Polar Bear | |
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![]() Polar Bear at Taylor John's House, Coventry, England, 2007 | |
Background information | |
Origin | London, England |
Genres | Experimental, jazz |
Years active | 2004–present |
Labels | Leaf, Babel, Tin Angel |
Members | Seb Rochford Pete Wareham Mark Lockheart Tom Herbert Leafcutter John |
Website | www |
Polar Bear is a British experimental jazz band led by drummer Seb Rochford with Pete Wareham and Mark Lockheart on tenor saxophone, Tom Herbert on double bass and Leafcutter John on electronics and occasionally guitar or mandolin.
Polar Bear were nominated for the Best Band award at the BBC Jazz Awards 2004, while Rochford was nominated for the 'Rising Star' award. [1] Their first album Dim Lit was released in the same year and was a small scale success.
Their second record, Held on the Tips of Fingers merged elements of cool jazz, funk, dance music, free jazz, electronica and drum and bass and was, by comparison, a crossover hit, earning Polar Bear a nomination for the Mercury Music Prize in 2005. [2] The success was all the more unusual for an almost purely instrumental album. The album was nominated for a BBC Jazz Award 2006. It was selected as one of "The 100 Jazz Albums That Shook The World" by Jazzwise magazine. [3] and featured in The Guardian's list of "1000 Albums To Hear Before You Die". [4] They have been involved with F-IRE Collective.
They released their self-titled third album, Polar Bear , in July 2008 with Tin Angel Records. [5]
In 2010, the band released Peepers and mini-album Common Ground, a collaboration with Portuguese-born, London-based rapper Jyager, on The Leaf Label. [6] [7] Their 2014 album In Each And Every One was shortlisted for the Mercury Music Prize [8] [9] and in the same year they released the single "Cuckoo" in collaboration with singer and songwriter Jin Jin. [10] In March 2015 Polar Bear released their sixth album Same as You , including the single "Don't Let The Feeling Go". This track features frequent collaborator Shabaka Hutchings (Sons of Kemet and The Comet Is Coming) on tenor saxophone and Rochford and Hannah Darling on vocals.
In 2015, Polar Bear were nominated for Best Jazz Act in the MOBO Awards and Urban Music Awards. [11] [12]
Collaborations
Acoustic Ladyland was a London-based jazz-punk band consisting of Pete Wareham on vocals and saxophone, Seb Rochford on drums, Chris Sharkey on guitar, and Ruth Goller on bass guitar.
Last Chance Disco is the second studio album by British punk jazz band Acoustic Ladyland. It was released on 16 May 2005 by Babel Label.
Babel Label is a jazz record label founded in 1994 by Oliver Weindling that specialises in British jazz, particularly the London scene. It released more than 130 recordings in its first 20 years, two of which were nominated for the Mercury Prize.
Sebastian Rochford is a British drummer and composer. He has recorded and released music as leader of the British band Polar Bear, as Kutcha Butcha and as part of numerous collaborations.
Mark Lockheart is a British jazz tenor saxophonist who was a member of the Loose Tubes big band during the 1980s.
Denys Baptiste is an English jazz musician. A graduate of Tomorrow's Warriors, Baptiste plays tenor and soprano saxophone in addition to composing.
Led Bib is a modern jazz group from London, England. Its fourth album, Sensible Shoes, was shortlisted for the 2009 Mercury Prize.
Pete Wareham is a British saxophonist, composer and band leader. He led the genre-defying North African/punk/jazz/dance band Melt Yourself Down and was a member of Nadine Shah’s Mercury Prize-nominated band, Seb Rochford’s Pulled By Magnets and also ran the influential group Acoustic Ladyland. Formerly of Rochford’s now disbanded Mercury Prize-nominated Polar Bear, Wareham has also played saxophone and flute with The Smile, Sons Of Kemet, Mica Levi, James Chance, Supergrass, Ben E King.
Jonny Phillips is an English jazz guitarist and composer. He played the violin and studied theory from the age of five, however he swapped to guitar at fifteen to study jazz, Brazilian and African music. After his studies at Newcastle College of Music, Phillips moved to London where he set up his group Oriole, with whom he has released three albums on the F-IRE Collective label. Oriole is perhaps one of the few groups to feature two Mercury nominated artists: Ben Davis on cello and Seb Rochford on drums. Phillips is now based in South London after three and a half years living in Andalusia, Spain.
Roller Trio are a British jazz-rock trio, who formed whilst studying at Leeds College of Music in 2011. In 2012, their eponymous debut studio album was nominated for the Mercury Prize alongside a nomination for the band as "Best Jazz Act" at the MOBO Awards that year. In performance, John Fordham of The Guardian described their preview gig for the Mercury prize [as having] "the same wild insouciance that has made their sound a howl of fresh air." DJ and broadcaster Gilles Peterson described their music as "Dark, menacing, bass heavy – the new sound of UK jazzzzzzz!" They are known for their "epic memorably singalong melody hooks and blistering riffs".
Sons of Kemet was a British jazz group formed by Shabaka Hutchings, Oren Marshall, Seb Rochford, and Tom Skinner. Theon Cross replaced Marshall on tuba after the first album, and Eddie Hick replaced Rochford on drums after the third. The band disbanded in 2022.
Janée Bennett, known professionally as Jin Jin, is an English musician, singer and songwriter from Manchester.
Dim Lit is the debut album by British jazz band Polar Bear, formed and led by drummer Sebastian Rochford.
Polar Bear is the third album by Sebastian Rochford's British jazz band, Polar Bear.
Peepers is the fourth album by Sebastian Rochford's British jazz band Polar Bear.
Held on the Tips of Fingers is the second album by Sebastian Rochford's British jazz band Polar Bear.
In Each and Every One is the fifth album by Sebastian Rochford's British jazz band Polar Bear.
Same as You is the sixth studio album by British jazz band Polar Bear. It was released on 30 March 2015 by The Leaf Label.
James Mainwaring is an English jazz composer, saxophonist and bandleader.
Matthew Halsall is an English jazz musician, composer, producer and founder of the independent jazz label Gondwana Records, based in Manchester.