The Lodger

The Lodger was born in Ben Siddall's Leeds bedsit flat. He was making demos on his PC and playing them to whoever happened to pop round for a cup of tea. Once he had three songs, he burnt a CD of them and it was quickly passed around Leeds folk.

Around the same time, new label Dance to the Radio was getting off the ground and offered to release the first single by The Lodger. Two friends were quickly recruited on bass and drums and the band made their live debut.

As the new year began, Dance to the Radio issued their first compilation which featured "Unsatisfied" and then quickly followed it up with the debut single by the band "Many Thanks For Your Honest Opinion". A further limited 7" single "Watching" was issued as the year drew to a close.

2006 was where the band got their act together – a permanent line-up of Ben, Joe and Katie was established and the band went out on the road with kindred Yorkshire spirits The Research in February. London indie label Angular Records released the band's third single "Let Her Go" shortly afterwards. This single won the BBC 6music's Rebel Playlist.

In the summer the band decamped to Alan Smyth's tiny little Sheffield recording studio to record songs for their debut album. 13 tracks were recorded in a week in September and the result is "Grown-Ups". This material was road-tested at headlining gigs in the UK and Germany towards the back end of the year.

As 2007 begins, the band head out on an 11-date UK tour with The Long Blondes and have just completed recording a track with James Ford of Simian Mobile Disco.

Though the Lodger were formed in 2004, indie pop fans who remember a time before the Strokes will find their chiming, artfully un-artful strummy guitar pop endearingly evocative of the twee pop sound of the 1980s and '90s. Strong echoes of the Wedding Present, the Smiths, Talulah Gosh and their offshoots, and seemingly dozens of others are inescapable in Ben Siddall's urgent up-and-down guitar riffs and his somewhat adenoidal boy-next-door vocals, which themselves sound directly inspired by the Television Personalities' Dan Treacy. The sound is so authentic that the largely moribund Slumberland Records, one of the key players in '90s twee pop, became the British trio's U.S. label. The Lodger were formed in Leeds in 2004 by vocalist, guitarist, and songwriter Siddall, with bassist Lisa Harker and drummer Bruce Renshaw. Signing to the hot local indie Dance to the Radio, the Lodger released the singles "Many Thanks for Your Honest Opinion" and "Watching" in 2005, along with tracks on two of the label's compilation albums. Before recording started on the Lodger's first album, Harker and Renshaw left, replaced with bassist Joe Margetts and drummer Katie James. The revised lineup recorded its debut album in Sheffield with Arctic Monkeys producer Alan Smyth, including new versions of the previously released singles. Following the teaser singles "Let Her Go" and "Kicking Sand," Grown-Ups was released in the early summer of 2007. ~ Stewart Mason, All Music Guide