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Foals picked up quite a buzz in the U. The sessions went well, but the bandmembers ended up not being happy with the final mix, choosing instead to remix it themselves, and issuing the full-length, Antidotes -- which, incidentally, included neither "Hummer" nor "Mathletics" -- in March of , while Sub Pop picked up the album in the U.

Two years later the band returned with its sophomore album, Total Life Forever , released by Transgressive Records. After having songs appear on shows like Entourage and Misfits, the band returned in early with its third album, the expansive Holy Fire , Foals ' first record to chart outside of Western Europe, cracking the Billboard in the U.

They toured Europe and the U. Early the next year, the band confirmed that founding member Gervers had left the group on amicable terms. Other members filled in on bass in remaining sessions. Albums chart, and Pt. If guitar music has been going through a lull, nobody told Foals. In the midst of a supposed indie recession, the Oxford quintet are a growth industry: selling out the Albert Hall in ten minutes, seeing their recent single, Inhaler , receive half a million YouTube hits in three days, and getting critical and commercial love for their new album, Holy Fire.

The way they upholster indie rock with a visceral blend of electro, funk, synth-pop and shimmering polyrhythms has something to do with that, as do their fug-inducing live performances.

But what really sets them apart from the legions of dispiriting guitar combos is their frontman, Yannis Philippakis. But they barely disturb him. It's surprising to discover Philippakis is so emotionally wrought. When Foals emerged from Oxford in , they seemed almost the definition of a "haircut group", their angular barnets matching their music's mix of afrobeat and math-rock.

While there was much to admire in the quintet's music, it seemed more cerebral than heartfelt. Enough people bought their debut album, Antidotes, to take it into the top three, but polyrhythms and seemingly flippant lyrics to songs such as The French Open — which addressed in French the subject of Andy Roddick's serve — left many with what Philippakis describes as an unfair impression that they were "calculated, distant pseudo-intellectuals".

But it was all genuine. It's just been a natural progression. Foals started as an instrumental group and lyrics were something he "just tagged on". When he did reveal anything in song, he'd couch his sentiments in "so many layers and metaphors that no one knew what I was saying". Two years on, everything has changed with Foals' second album, Total Life Forever.

It's a gigantic departure: not only does it take their sound into intense rock and global funk something like Talking Heads produced by Tusk-period Fleetwood Mac , but it overflows with confessionals and, thrillingly, the emotions that were missing from the first. But I realised I needed emotional catharsis. Music can be a soothing balm.

Over two days and two countries, two encounters with Philippakis suggest that songs such as the new album's haunting first single Spanish Sahara — "leave the horror here," he sings, "forget the horror here" — are just the tip of an emotional iceberg. He talks of feeling ill at ease in the world, of his particular fascination with ups and downs, be they the rise and fall of empires or bipolar disorder moodswings. He talks about his predominant feelings being "sadness and hollowness", and of feeling an "air of finality" around him, as if "we've seen the best days already".

Most troublingly, he says he is "carrying this stuff around, this black, unfathomable rage". He doesn't seem like a pretentious rock star visiting the dark side for effect. As he puts it: "Without the solace I've found in music, I would have gone mental.

However, Yannis plugged those feelings into his music, using his writing as a kind of therapy. See more Foals Latest. Glastonbury Festival. How did Foals come up with their band name?