The Automatic

The Automatic biography

The Automatic (also known as The Automatic Automatic in the U.S.), are a Welsh rock band. The band is composed of Robin Hawkins on vocals, bass and synthesizers, James Frost on guitar, synthesizers, backing vocals and occasional bass, Iwan Griffiths on drums and Paul Mullen on vocals, guitar and synthesizer - since 2007. Mullen joined after the departure of Alex Pennie who provided synthesizer, percussion and vocals.

Signing to a deal between B-Unique Records and Polydor Records in 2005 the band released their platinum selling début Not Accepted Anywhere in 2006, which spawned three UK top 40 singles - Raoul, Recover and Monster. The band released their second album This Is A Fix accompanied by only one single; Steve McQueen in 2008, which due to a dispute between the band's labels - B-Unique and Polydor - was plagued with distributional and promotional problems, The dispute led to the band withdrawing from their 5-album deal with the labels and instead formed their own label, Armoured Records, distributed through EMI.

After independently releasing their third album Tear the Signs Down in 2010 and three singles - Interstate, Run & Hide and Cannot Be Saved, the band have begun a temporary break while members concentrate on other projects, with James Frost playing guitar in Effort and Paul Mullen providing vocals and guitar in Young Legionnaire.

History

Band beginnings (1998-2004)

The members first met at primary school, in the early 1990s, and formed a band at the age of 13. Alex Pennie was asked to join five years later. Originally known as White Rabbit, up until February 2005 when they renamed themselves The Automatic because they believe that music is the antidote to "the automatic life". After recording their two-track demo featuring rough versions of "Monster" and "Rats" in 2005 they signed a five-album record deal

After signing their record deal with B-Unique the band began the writing and recording of their first record, the first release from which came in the form of "Recover" which on 7 November 2005 saw its release along with b-side "Jack Daniels". for the next 2 months the band were in studio, put under strain to write their record for a January deadline set by their record label, because of this the band believe the end result came out sounding quite similar. Whilst début single "Recover" did not chart, it had still gained them publicity, NME put the band on their new music tour, also calling them "The sound of 2006", the band quickly had further success, being awarded Best New Band in the Pop Factory Awards 2005. thumb After touring with The Kooks in early 2006 the band began the release of second single "Raoul" which came on 27 March 2006, being the first chart eligible release, reaching a peak in the UK Singles Chart of #35, album track "On The Campaign Trail" was also released on the CD single, whilst "Trophy Wives" was released on the vinyl, the single received as a large amount of airplay on MTV Two amongst other channels, as well as further exposure. the band went around the country between touring promoting the single and the forthcoming album with instore signings.

Biography from , the free encyclopedia.
It may not have been reviewed by a professional editor, and recent changes may not show up straight away. See the latest version of this article. Used under licence. Subject to disclaimers.