rock

The Magic Numbers

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Two sets of siblings from West London whose harmony-drenched indie pop broke through in the mid-2000s and has quietly carried on ever since.

The Stodart siblings were born in Trinidad to a Scottish father and Portuguese mother who worked as an opera singer there. The family left after an attempted coup in 1990 and settled in New York, before Romeo and Michele moved to London in the mid-1990s, when Romeo was seventeen and Michele thirteen.

In Hanwell they became friends with neighbours Sean and Angela Gannon, whose family was of Irish descent. Romeo and Sean had already tried to form a band together, performing for a time as Guess, before the four of them settled into the lineup that became the Magic Numbers in 2002.

The group built a following on the London circuit, drawing early admirers among artists such as Travis, Ed Harcourt and the Chemical Brothers; Harcourt's support proved decisive in their signing to Heavenly Records, chosen over Rough Trade. Support slots with Travis, Ed Harcourt and Snow Patrol followed through 2004.

Their self-titled debut album, recorded at Metropolis Studios with American producer Craig Silvey, was released on 13 June 2005, trailed only by the single "Forever Lost" and followed by "Love Me Like You," "Love's a Game" and "I See You, You See Me." Its close family harmonies and unhurried, melodic guitar pop, indebted to songwriting from the 1960s and 70s rather than to the guitar bands around them, brought the band a wide audience.

The band toured widely in support of the album, across the UK, US, Europe, New Zealand, Australia and Japan, with their Japanese dates featured in a segment of Jonathan Ross's Japanorama. Four more studio albums followed: Those the Brokes in 2006, The Runaway in 2010, Alias in 2014 and Outsiders in 2018.

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