Glastonbury, Meltdown, Latitude, sell-out shows and a debut album release are all part of a crazy week for this Oxford band, as Tim Hughes finds out

With everything that has happened to him lately, Dave Bayley could be excused a little overexcitement.

Yet, the frontman of Glass Animals is glacially cool and reflective.

I caught up with him as he took a break from rehearsing at The Shed – an old stable near Shotover, which serves as the group’s HQ. It follows a week which has seen his band added to the bill at Glastonbury Festival, and selling out London’s Southbank Centre for a headline show as part of James Lavelle’s Meltdown. Oh, and then there’s the small matter of their debut album, Zaba, out earlier this week, and an international tour which is also well on its way to selling out.

“It’s kind of crazy, but we don’t see it as we are so immersed in playing, keeping our heads down and focusing on doing the best we can,” says Dave, a songwriter and qualified neuroscientist.

“The album coming out is incredibly exciting though; it’s a dream come true.”

It’s impossible to overestimate the buzz surrounding this Oxford band, whose fans include Radiohead’s Colin Greenwood, who booked them to headline his own night at the city’s Jericho Tavern; and Metronomy and St Vincent, whom they have supported on tour.

Another admirer is Adele’s producer Paul Epworth, who snapped them up to his Wolf Tone label.

Reviews of Zaba, with its r’n’b-tinged indie-electronica, have been uniformly glowing. “I don’t think any of us were expecting people from the other side of the world to be interested in us,” says Dave, who lives in Walton Street. “It’s incredible and very cool.”

Like many musicians before them, Dave and bandmates Drew MacFarlane (guitar, organ and violin), Edmund Irwin-Singer (keys, bass, cello and piano) and Joe Seaward (drums) are alumni of St Edward’s School, in Woodstock Road. Dave who had been living in America, bonded with Drew, who had also been brought up in the States. Theybonded over a shared love of soul, rock & roll and r’n’b.

listen to ‘Oxford Mail talk about Glass Animals - Pools’ on Audioboom

“We had to do a lot of music at school,” he says. “In fact, the only reason I went was because I had a music scholarship. I am pretty amateur compared to the others though.”

It wasn’t until he went to Kings College, London, to study medicine, that he turned his hand to songwriting, gaining some serious music industry interest after posting the band’s songs online.

The album was largely recorded in Jericho, its title being a reference to Dave’s favourite childhood book, William Steig’s dreamlike adventure The Zabajaba Jungle.

“We wanted to make something to play from start to finish, and one way of doing that is in the form of a book. I wanted every song to convey different emotions and experiences. There’s no real story running through it, though. It’s more about creating a whole world of sound.”

And how would he describe that sound? “That’s the most difficult question,” he admits. “It’s just the music that comes out of my head. But from what other people say, it sounds like hip-hop holding a pineapple!”

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So what’s their secret? “I don’t know if there’s a secret,” he says. “There’s an element of luck but it’s largely down to hard work.”

“In our formative years we were playing 20 shows a year, working really hard and finding out what we wanted to do musically.”

“We wanted to make sure our live shows were as good as they could be. It’s about us being more and more comfortable on stage so that it’s not an adrenaline rush of panic we get, but of excitement.

“We go on stage and have a really good time. We like putting on shows that aren’t simply how we are on record. We want it to be two different experiences.”

The band celebrate the album launch with a free set at the Truck Store, Cowley Road, Oxford, tomorrow and a launch party at the Jericho Tavern on June 26. That will be followed by a string of US dates and festival sets at Glastonbury, Latitude in Suffolk, and Bestival on the Isle of Wight.

But, for Dave, it’s the Jericho date which is the special one. “It’s very nice to play at the Jericho,” he says. “It’s where we played our first ever show and it’s always more light hearted playing there because it’s our second home.

“We’ll be making it fun – and have got some great ideas. Hopefully something cool will happen!”

  • Glass Animals’ album Zaba is out now.
  • The band celebrate the launch at The Jericho Tavern on Thursday, June 26. Tickets £5 from wegottickets.com
  • They play a free in-store set at Truck Store, Cowley Road, Oxford, tomorrow.
  • They also play Latitude festival (July17-20) latitudefestival.com and Bestival (Sept 4-7) 2014. bestival.net
  • Listen to Glass Animals’ song Pools on our Oxfordshire bands showcase at oxfordmail.co.uk/music