Imagine Dragons
Imagine Dragons are an American pop rock band formed in 2008, based in Las Vegas, Nevada, and currently consists of lead singer Dan Reynolds, guitarist Wayne Sermon, bassist Ben McKee and drummer Daniel Platzman.[1] The band first gained exposure with the release of their single "It's Time", followed by their debut album Night Visions (2012), which resulted in the chart-topping singles "Radioactive" and "Demons". Rolling Stone named "Radioactive", which held the record for most weeks charted on the Billboard Hot 100, the "biggest rock hit of the year".[1][2][3][4] MTV called them "the year's biggest breakout band",[5] and Billboard named them their "Breakthrough Band of 2013" and "Biggest Band of 2017",[6] and placed them at the top of their "Year in Rock" rankings for 2013,[7] 2017,[8] and 2018.[9] Imagine Dragons topped the Billboard Year-End "Top Artists – Duo/Group" category in 2018.[10]
This article is about the band. For their self-titled EP, see Imagine Dragons (EP).
Imagine Dragons
Ragged Insomnia
Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S.
2008–present
- Andrew Beck
- Aurora Florence
- Dave Lemke
- Andrew Tolman
- Brittany Tolman
- Theresa Flaminio
The band's second studio album Smoke + Mirrors (2015) reached number one in the US, Canada and the UK.[11][12] This was followed by their third studio album Evolve (2017), which resulted in three chart-topping singles, "Believer", "Thunder", and "Whatever It Takes", also making them the artist with the most weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot Rock Songs chart. The album reached the top five in many countries.[13] The band's fourth studio album Origins (2018) featured the single "Natural", which became their fifth song to top the Hot Rock Songs chart. Although all four albums were commercially successful, critical reception was mixed.[14] The band released their fifth studio album Mercury – Act 1 on September 3, 2021 and its follow-up Mercury – Act 2 on July 1, 2022, both to similarly mixed reviews.
Imagine Dragons have won three American Music Awards, nine Billboard Music Awards, one Grammy Award, one MTV Video Music Award, and one World Music Award. In May 2014, the band was nominated for 14 Billboard Music Awards, including Top Artist of the Year and a Milestone Award, which recognizes innovation and creativity of artists across different genres. In April 2018, the band was nominated 11 more times for Billboard Music Awards.[15]
Imagine Dragons have sold more than 74 million albums and 65 million digital songs worldwide, making them one of the world's best-selling music artists.[16] They have also earned 160 billion streams across music platforms.[16] They were the most streamed group of 2018 on Spotify,[17] the first rock act to have four songs, "Radioactive", "Demons", "Believer", and "Thunder", to surpass one billion streams each,[18] and the only group in RIAA history to have four songs certified higher than Diamond.[19] According to Billboard, "Believer", "Thunder", and "Radioactive" were the three best performing rock songs of the 2010s.[20]
History[edit]
2008–2011: early years[edit]
In 2008, lead singer Dan Reynolds met drummer Andrew Tolman at Brigham Young University, where they were both students.[21] Reynolds and Tolman recruited Andrew Beck, Dave Lemke, and Aurora Florence to play guitar, bass, and piano, respectively, for their band. Their name is an anagram for a phrase only known to members of the group, which Reynolds stated each member approved of.[22] The five-piece recorded demos that they uploaded to MySpace that year, but Beck and Florence left the band later that year. In 2009, Tolman recruited long-time high school friend Wayne Sermon, who had graduated from Berklee College of Music, to play guitar. Tolman later recruited his wife, Brittany Tolman, to sing back-up and play keys, and the band began to play shows together again. Lemke left the band shortly thereafter, leading Sermon to recruit another Berklee music student, Ben McKee, to join the band as their bassist and complete the line-up.[23][24] The band garnered a large following in their hometown of Provo, Utah, before the members moved to Las Vegas, the hometown of Dan Reynolds, where the band recorded and released their first three EPs.[25]
The band released a self-titled EP Imagine Dragons on September 1, 2009, and Hell and Silence on March 10, 2010, both recorded at Battle Born Studios, in Las Vegas.[26][27][28] Six months after releasing their third EP, It's Time, on March 12, 2011, they signed a record deal with Interscope Records on November 18, 2011.[29]
They got their first big break when Train's frontman Pat Monahan fell sick just prior to the Bite of Las Vegas Festival 2009. Imagine Dragons was called to fill in and performed to a crowd of more than 26,000 people.[30] Local accolades including "Best CD of 2011" (Vegas SEVEN),[31] "Best Local Indie Band 2010" (Las Vegas Weekly),[32] "Las Vegas' Newest Must See Live Act" (Las Vegas CityLife),[33] Vegas Music Summit Headliner 2010,[34] and more sent the band on a positive trajectory. In November 2011, they signed with Interscope Records and began working with English Grammy Award-winning producer Alex da Kid.[35] Eventually, the Tolmans left the group. Drummer Daniel Platzman and keyboardist Theresa Flaminio were recruited by McKee in August 2011, prior to the band's label deal in November 2011.[36] Flaminio departed from the group around the time of the band's deal with Interscope, leaving the band a four-piece.
