Alternative
United States
Foster the People
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About Foster the People
Hometown
Los Angeles, CA, United States
Formed
October 2009
Genre
Alternative
Before he founded Foster the People in 2009, Mark Foster paid the bills by writing commercial jingles for a Los Angeles production house. Beyond giving him an invaluable education in the science of songwriting, the gig also gave him a crash course in the sleight-of-hand psychology of advertising—like how to package a song about a troubled teen shooting up his school into one of the most indelible indie-pop anthems of the 2010s. That song, “Pumped Up Kicks,” was perfectly timed for a moment when bands like MGMT and Phoenix were giving the Hot 100 a quirky hipster makeover, and its viral success online would lead to a Top 5 slot on the Billboard charts and a major-label deal. (Though perhaps the truest measure of the song’s cross-generational appeal—and Foster’s effortless way with melody—is that it yielded both a Weezer cover and an invitation for the band to perform at the Grammys alongside The Beach Boys and Maroon 5.) The subsequent debut album, Torches, proved Foster to be a multi-hit wonder, able to finesse elements of EDM (“Helena Beat”) and loopy alt-rock (“Don’t Stop [Color on the Walls]”) into instant earworms. Foster spent the next decade fusing classic pop songcraft and unsavory subjects into club-friendly cuts like 2017’s “Sit Next to Me,” a tale of pained romantic longing and shaky sobriety rendered as seductive disco-soul. As he explained to Apple Music, “Something I’ve always loved to do is make music as an escape, as a friend, as a comforter,” affirming Foster the People’s commitment to spinning dark thoughts into feel-good jams.
Musical InfluencesFoster the People's musical influences include The Postal Service, Vampire Weekend, Delorean and more.
Influenced by Foster the PeopleFoster the People has influenced the music of Max Jenmana, Benjamin Amaru, LOVKN and more.
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