Huge attention was drawn to ‘Diamond Days’, the debut single from London-based four-piece Habitats back in March. Made up of Mike Lawford, James Furniss, Joe Payne and Adam Saunders, the band relish the idea of not having a one frontman and instead choose to utilise everyone’s strong characteristics and stage presence by rotating the microphone and instruments during live performances. It’s an unusual arrangement indicative of a band not looking to go about things the same way as everyone else.
The quartet admitted they made their own music in an attempt to escape from the generic environment of popular music. Luckily for us, they decided to share it with the internet. Atmospheric first demo ‘Lay Me Down’ got enough positive feedback for it to be worthwhile for them to continue. Fast forward around a year and their official debut single ‘Diamond Days’ had over 30,000 plays within the first seven days and it was pretty obvious that people were liking what they heard. By that point they’d drawn comparisons to established artists and alternative royalty such as Foals and Bombay Bicycle Club, and had already taken their energetic tropical groove on tour with the likes of Superfood and JAWS.
Now in the back end of the year, the band are set to release their second offering, ‘Peace Of Mind’, on November 3rd. We can expect more of the same sun-soaked bounce, experimental mayhem and fervent feel-good vibes as before. It’s high calibre, new wave indie-pop filled with catchy hooks and ‘daydreamer’ lyrics that make for easy listening. There’s very little, if anything, these guys are doing wrong from their insanely dancey beats to their penchant for top notch facial hair. They are definitely a band who will bloom as time goes on; song reviews and live reviews alike have been nothing but complimentary. So well worth keeping a watch out in the long term; their debut EP is pencilled in for a February release and who knows how big they’ll be by then.
