved into with The Sunshine Underground. It’s all rolled up with some awesome styled vocals, from Kev Sewell, who sometimes sings, but sometimes speaks the words, in the way Julian Casablancas did, if he had Scroobius Pip‘s Essex accent. It’s an outstandingly smooth ride, considering they’ve only been together for just over a year, with Greg being the main architect. We spoke with the South African-born Greg earlier today, who’s been over in East London for the last seven years. As former members of Havana Guns and Dakar Raleigh, they’ve now formed this new project, together with the Supremo Music label, which they’ll release on, at least initially. They’re playing our Recommender party in Brighton on Saturday 24th April with Wild Palms, so head down if you like what you hear. If you don’t like what you hear, we suggest you locate your brain’s reset button, it’s in their somewhere. (MB) - The recommender