Darkness

The Darkness are an English hard rock band. Their highly retro style of music seems to have been influenced by rock bands like AC/DC, Queen, Aerosmith, T. Rex, Van Halen and Def Leppard. They are best known for their former lead singer Justin Hawkins' soaring falsetto. more...

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Hawkins left the group in 2006.

History

Originally from Kirkley High School, Lowestoft in Suffolk, brothers Justin Hawkins (vocals and guitar) and Dan Hawkins (guitar) found themselves in London where they met up with childhood friends, Frankie Poullain (bass) and Ed Graham (drums), and thus The Darkness was formed. Dan initially saw his brother's potential of being a frontman after Justin did an impressive recreation of Queen's 'Bohemian Rhapsody' at a New Year's Eve party in 1999, thrown by Justin and Dan's aunt in her Norfolk pub. Playing at first only in pubs and bars, their pyrotechnic guitar solos and over the top performances soon brought them to public knowledge.

Permission To Land

Their debut album, Permission to Land, went straight to number two in the UK charts upon its release on 7 July 2003, before going to number one and staying there for four weeks, eventually going on to sell one and a half million copies in the UK.

The success of this album led to heavy touring for the band, including European portions of the Summer Sanitarium Tour 2003. They then went on to headline the Carling Festival in 2004. The band won three Brit Awards in 2004 in response to the album, Best Group, Best Rock Group and Best Album. They also won two Kerrang! awards in 2004 for Best Live Act and Best British Band.

By late 2004 the band's constant media coverage had started to lead to a general public backlash of antipathy, with the commonly-heard claim that they were no more than a novelty band. The band seemed to respond to this criticism by touring the UK's top arenas on their Winter-National Tour. One part of the show included Justin climbing upon a life-sized tiger during Love on the Rocks with No Ice and being elevated above the audience whilst playing guitar. The majority of the shows on the tour sold out.

One Way Ticket To Hell... And Back

On May 23, 2005 bassist Frankie Poullain left the band during recording of their second album, One Way Ticket To Hell... And Back, apparently due to "musical differences". Frankie has disputed this version of events, claiming he was "frozen out" and forced to leave the band. On June 13, 2005, The Darkness announced that Richie Edwards, formerly Dan's guitar technician, had replaced Frankie as bassist.

Read more at Wikipedia.org