Kasabian
Background information
Origin	Blaby and Countesthorpe, Leicestershire, England
Genre(s)	Alternative rock Indie rock Electronica
Years active	1999–present
Label(s)	RCA Records(U.S.) Columbia Records(UK) Sony BMG
Website	Official website
Members
Sergio Pizzorno Tom Meighan Chris Edwards Ian Matthews
Former members
Chris Karloff

Kasabian are an English rock band from Leicestershire, formed by Tom Meighan (vocals), Sergio Pizzorno (guitar and vocals), Chris Edwards (bass) and Chris Karloff (guitar and keyboards).

The band has been compared with the likes of Primal Scream, with whom they share an electronica-indie rock fusion, and The Stone Roses and Oasis, with whom they share confidence, swagger and rough vocal style.

Contents 1 History 2 Current album 3 Recent and future events 4 Discography 4.1 Albums 4.2 Live Albums 4.3 Singles 4.4 Compilations 5 Members 6 Trivia 7 References 8 External links

History

The band members are from the Leicestershire villages of Blaby and Countesthorpe. They met whilst attending Leysland High School and Countesthorpe Community College.

The band is named after Linda Kasabian, a member of the Charles Manson cult (aka the Manson "family"). In an interview with Ukula, bassist Chris Edwards explained how the former guitarist Chris Karloff picked the name. Reading up on Charles Manson, the Kasabian name stuck with Karloff. "He just thought the word was cool, it literally took about a minute after the rest of us heard it…so it was decided,” says Edwards.

Their self-titled debut album was released in the UK in September 2004. During the recording, the band had lived in a farmhouse at Rutland Water, so as not to be disturbed.

Current album

During the recording of Kasabian's second album, Empire, Christopher Karloff, one of the band's chief songwriters, had "artistic and creative differences" and was asked to leave the band, according to the band's website. He had contributed his writing skills to three of the songs on Empire, including the title track, which went on to be the first single released from the album. The album itself was released in the UK on August 28, 2006. The band recruited once temporary drummer, Ian Matthews, as a permanent member of the band. In the early days Tom Meighan used to post on the Libertines.org forum for short notice gigs and to promote his band.

The members of Kasabian have been very critical of other bands and in one instance labelled the band My Chemical Romance as "clowns" and "emo kids" who "don't have anything positive to say" and "should get out more and try and have a good time instead." Later Sergio Pizzorno claimed this statement was "unnecessary" and "childish", and regretted what he had said.

The song "Empire", a self-described 'call to arms' and the first single from the album of the same name, reached #9 on the UK charts, based on downloads sales alone, and with only six days airplay. It stayed in the top 10 for 4 weeks. It was exclusively played on BBC Radio 1's Zane Lowe show in July 2006 and immediately made available for internet download.

The album seems to focus on the horrors of war, and the problems of waging it. "Shoot the Runner" reached #17 in the British charts. "Me Plus One" is the latest single, which was released on January 29th, 2007.

Recent and future events

Kasabian recorded a live session for Live From Abbey Road at the famed studios on October 25th 2006.

Kasabian won the Best Live Act award at the 2007 NME Awards. After receiving the award, Meighan had said: "This is the first award we've ever won, so about fucking time! Thank you NME!"

Kasabian played the main stage on Saturday 19 May 2007 at Radio 1's Big Weekend in Preston, and were second on the bill on Saturday 9 June 2007 at the Isle of Wight Festival. They also played the Pyramid Stage at the 2007 Glastonbury Festival on the Friday night and on the 30th of June they performed at B'Estival in Bucharest, Romania along with Reamonn and Pink.

On 7 July 2007 Kasabian performed as part of the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Kasabian performed at the T in the Park concert in Scotland 8 July 2007.

Kasabian are also due to perform on the second day of Tennents ViTal in Belfast in August 2007.

The band are scheduled to release an EP on September 3rd 2007 entitled Fast Fuse. Serge said: "This was done in my house in a little room downstairs, Just in front of a computer, I produced it all myself. I'm in a really, really rich vein of form as far as songwriting goes. I'm in a really good patch where everyday something happens. There was no point in saving it you know, because we've got equally good songs for the album. So this marks this summer and what we're doing at the moment. I think the fans who first got into us, they'll really appreciate it, they'll feel we've not disappeared into fucking arenas and all that. It's like, 'There's a bit more music for you for people to enjoy'."

They plan to start work on their third album in Winter 2007.

