Coming Up: Clean Bandit

Filmed and edited by: Mollie Mills
Text: Aimee Cliff

“I would like to know how many people ARE actually in Clean Bandit!?” says the current top comment on the video for Clean Bandit’s track Nightingale. It fills us with excitement here at Dummy to be able to finally answer that monumental question, for the commenter who was baffled enough to post it, and the 48 other head-scratchers who clicked “like”.

Clean Bandit has a core of four members – Grace, Jack, Luke and Neil. Having met at university (apart from Jack and Luke, who are brothers), the quartet are close, and together they form the instrumental powerhouse behind the classically-influenced, dub-infused tracks that are blazing a Clean Bandit-shaped trail across the internet right now. Vocals on their songs come from a variety of singers that they’ve met through their work at South Kilburn Studios, which is where we met up with them to chat about where they’re at right now, and their plans for the future.

It’s all looking bright for the group, who have a sound that falls into a category entirely of its own (a category of super-fun, dub-driven, hook-laden electronic chamber pop). Live, they send an electric current through their audience with all the awe of classical virtuosity and all the performative flair of a hip hop show. In their visuals, they combine a sense of humour that walks the line between clever and daft with a genuine knack for creating a mood (check some of them below). Since they’re currently on tour with Disclosure, and have just announced the release of their new single Mozart’s House on Atlantic, it’s about time you got to know Clean Bandit if you haven’t already – you’d better catch up now, because they’re moving fast.

Clean Bandit – A&E