XES_1 Biography

Initiation ceremonies be damned! Brian, Lynke, Stitch, Kelvis AKA XES_1 have endured the fiercest of storms, worked in the darkest times and exhibited a determination to be proud of in order to see their joint collaborative vision through thus far. Musical style coming into question as each member of the band brought something different and expressed themselves through their influences and past experiences.

The core band was the brainchild of Brian as he began fusing samples and rock, metal as a project. Lynke was escaping from yet another band whose genre was, again, just not quite right. Both were coming from an extensive touring background with a need to produce something powerful and more passionate with an emphasis on live performance. Lynke knew immediately that he could bring something to the project and the excitement began. Finding a charismatic and powerful frontman in Stitch was really the defining birth of the "band". He had a calling, leaving behind the guitar in previous bands, to concentrate on vocals here. It became more than a project, it grew a soul.

Bringing Kelvis on board only a short 2 years ago has had a magical rejuvenating effect on the other members making the band even more alive and hungry. The search for band members and not just passing ships is never an easy one and to find the right person who has the same determined outlook on life, loves the music and can play is rare. And on this rare occasion Kelvis was looking for a challenge. This line up was creative from the first rehearsal together, an instant rapport, allowing the songs which are now InSaneVoice to be carefully crafted and moulded until every member of the band thought they could do no better.

XES_1 are never more at home than when playing live. Stitchs' powerful melodic vocals hold court on stage, never letting the moment slip. He fronts as 'show' personified, faithful, unswerving, devoted, whilst Brian, Lynke and Kelvis provide the coiling, twisted atmosphere which paints each scene. They are a thunderous force, having cut their teeth at some of the more intimate cult scene venues such as 'The Monarch', 'Gossips', 'the Ocean', 'the Garage', 'Metros', 'Cargo', 'Devonshire Arms' as well as venturing further around the country from Farnborough to Leicester, Leeds to Margate. A high point so far has been the opportunity to gig in Germany which has paved the way for the next European stint.

Life, Pain, Transformation, Jealousy, Unity, Change, Destruction, Hope

All themes expressed through songs culminating in the new album InSaneVoice, recorded and produced at BonaFideStudios in London. InSaneVoice, a journey oscillating through darkness and light, positive and negative, a character, a psychological profile, the effect of circumstance on inner state of being. Its manifest content certainly reveals itself more and more following each listen. It is XES_1's first album, of which they are immensly proud and which they seek to bring to as many new places and to as many new people as possible in the guise of an intense live experience.