Elliot Minor (formerly The Academy) are a band from York, England. They cite among their influences Something Corporate, Jack's Mannequin, The Used, All American Rejects, Queen, The Beach Boys, The Krankies and James Horner. The band are classically trained and the music is a fusion of classical and rock. Their first four single releases all charted in the UK Top 40.
Band History
Before Elliot Minor, Alex Davies was into classical music and was expected to become a concert violinist but due to meeting Ed Minton at Uppingham School in 2000 his focus soon drifted to rock music. As Alex and Ed quickly became close friends they had started Elliot Minor as an acoustic duo in 2004/2005.
During the last year at school, Alex and Ed built a simple recording studio in their attic flat, where they spent most of their time writing songs, recording demos and performing. After finishing school they both decided to take a gap year to develop the band while at the same time Alex had built a more sophisticated home studio in his garage.
In October 2005, Alex Davies and Ed Minton arranged to have a band practice in Alex’s garage along with Dan Hetherton as the drummer. Soon Heatherton had been accepted into the band and the three began recording new songs, improving old songs and sending out demos.
During live performances both keyboard player and a bass player were needed, so the band had recruited both Ali Paul, who was a childhood friend of Alex, and Teddy Hetherton, Dan’s brother to the band.
Elliot Minor are classically trained in the violin, piano, clarinet, cello, double bass, saxophone and singing. Alex, Dan and Ali were choristers at York Minster Choir School, while Ed Minton, born in Japan, began his education in England as a chorister and ultimately head chorister at St John’s College, University of Cambridge.
In a few short months the band was signed to Repossession Records, a new label founded by former MCA Vice President and Head of A&R Gary Ashley, who is credited with signing and developing acts including Dusty Springfield, Blink-182, Shaggy, New Found Glory, Something Corporate, Aqua and The Beatles among others.
In November 2006, they flew out to Los Angeles to record the first single with producer Jim Wirt (Hoobastank, Incubus, Something Corporate, Jack’s Mannequin. After hearing the track, Neal Avron (Yellowcard, Fall Out Boy) offered to mix the record and, of course, the boys accepted.
Their first single, Parallel Worlds, was released on April 9th, 2007. Parallel Worlds is energetic rock track, driven by guitars, but woven together with violin and piano. The song is about the spooky/paranormal events that occurred in Alex and Ed’s attic flat at school. Alex swears the room was haunted. Drawers would fly open, lights would swing and posters would mysteriously peel off the wall. In the video for the single the boys rehearse the song in a spooky old room, and as they play the energy from the music is transferred to the objects around them. The single entered at number 31 on the UK Singles Charts where it featured for one week in April 2007.[1] Prior to this it had already been playlisted on major channels such as Kerrang! TV, MTV2, The Box and The Hits.
Elliot Minor currently less than 42 songs recorded and are still writing and recording. All material to date are original songs written and recorded by Elliot Minor or Alex Davies, the frontman. Their debut album is completed with its release set for April 21st in the UK.
Their second single, 'Jessica', was released August 6th. It was playlisted on Kerrang! TV, The Box and The Hits and MTV Hits, and was ranked 19th in the UK chart for one week in August 2007.[2] The band have said the song is about the star Jessica Alba. The song includes many quotes referring to Jessica and her career. "Jessica" was originally known as "Walk With Me".