TTNG (formerly known as This Town Needs Guns) are a British

math rock Math rock is a style of progressive and indie rock with roots in bands such as King Crimson and Rush as well as 20th-century minimal music composers such as Steve Reich. It is characterized by complex, atypical rhythmic structures (includi ...

band from

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

, formed in 2004, and currently signed to the American label Sargent House Records. Following numerous departures, the band went from being a four-piece to a trio, featuring Henry Tremain on bass and lead vocals, Tim Collis on

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected strin ...

and his brother Chris Collis on drums. Their debut full-length album, ''

Animals Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the biological kingdom Animalia. With few exceptions, animals consume organic material, breathe oxygen, are able to move, can reproduce sexually, and go through an ontogenetic stage in ...

'', was released in the UK via

Big Scary Monsters Recording Company Big Scary Monsters Recording Company (often known simply as Big Scary Monsters or BSM Records) is an independent record label based in Oxford, England, UK. Its releases include La Dispute, Beach Slang, Modern Baseball, Minus The Bear, mewit ...

in October of 2008 and shortly after in the US via Sargent House Records. They have released four studio albums, as well as numerous EPs and singles.

History

The band formed in 2004 in

. The original lineup consisted of Stuart Smith on rhythm guitar and vocals, Tim Collis on lead guitar, Simon Thompson on drums and Ian Lewis on bass. Thompson and Lewis left the band in 2005, to be replaced by Dan Adams on bass (replaced by Jamie Cooper after the recording of Animals in 2008) and Matt Bennington on drums (replaced by Chris Collis, brother of guitarist Tim, in 2006). In their earlier careers, bassist Jamie Cooper had worked as a graphic designer, drummer Chris Collis had been a librarian at the University of Oxford, guitarist Tim Collis was a primary school teacher, and lead vocalist Stuart Smith worked building websites for a publisher. On 11 May 2011, it was announced on This Town Needs Guns' website that lead singer Stuart Smith would be leaving the band to start a family, and that he would be replaced by Pennines' singer and guitarist Henry Tremain. Bassist Jamie Cooper also left the band in late 2011 to focus on a career in graphic design. Tremain has since taken over on bass guitar duties, converting the band into a

power trio A power trio is a rock and roll band format having a lineup of electric guitar, bass guitar and drum kit (drums and cymbals), leaving out a second rhythm guitar or keyboard instrument that are often used in other rock music bands that are quart ...

. On 14 September 2012, the first track from the second album '' 13.0.0.0.0'', entitled "Cat Fantastic" was released on digital streaming platforms. The album was released on 22 January 2013. Their third album, ''Disappointment Island'', was released in July 2016. In 2017, the whole band was arrested in Hong Kong during an immigration raid on the final show of their tour. In July 2018, the band announced a 10-year anniversary tour of ''Animals,'' in which Smith would be returning to the band to play with them for the first time in seven years. In October of that year, an acoustic version of the album entitled ''Animals Acoustic '' was released.

Musical style and influences

Over the years, the band's musical style has progressed and changed, although the consistent focal point of their style has been the guitar work of Tim Collis interspersed with, at points, highly complex drumming and sparse, melodic bass. Early releases, however, featured more distorted chord progressions, as well as a strong focus on the interlinking melodies of both Collis and Smith's guitars. ''

The Sydney Morning Herald ''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily compact newspaper published in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, and owned by Nine. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuously published newspaper ...

'' describes the band's music as having "intricate pop guitar work, with a touch of jazz and Spanish influences". The band cites influences of other bands such as Owls,

American Football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

and

Make Believe Make believe, also known as pretend play, is a loosely structured form of play that generally includes role-play, object substitution and nonliteral behavior. What separates play from other daily activities is its fun and creative aspect rather t ...

Name change

With the release of '' 13.0.0.0.0'' the band announced that they would be calling themselves TTNG. They stated that the name was ironic because guns are hardly present in their hometown of

, and the UK in general. Now that the band is more known around the world, the name is no longer clearly ironic.

Discography

Albums

* ''

'' (BSM - October 2008, Sargent House - January 2009) * '' 13.0.0.0.0'' ( Sargent House - January 2013) * ''Disappointment Island'' ( Sargent House - July 2016) * ''Animals Acoustic'' ( Sargent House - October 2018)

EPs

* ''First Demo'' (2003) * ''Split CD with Cats and Cats and Cats'' (

Big Scary Monsters Big Scary Monsters Recording Company (often known simply as Big Scary Monsters or BSM Records) is an independent record label based in Oxford, England, UK. Its releases include La Dispute, Beach Slang, Modern Baseball, Minus The Bear, mewit ...

