Driven by percussive grooves and flirtatious vocals, Brooklyn's Friends find a modern middle ground between post-disco and '60s girl group sounds. Fronted by Samantha Urbani and Lesley Hann, the band began as an extension of Urbani's home recordings, made with drum loops and effects-laden vocal tracks, something she'd done for years but kept to herself due to stage fright. Wanting to get the songs out of her system, in 2010 she began sharing them with friends -- among them, future groupmates Matthew Molnar and Nikki Shapiro -- while she traveled to Berlin for the summer. A twist of city-living fate -bedbugs- led to Hann and friend Oliver Duncan staying at Urbani's place for a spell, and within a week of sharing her demos with the pair, the band was born. Playing a steady stream of shows through 2010 and into 2011, Friends ranked in the NME's Best New Bands list and signed to the Lucky Number label, where they released two singles and, in October 2011, full-length debut I'm His Girl.
Brooklyn-via-Texas project Phone Tag was one of the scene compatriots Friends name-checked in their BTW piece, which was a kind plug while also being ...
This last year has been very good to Friends: The Bushwick band earned their BTW in April; they went big in October compliments of the "I'm His Girl" ...
Friends: "Mind Control" (via SoundCloud) Friends, the Brooklyn act of "I'm His Girl" fame ("When you see me walkin' around with him/I'm not just anoth...
BTW Friends generated a lot of attention last year thanks to singles like "Friend Crush" and "I'm His Girl" -- as well as the requisite Ghost Town DJ'...
Here is the video for "Mind Control," the first single from BTW Friends' first full-length album. Director Hir Muria conjures a dystopian vision which...
BTW Friends will issue their debut record, Manifest!, next week on Fat Possum, which they teased a while back with the lead single "Mind Control" as w...
The slinky Brooklyn BTW Friends will soon release their debut album Manifest!, and we've already heard a bunch of early tracks like "Mind Control" and...
Here's London duo AlunaGeorge's remix of Friends' "I'm His Girl," a rework that pulls the source track into weird, pulsating digital soundscapes. It s...
Lo-fi Brooklyn punk-funkers Friends have devoted themselves to resurrecting a very particular sort of circa-1980 New York sleaze, and their vaguely NS...
Tweet Just a week ago we had a stream to Ryan Hemsworth's mix for Diplo & Friend's show on the BBC's Radio 1. Well, the hot DJ producer has given us a...
