Close Up (band)

Close Up is a Dutch Indie-Pop/Rock band, founded in 2009 in Utrecht. The band consists of two brothers and two neighbours who met each other at elementary school and have been making music together ever since.

Formation
The band is founded as the Fast Flyers at the Kohnstammschool in Utrecht by Daan Meurs, Jasper Meurs and Tom Schild. Tom started off playing the saxophone before switching to bass guitar. From the foundation of the band onwards Jasper has been playing the drums and Daan the electric guitar. The band gets well known locally for playing at the same spot every Queens' Day and Night. In 2009 the band asks Sam Bakker to join. Sam was a classmate of most members at the Kohnstammschool. With Sam joining the band changes their name to Close Up.

In 2011 the band releases the EP WE ARE CLOSE UP en shortly after the single Summer Day. Thanks to this single the band gets to play a few festivals including Appelpop, Het Wereldfeest en Festival aan de Werf. The band also won numerous competitions, like Kunstbende Utrecht, De kleine prijs van Baarn and they won best band at the High School Music Competition.

I am October
In 2012 the band played their first show outside of the Netherlands, which took place in Germany and shortly after they left for a tour in Norway. In 2013 the EP I am October was released and the band got a lot of attention. The populair band Coldplay posted the music video accompanying single Cold War Affair on their website, they gained attention from 3VOOR12 and Dutch radio station 3FM and a year later the band got to join the Popronde. With 25 shows Close Up was one of the most booked bands of the Popronde 2014.

Meanwhile the band is working on a new EP which is set to be released in 2015. The band collected the €4.000 needed to record the EP by means of a crowdfunding project. and in the summer of 2014 the band recorded the new EP in the Basement Studio with Bas van Wageningen.

The music Close Up makes is comparable to bands like Foals and Phoenix.

Members

 * Sam Bakker - Lead vocals, guitar, keyboard (2009–present)
 * Daan Meurs - Lead guitar (2009–present)
 * Jasper Meurs - Drums, backing vocals (2009–present)
 * Tom Schild - Bas, vocals (2009–present)

EPs

 * WE ARE CLOSE UP (2011)
 * I am October (2013)

Singles

 * Summer Day (including B-side Cigarette Smoke) (2011)
 * Cold War Affair (2013)
 * Vixen (2015) (exclusive release on Spotify happened in 2014)