- 2007) * ''This Town Needs Guns'' (Yellow Ghost - 2008, Rallye - 2008)

Singles

* "Hippy Jam Fest" (

- 2006) * "And I'll Tell You For Why..." (

- 2007) * "Pig" (Single Split with Pennines) (

- 2008) * "Adventure, Stamina & Anger" (Sargent House - 2011)

Personnel

Current members

* Tim Collis -

(2004–present) * Chris Collis - drums,

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Ex ...

(2006–present) * Henry Tremain - vocals (2011-present), baritone guitar (2012–present), guitar (2011-2012)

Former members

* Simon Thompson - drums (2004-2005) * Ian Lewis - bass (2004-2005) * Matt Bennington - drums (2005-2006) * Stuart Smith -

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or withou ...

, guitar (2004-2011, 2018-2019) * Dan Adams - bass,

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

(2005-2008) * Jody Prewett -

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keybo ...

, guitar (2008, contributed with additional guitars and piano on ''This Town Needs Guns'' and ''

'') * Jamie Cooper - bass, backing vocals (2008-2012)

Touring members

* Chris Baker (from the band Tyrone) - bass (2012) * Henry Kohen (from the band Mylets) - bass (2016-2018) * Garrett Karp - trumpet, piano, percussion (2018-2019)

Timeline

ImageSize = width:900 height:auto barincrement:22 PlotArea = left:120 bottom:80 top:15 right:0 Alignbars = justify DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy Period = from:01/01/2004 till:31/12/2021 TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal format:yyyy Legend = orientation:vertical position:bottom columns:3 ScaleMajor = increment:3 start:2004 ScaleMinor = increment:1 start:2004 Colors = id:vocals value:red legend:Lead_vocals id:bvocals value:pink legend:Backing_vocals id:trumpet value:yellow legend:Trumpet id:guitar value:green legend:Guitars id:piano value:purple legend:Keyboards id:bass value:blue legend:Bass id:drums value:orange legend:Drums id:Lines value:black legend:Studio_album id:Lines1 value:gray(0.5) legend:Other_release id:bars value:gray(0.9) BackgroundColors = bars:bars Legend = position:bottom columns:2 BarData = bar:Stuart text:"Stuart Smith" bar:Henry text:"Henry Tremain" bar:Tim text:"Tim Collis" bar:Jody text:"Jody Prewett" bar:Ian text:"Ian Lewis" bar:Dan text:"Dan Adams" bar:Jamie text:"Jamie Cooper" bar:Simon text:"Simon Thompson" bar:Matt text:"Matt Bennington" bar:Chris text:"Chris Collis" PlotData= width:11 textcolor:black align:left anchor:from shift:(10,-4) bar:Tim from:01/01/2004 till:end color:guitar bar:Stuart from:01/01/2004 till:11/05/2011 color:vocals bar:Stuart from:25/07/2018 till:16/08/2019 color:vocals bar:Ian from:01/01/2004 till:01/01/2005 color:bass bar:Simon from:01/01/2004 till:01/01/2005 color:drums bar:Matt from:01/01/2005 till:01/01/2006 color:drums bar:Dan from:01/01/2005 till:01/01/2008 color:bass bar:Chris from:01/01/2006 till:end color:drums bar:Jody from:01/01/2008 till:01/10/2008 color:piano bar:Jamie from:01/01/2008 till:01/12/2011 color:bass bar:Henry from:01/11/2011 till:01/01/2012 color:vocals bar:Henry from:01/01/2012 till:end color:vocals bar:Henry from:25/07/2018 till:16/08/2019 color:bass bar:Henry from:16/08/2019 till:end color:vocals width:3 textcolor:black align:left anchor:from shift:(10,-4) bar:Stuart from:01/01/2004 till:11/05/2011 color:guitar bar:Stuart from:25/07/2018 till:16/08/2019 color:guitar bar:Dan from:01/01/2005 till:01/01/2008 color:trumpet bar:Jody from:01/01/2008 till:01/10/2008 color:guitar bar:Jamie from:01/01/2008 till:01/12/2011 color:bvocals bar:Henry from:01/11/2011 till:01/01/2012 color:guitar bar:Henry from:01/01/2012 till:25/07/2018 color:bass bar:Henry from:25/07/2018 till:16/08/2019 color:bvocals bar:Henry from:16/08/2019 till:end color:bass LineData = at:01/01/2004 color:Lines1 layer:back at:01/01/2006 color:Lines1 layer:back at:01/01/2007 color:Lines1 layer:back at:01/03/2008 color:Lines1 layer:back at:01/10/2008 color:black layer:back at:01/10/2011 color:Lines1 layer:back at:13/01/2013 color:black layer:back at:08/07/2016 color:black layer:back at:05/10/2018 color:Lines1 layer:back

References

External links

* {{Authority control British indie rock groups Math rock groups Musical groups established in 2004 2004 establishments in England Musical groups from Oxford Sargent House artists