Chemical Brothers HHV Records 19 Items

The new trendsetters of Big Beat

The Chemical Brothers were formed in late 1980s Manchester with a mission to redefine electronic music. “The brothers gonna work it out” – in the 1990s, the duo consisting of Ed Simons and Tom Rowlands played a significant role in making Big Beat a global phenomenon and setting a new trend in clubs after the Acid House movement. The two sample enthusiasts met in 1989 while studying in Manchester, both being passionate about the nightlife surrounding the legendary Haçienda Club. And because they were big fans of the production team The Dust Brothers, who had worked with the Beastie Boys, Ed and Tom decided to name themselves simply the same way – as they unexpectedly began to make waves on a regional level with their first DJ gigs and 12" records, they opted to change their name to The Chemical Brothers to avoid any confusion. With singles like Song To The Siren, the duo explored their breakbeat roots, and after a remix EP, Ed and Tom regularly performed at the London Heavenly Sunday Social Club in 1994. Somewhere between hip-hop beats, obscure sound snippets, and the deepest bass that the club’s subwoofers could handle, the Chemical Brothers defined Big Beat and solidified their international success in 1995 with the debut album Exit Planet Dust.

Breakbeats and Retro Synthesizers

After their first world tour, the Chemical Brothers joined Virgin Records and scored their first number-one hit in the UK in 1996 – on the hypnotically chaotic Setting Sun, none other than Oasis legend Noel Gallagher took on the vocal part. For their second number one, the madness known as Block Rockin’ Beats, which falls somewhere between psychedelia, hip-hop, and funk, they even received a Grammy Award shortly thereafter. Their second album, Dig Your Own Hole, even caught the attention of the actual Dust Brothers, who now wanted to collaborate with the Chemical Brothers, and constant touring was the result of their massive rise in the electronic music scene. In 1998, they released one of their DJ mixes on Brothers Gonna Work It Out, and with albums like Surrender in 1999 and Come With Us in 2002, the duo expanded their collaboration horizon by featuring guest appearances from Bernard Sumner (New Order), Bobby Gillespie (Primal Scream), and Richard Ashcroft (The Verve). They also landed headlining slots at festivals like Woodstock ’99 and Glastonbury. Furthermore, their tracks were now prominently featured in films like Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and games like Project Gotham Racing, where they swapped breakbeats for retro synthesizers and replaced their ever-driving basslines with dreamy melodies.

Always with a love for melody

The live shows of this genre-defining duo became a collective and personal experience for their fans: “It’s an intense experience where you get very close to yourself, but together with a lot of other people,” says Ed. “You could call it controlled extremism” – hit songs like Galvanize, produced in collaboration with Q-Tip in 2005, confirm this theory. Since their breakthrough in the 1990s, the Chemical Brothers have never adhered to a formula: their albums Push The Button, Brotherhood, and Born In The Echoes balance between disco beats and techno, always with a love for melody and that compelling energy that Tom and Ed have possessed since their early days. With No Geography in 2019, they won three Grammy Awards, and on For That Beautiful Feeling in 2023, colleagues like Noel Gallagher, Aurora, and Beck made guest appearances as usual. After twenty years of band history, their new record still exudes a youthful euphoria that sounds like raves and sweaty club nights. And they also remain true to their origins as DJs: “We do this because we want to give people a truly unique experience, a psychedelic experience.”