Flood Of Red formed in Airdrie, a satellite town twelve miles east of Glasgow in 2004. Starting out as a trio who met via school and the local skate scene, they soon expanded to a sextet. Sitting in the heart of post-industrial Lanarkshire, Airdrie provided an early inspiration of sorts: inspiration to strive for more. Inspiration to get out. ...show more

Flood Of Red formed in Airdrie, a satellite town twelve miles east of Glasgow in 2004. Starting out as a trio who met via school and the local skate scene, they soon expanded to a sextet. Sitting in the heart of post-industrial Lanarkshire, Airdrie provided an early inspiration of sorts: inspiration to strive for more. Inspiration to get out.

"It's known as a bit of hooligan town," says drummer Graham Griffith. "It was also voted the crappest town in Britain two years running and was the only place to actually address that accolade with a plaque in the town centre, in which effectively it said: 'Airdrie may be crap, but it's our crap'. Which is sort of how we feel about it too. It made us what we are today." Though members were born in countries as far-flung as South Africa, Canada and the US but all based in nearby town such as Caldercruix and Dumbarton, these Glasgow conurbations were enough to inspire the name of Flood Of Red's new record label Dark City and to send the band straight out on tour just months after their formation, all aged just seventeen, playing for £20 and cheese sandwiches per night ("If we were lucky..." laughs Graham).

Home for the next few months was an ex-police riot van. The early shows and recordings slotted somewhere into the post-hardcore and screamo genres - think pile upon pile of jagged guitars, a melodic and abrasive vocal interplay, a squall of electronics and Satan's own in-house rhythm section. Things got moving in 2006, when Flood Of Red played a show with another new young band taking the DIY /self-empowerment route, Enter Shikari. A year later and the two bands had shared over forty stages and put in many road miles together - Enter Shikari still fondly tell interviewers about certain Flood Of Red's members' propensity to hang out of the back of vans, naked at 70mph along the highways and by-ways of Britain (OK, it was US guitarist Calum). ...show less