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Brakes

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British indie rock outfit formed in 2003 from members of other Brighton bands, alternating brisk country-tinged songs with joke-length blasts of a few seconds.

Brakes formed in Brighton in 2003, when Thomas White and Alex White of the Electric Soft Parade saw Eamon Hamilton play a solo gig and recruited him; bassist Marc Beatty, who had engineered records for British Sea Power, completed the line-up. Hamilton sings and plays guitar.

Their debut single, "Pick Up the Phone," appeared on Tugboat Records in 2004. The following year they recorded their debut album, Give Blood, for Rough Trade in just seven days; it drew five-star reviews and was named Rough Trade Shops' album of 2005.

Brakes toured with Belle & Sebastian, Editors and the Killers, and Hamilton left his side job playing keyboards for British Sea Power in 2006 once touring made it impossible to do both. Their second album, The Beatific Visions, was recorded in Nashville with producer Stuart Sikes.

In the United States the band performed as BrakesBrakesBrakes, to avoid confusion with an unrelated Philadelphia band called the Brakes. Their third album, Touchdown, was released on Fat Cat Records in 2009, produced by Paul Savage, formerly of the Delgados.

Their records mix brisk, sometimes country-inflected indie rock with songs lasting only a few seconds, laced with a dry, offhand lyrical humour. The band effectively disbanded after their run of albums, but Brakes reformed briefly for live dates in 2015 and again in 2026.

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