The Horrors are an English band from Southend on Sea, formed in 2005. Their debut Strange House, was released in 2007 and reached number thirty-seven on the UK Albums Chart, their second album Primary Colours was released in 2009 and peaked at number 25 in the UK. In July 2011 The Horrors' third album Skying was released, and reached number five in the UK album chart.
The Horrors originated in the early 2000s when their interests in obscure vinyl and DJing caused the members to meet: during trips to London and on the Southend circuit, Rhys Webb met Faris Badwan and Tom Cowan through their mutual interest in '60s Garage Rock, New Wave and Post Punk bands such as The Birthday Party and Bauhaus. In 2005 the three formed a band with Joshua Hayward and Joe Spurgeon.
The band was centered around Junkclub, an underground club founded by Webb and Oliver Abbott. Their first rehearsal consisted of two covers: The Sonics' "The Witch" and Screaming Lord Sutch's "Jack the Ripper" (heavily influenced by previous cover versions by The Fuzztones, One-Way Streets and The Gruesomes) - the latter would eventually find itself as track one on the band's debut album.
The Horrors made their first live performance at The Spread Eagle on Kingsland Road in London on 16 August 2005. They played with one other band, London's new wave punk pop band LR Rockets.
The Horrors drew the attention of critics and the public with their debut single "Sheena Is a Parasite." Their second release, "Death at the Chapel," a high-profile show at London's 100 Club in July 2006, and an appearance on the cover of the NME in August, greatly increased their profile. As a result of this exposure, the band played the NME Awards Indie Rock Tour in early 2007 along with Mumm-Ra, The View and The Automatic which helped garner further notoriety.
Having released their debut album Strange House in March 2007, The Horrors played a world tour to promote it. A slot as a support act for Black Rebel Motorcycle Club in the USA in the summer was cancelled due to lack of funds, and the band instead headlined a US tour in June.
They made a number of festival appearances throughout 2007, including appearances at the Glastonbury Festival, the Carling Weekend (on the Radio 1/NME stage), various Scandinavian festivals, the Summer Sonic Festival in Japan, and Splendour in the Grass in Australia; their setlists throughout the summer contained a cover of "No Love Lost" by Joy Division. The Horrors also appeared in the third series of The Mighty Boosh in December as the fictional band The Black Tubes, and supported the Arctic Monkeys on their sell-out arena tour of the UK, at which they received a mixed reception.
The band played an NME Awards show in 2008 with Crystal Castles, Ulterior and These New Puritans, and supported The Sonics on 23 March, their last London show until their appearance at Bethnal Green's Rich Mix on 23 May of the following year. On January 18, Counting in Fives, a documentary of the band's 2007 tour of the USA, was unveiled at the Sundance Film Festival.
At the end of 2007, The Horrors announced the forthcoming recording of a new album. The album was produced by the band, Craig Silvey, Geoff Barrow of Portishead, and music video director Chris Cunningham. Recording took place in Bath during the summer of 2008. The band were forced to pull out of their planned appearance at the Underage Festival due to recording schedule conflicts.
The band signed to XL Recordings after they left Loog Records in 2007. The only release from the band between the "She Is the New Thing" single in June 2007 and the new material in 2009 was a cover of Suicide's "Shadazz", released by Blast First Petite as part of their tribute to Alan Vega in October 2008.
A few weeks before the new album's release, a number of songs from the album were leaked. The album's first single, "Sea Within a Sea", was released as a digital download-only single on 17 March 2009. A music video for the song, directed by Douglas Hart (former bassist for The Jesus and Mary Chain), was also posted on the band's website on the same day.
The second album Primary Colours was officially released on 4 May 2009 to critical acclaim and reached #25 on the UK Albums Chart. The single "Who Can Say" was released on 7" vinyl one week later. Primary Colours was nominated for the 2009 Mercury Prize. NME later awarded the album first place in the 50 Best Albums of 2009.
In April 2010, singer Faris Badwan announced on their official forum that the band had already started working on their third album, to be called Skying, and had been in the studio for some months.
A track from the album, "Endless Blue", was first unveiled at Latitude Festival in July 2010, and later performed at Poland's Off Festival and Belgium's Lokerse Feesten in August 2010. In February 2011, after rumours that the album had been delayed, Badwan announced via the official forum that the album would be released in July. The first single, titled "Still Life", premiered on 24 May on Zane Lowe's BBC Radio 1 show.
The full album was made available for streaming from the band's website on 4 July, and officially released on 11 July, 2011.
The band were announced to be headlining the Festival Republic Stage at the Reading and Leeds festivals in August 2011,, where during their performance, were joined onstage by The Vaccines due to Tom Cowan being older brother to The Vaccines Guitarist Freddie Cowan. Tom Cowan had joined The Vaccines on stage earlier on the same day. They had also been chosen to perform at the ATP I'll Be Your Mirror festival curated by ATP & Portishead in September 2011 in Asbury Park, New Jersey.
