Don Broco

Don Broco are a four-piece alternative rock band. Formed in Bedford, England in 2008, the band consists of Rob Damiani (lead vocals and electronics), Simon Delaney (guitar), Tom Doyle (bass) and Matt Donnelly (drums and vocals). The band's debut album Priorities was released 13 August 2012.

Biography:

Formation and touring (2008-2010):
The bands origins go back to before their university years during High School, attending Bedford Modern School, where they played their first gigs, but it wasnt until after University where they decided to become a band. Damiani, Delaney and Donnely all attended the same High School, and met Rayner after university.
The band, which initially underwent many different names, including "Club Sex", but one of the bands name ideas was "Don Loco", but after guitarist Simon Delaney had broken his wrist in a football accident, they made a joke about naming the band Don Broco, and decided to use that as the bands final name.
They first toured the country in November 2008, playing gigs in places such as Leeds, Birmingham, Manchester and Watford, amongst others.
They appeared at Camden Crawl and Download Festival in 2009, as well as supporting Enter Shikari on a short run of shows in May 2009.
Don Broco also played Underage Festival, at Victoria Park in London, UK, in both 2009 and 2010. They played Sonisphere festival 2010 on the Red Bull Bedroom Jam stage. The band then went on to support Enter Shikari at both their Christmas parties at Hatfield Forum in December 2010. In September 2010 Don Broco also played in a local festival called Amersham Summer Festival.

Big Fat Smile (2011):
In January 2011, they released the video to "Beautiful Morning", directed by Lawrence Hardy. The following month they released Beautiful Morning as a single. They released their EP 'Big Fat Smile' on 14 February 2011.
Don Broco, alongside Lower than Atlantis and Veara, supported We Are The Ocean on tour in April/May 2011. The band completed a third UK headline tour in May 2011 with support from Burn The Fleet. This run of shows included a show at the Alternative Escape Festival in Brighton, with Deaf Havana and at Hub Festival in Liverpool, as well as performances at Slam Dunk North and South.
Over the summer 2011, Don Broco played a number of UK Festivals including Download Festival, Sonisphere Festival,Hevy Festival, Liverpool Sound City, Slam Dunk Festival, The Great Escape Festival. and at the Reading and Leeds festivals on the BBC Introducing stage which they were put forward for by the BBC Introducing programme which covers the Bedford area where the band is originally from.
An accompanying video to the band's B-Side "We Are On Holiday" off their 'Dreamboy' single was released in August 2011. The single was made available to download on iTunes on 22 August 2011.

Priorities and Rayners departure (2012-present):
Don Broco supported Four Year Strong on their UK tour in January and February 2012. During this time, before the release of the debut album, Luke Rayner left the band due to commitment issues and different interests, however they are still on good terms. The band played Hit the Deck festival in Bristol and Nottingham, the Great Escape Festival in Brighton, Slam Dunk festivals in Leeds, Hertfordshire and Cardiff, and Redfest 2012. Don Broco were going to support Futures in April 2012, but their tour was postponed to July 2012.
On March 23, 2012, the band announced that they had signed a deal with Search and Destroy Records, a new venture between Raw Power Management and Sony Music. The band's first single "Priorities" from their debut album of the same name was released on May 20, with the album released on August 13. The band replaced original bassist with new bassist Tom Doyle. In April, the band supported You Me At Six in Dublin and Belfast on their Irish leg of their UK tour. The band replaced the support bill originally consisting of Kids In Glass Houses, The Skints and Mayday Parade, however the Irish leg was rescheduled after Josh Francheschi contracted tonsillitis. The band supported The Used on their April/May UK tour, alongside Marmozets.
The band released the second single from Priorities, titled "Actors" it was released on the same day as Don Broco's debut album, 13 August 2012. The video sees the boys performing and a storyline where the boys don't get on and putting all the chemistry between them on for the cameras.
On 20 September, Hold On was revealed to be the third single from the album and shortly after they supported Lower Than Atlantis along with The Dangerous Summer and Gnarwolves in Autumn 2012, followed by their first European tour, supporting Young Guns accompanied with Your Demise on their European leg in October 2012. It was announced that Don Broco will be the final support on the Rock Sound Riot Tour 2012 in November 2012 along with Billy Talent and Awolnation.
In February 2013, they embarked on their first headline tour of the United Kingdom with dates spanning from February to April. For the February to March dates they brought Mallory Knox and Hey Vanity along as support. On 3 February it was announced that all dates for the February leg of the tour had sold out. For the April dates Pure Love and Decade were the supporting acts.
On 30 March 2013 Don Broco performed a headlining set at the Radstock Festival, Liverpool, at the O2 Academy Liverpool.
On the weekend of August 23-25, 2013, Don Broco performed on the main stage at the Reading and Leeds Festivals

Musical style:
Their style has often been related to genres such as alternative rock, rock pop and post-hardcore by reviewers. RocksFreaks.Net expressed the Thug Workout EP to be a half mixture of nu metal and post-hardcore due to the mixture of half-rap verses and screams and related their sound to that of A Day to Remember. The reviews for the third EP Big Fat Smile primarily called it a general rock album with elements of rock pop. Rocksound called the album "...good mix of Brit-rock riffs, sarcastic lyrical content and jovial pop sensibilities." with Alter the Press! also backing this statement up, placing them with the likes of many other "...British rock hopefuls for 2011.".
AltSounds reviewed their début album Priorities to have elements of all three genres. The review continues to say that various songs have some sort of groove to them, in particular "Hold On" stating that it had a "...Sexy Groove aided by the lead singer's charisma and frank lyrics about a close encounter of the female kind...". AllreadyHeard expressed that the album was mostly alternative rock, yet praised the albums range off different moods, going from energetic to "cheeky" songs. A live review from Virtual Festivals reviewed the bands performance at the Leeds Festival in 2013 and proclaimed that the bands musical style compared to their earlier music from the likes off the Living The Dream and Thug Workout EPs where substantial. They claimed that due to this some members of their audience where not so contented and was more dull since the new albums tempo is slower and the lyrical style has become more "love-letter" material.

Band members:

Current members
Rob Damiani - lead vocals, electronics, samples, programming (2008-present),
Simon Delaney - guitar, backing vocals (2008-present),
Matt Donnelly - drums, backing vocals (2008-present),
Tom Doyle - bass guitar, backing vocals (2012-present),

Former members
Luke Rayner - bass guitar (2008-2012)

Videos