On the 26th of July they played a secret gig in their hometown of Leicester, it is to be shown on Channel 4 in August

Discography

Albums

• Kasabian (September 13, 2004) RCA Records (UK) / BMG/RCA (US) #4 UK, #94 US
• Empire (August 28, 2006) Columbia Records (UK) / BMG/RCA (US) #1 UK, #114 US

Live Albums

• Live From Brixton Academy (July 4, 2005) Arista Records (UK) / BMG/RCA (US) Download only

Singles

Year	Title	Album	Chart Positions
			UK Singles Chart	UK Download Chart	US Modern Rock
2003	"Processed Beats"	Demo	-	-	-
2004	"Reason Is Treason"	Kasabian	-	-	-
	"Club Foot"		19	-	27
	"L.S.F. (Lost Souls Forever)"		10	-	32
	"Processed Beats"		17	-	-
2005	"Cutt Off"		8	18	-
	"Club Foot (reissue)"		21	36	27
2006	"Empire"	Empire	9	8	-
	"Shoot the Runner"		17	29	-
2007	"Me Plus One"		22	-	-
2007	"Fast Fuse" (unreleased)	Non-album	-	-	-

Compilations

• Music from the OC: Mix 5 (2005 · Warner Bros./Wea)

Members

Line-up:

• Tom Meighan - Lead vocals
• Sergio Pizzorno - Guitar, Backing vocals & Lead vocals
• Chris Edwards - Bass
• Ian Matthews (Joined in 2005) - Drums & Percussion
• Jay Mehler (Live replacement for Chris Karloff, formerly of the band Mad Action) - Guitar

Past members

• Christopher Karloff - Lead Guitar, Bass, Synths & Omni Chord.

Trivia

• The video for the song "Club Foot" is dedicated to Jan Palach.
• Tom Meighan is notably famous for calling The Strokes' lead singer Julian Casablancas a "posh f***ing skier", the now defunct London based trio - Test Icicles as "King's Cross rent boys", Pete Doherty as "a f***ing tramp" and The Automatic as "horrible" in an NME interview. Kasabian also criticised My Chemical Romance in a October interview by Bizarre in the Sun after being told the quintet were heading for No. 1 in the UK, claiming that they should "get out more" and that their lyrics were depressive and negative to youth as part of the emo phenomenon. Tom Meighan also called Justin Timberlake a "Midget with Whiskers", "Sex on legs" and a "Puppet in a million dollar suit". Joining in the Britney Spears breakdown debate, Tom recently said that Britney looks like "a tranny who forgot the wig". After playing the Ibiza Rocks event, Meighan also said that he "wouldn't give a f*** if the island sank" Additionally, in his most recent NME (4.3.2007) interview he said that both David S. Sexton and Mark Wahlberg were "absolute fannies". Also after the Live Earth concert, Tom said that he wished to see Madonna perform as she looked like his old gym teacher he then went on to say that his old gym teacher was a man.
• Fans of the band include William Shatner and Arnold Schwarzenegger
• Their music is often compared with similar sounding madchester group the Stone Roses in music magazines such as NME.
• The song "Stuntman" was used in the film Green Street, and is also played during Sky Sports' Premiership coverage.
• The song L.S.F appears in the video game Fifa football 2004
• The song Club Foot appears in the video games Pro Evolution Soccer 5, Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition and Tony Hawks Project 8 (intro movie).
• The song Club Foot appears in the movie Goal! during the match between Chelsea and Newcastle United.
• The song Reason is Treason appears on the video game Gran Turismo 4 and is also used as the intro music.
• The song Sun Rise Light Flies appears in the last scene/closing credits of episode 101 of the HBO show "John From Cincinnati"
• They performed a cover version of the David Bowie classic "Heroes" for ITV's 2006 FIFA World Cup coverage. This rare release was available free for a short time on download from their record label.
• The song Club Foot is featured in the Ashton Kutcher and Kevin Costner film The Guardian.
• Kasabian was voted the best album of all time by Channel 4
• The song Running Battle was featured at the end of the episode As Fate Would Have It of the tv series The 4400.

References

External links

• Official website
• Official MySpace profile
• Interviews from the Leicester Mercury
• musicOMH.com Interview: August 2006
• Video interview with stv.tv, December 7, 2006

v • d • e Kasabian
Sergio Pizzorno · Tom Meighan · Chris Edwards · Ian Matthews Chris Karloff
Discography
Albums: Kasabian · Live From Brixton Academy · Empire
Singles: "Reason Is Treason" · "Club Foot" · "L.S.F." · "Processed Beats" · "Cutt Off" · "Club Foot / 55" · "Empire" · "Shoot the Runner" · "Me Plus One"