Elliot Minor

Elliot Minor are a classically influenced rock band from York, England. The group consists of Alex Davies (lead vocals/guitars), Ed Minton (vocals/guitars), Dan Hetherton (drums/backing vocals), Ed Hetherton (bass), and Ali Paul (keyboards). Elliot Minor stared as a duo, Alex Davies and Ed Minton, who met at school. They started as an acoustic duo and began playing covers of popular songs. In 2005, after they left Uppingham, and took a gap year to focus on their music. Davies bumped into childhood friend Dan Hetherton when they were both picking up younger brothers, and invited him to a band practice. Dan Hetherton joined as the band's drummer, and later they recruited Dan's brother, Ed, to play bass. Davies kept in contact with another childhood friend, Ali Paul, who joined as their keyboardist. They named themselves The Academy, though later changed the name due to legal reasons. Davies built a simple recording studio at his home, called Mavehole Studios, in which they started to record more songs. Albums: Elliot Minor In 2006, Elliot Minor won a competition to support McFly with an audience of over 13,000 at Newcastle. They signed to an independent label Repossession Records, run by their manager, Gary Ashley. Their first single, Parallel Worlds, reached #31 on the UK Official Charts; subsequent singles, Jessica, The White One is Evil, and Still Figuring Out, all reached top 30. Parallel Worlds was reissued, followed by Time After Time. Elliot Minor recorded their debut album in Santa Monica with Jim Wirt, producer for Hoobastank, Jack's Mannequin, Something Corporate, and others, and it debuted on April 14, 2008. Upon release, the album managed to debut #6 on the UK Albums Chart, and at #30 on the Irish Albums Chart. That same year, Elliot Minor played at several large music festivals, including T in the Park, Reading and Leeds, and Download Festival. They made an appearance on Jo Whiley's Radio 1 Live Lounge, recording a cover of Take That's Rule the World, which appears on Live Lounge Compilation 3. Their song "Running Away" was featured on the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics coverage, and more recently on he ITV coverage of the FA Cup. Solaris Elliot Minor took a break from touring to write album number two. Alex Davies drew from the experiences and changes in his life over the years Elliot Minor had been formed until the present when writing the album. He says, "The majority of the songs are uplifting as I was being positive in a pretty tough year to work through and the others are more personal and intimate. They have described their first album as being a collection of singles, while their second is more of a proper album with a beginning, middle, and end. This album was also recorded with Jim Wirt. "Electric High" was the first single and was released to co-incide with the album date. The tracks "Solaris" and "Discover (Why the Love Hurts)" were rerecorded before the album was released on October 19th, 2009. The album, mixed by John Greatwood and Tom Lord-Alge, reached #9 in the UK Indie chart. The title track “Solaris” has been featured heavily in the BBC coverage of the Winter Olympics and is released on Feb 21st as an iTunes exclusive. Touring Elliot Minor toured thee UK, Ireland, Continental Europe, and Japan almost relentlessly between spring 2007 and the summer of 2009 before taking a break to record Solaris. Their own tours were interspersed with arena dates supporting Fall Out Boy, Simple Plan and McFly. Headline shows ranged from poorly attended 'toilet tour' venues to a sold-out London Astoria 2 and everything in-between with support from the likes of Anberlin, You Me At Six, Kids in Glass Houses, Enjoy Destroy, Furthest Drive Home, Serpico, The Hot Melts, The Electric City, The Higher, Freak Bazar, Third Conduct, The Days, Shibby (Eleven Eleven), Fox Avenue, The Mission District, Saving Aimee, Me vs Hero, FranKo, and The Shower Scene. They have also played at many large music festivals, including Download Festival, T in the Park, Oxegen Festival, 02 festival, Wakestock, Reading and Leeds Festival, and headlined the All Access Academy in Dublin in 2009. The members of Elliot Minor play a wide variety of musical instruments, violin, piano, clarinet, cello, double bass, saxophone, guitar and drums. Their music is described as "symphonic rock," or "pop/rock with a lot of classical harmonies," and is known for being rich in minor and dissonant chords. Many of their songs are characterized by stunning vocal harmonies. Their recorded songs are rich in complex string and choral arrangements, all written by Davies, which are difficult to replicate live without a proper orchestra;[6] thus, their live shows are a stripped-down version of their songs, with a more rock edge than classical, although they have been known in the past to include Davies' violin solo during "Jessica" and Ed Hetherton's cello parts during "The Liar Is You." They frequently perform a rock version of Johann Sebastian Bach's "Toccata and Fugue in D minor. The band is known for strong fan interaction and often post updates and video blogs to their MySpace, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube accounts. Influences Elliot Minor cite among their influences Jack's Mannequin, Green Day, Something Corporate, The Used, Muse, Queen, Anberlin, The Beach Boys, John Williams, James Horner, Tom Newman, Hans Zimmer and Simon & Garfunkel. Band members Alex Davies - lead vocals, guitar, keyboards, violin, strings/choral/orchestral arrangements Ed Minton - vocals, guitar, violin Dan Hetherton - drums, backing vocals Ed Hetherton - bass guitar, cello Ali Paul - keyboards, synthesizer