2012–2014: Night Visions[edit]
The band worked closely with Alex da Kid, with whom they recorded their first major-label release at Westlake Recording Studios in West Hollywood, California.
An EP entitled Continued Silence was released on February 14, 2012 digitally and peaked at number 40 on the Billboard 200. The band also released an EP titled Hear Me in 2012.
Shortly after, "It's Time" was released as a single and peaked at number 15 on the Billboard Hot 100.[37] The music video debuted on April 17, 2012, on all MTV affiliates and was subsequently nominated for an MTV Video Music Award in the "Best Rock Video" category.[38] "It's Time" was certified a 7× platinum single by the RIAA.[39]
The band finished recording their debut album Night Visions in the summer of 2012 at Studio X inside Palms Casino Resort and released the album in the United States on September 4, 2012. It peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 chart with first week sales in excess of 83,000 copies, the highest charting for a debut rock album since 2006.[40] The album also reached No. 1 on the Billboard Alternative and Rock Album charts as well as the top ten on the Australian, Austrian, Canadian, Dutch, German, Irish, Norwegian, Portuguese, Scottish, Spanish, and United Kingdom Albums charts. It won a Billboard Music Award for Top Rock Album and was nominated for the Juno Award for International Album of the Year.[41] Night Visions is certified platinum in the US by the RIAA as well as in Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, and the UK. The album produced three tracks that reached the Billboard Top 40, four tracks in the ARIA Top 40, and five tracks charting in the UK Top 40.
Musical style and influences[edit]
Imagine Dragons' musical style has mainly been described as pop rock,[94][95][96] electropop,[97][98][99][100] pop,[101][98] indie pop,[102][103] indie rock,[104] arena rock,[105][106] and alternative rock.[107] Their music also contains influences from synth-pop, dance-pop, trip hop, folk, drum and bass, dubstep, industrial, EDM, R&B, and hip hop.[108][109][110][111][112][113][114][115][116][117][118]
Dan Reynolds cites Arcade Fire, Nirvana, Muse, The Beatles, Paul Simon, Coldplay, Linkin Park,[119] Harry Nilsson, and U2 as some of his and the band's artistic influences. In terms of success, Reynolds credits bands like Foster the People and Mumford & Sons for bringing alternative pop music to a new level of commercial success in recent years.[120]
Public image[edit]
Despite their popularity and large social media followings, reception towards Imagine Dragons from other musicians and music critics has been mixed since their breakthrough to the mainstream. Review aggregator Metacritic reports that the band's first four studio albums—Night Visions, Smoke + Mirrors, Evolve, and Origins—have scores of 53, 60, 47, and 59, respectively, out of 100, indicating generally mixed reviews.[121] The band's music has been criticized for its repetitive lyrics, "overblown" arena rock production, overemphasis on reverberation effects, sticking to formulas, and genre-hopping.[122][123] Following the band's halftime show performance at the 2019 College Football Playoff National Championship, American music publication Spin ran an article titled 'Is Imagine Dragons The Worst Band Ever?', which described the band's songs as having lyrics that are "a composite of motivational platitudes and pseudo-dramatic yelps, barely merit repeating, if only because Reynolds seems so willing to do that himself" and featuring a "punishing, squelching rhythmic force".[124] The band has frequently been compared to Canadian rock band Nickelback by critics, referring to Nickelback's own negative public perception.
Despite this criticism, the band has described themselves as "genre-less". In an interview with Billboard at the 60th Annual Grammy Awards, Reynolds stated, "We've always kind of prided ourselves on being kind of a genre-less band. [...] I have no idea how I'd categorize us. Sometimes it's definitely pop; sometimes the songs are all guitar-driven. It depends on the song."[125]
The band has also been the subject of ridicule by several musicians. In a 2019 interview, Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor echoed the Nickelback comparisons, claiming that Nickelback were "passing the baton of being rock and roll's scapegoat" to Imagine Dragons.[126] Matty Healy of The 1975 described "Radioactive" as 'nothingness', stating, "It might as well be called 'Pikachu Banana'." In a 2018 interview, Mark Foster joked that his band Foster the People give their rejected material to Imagine Dragons. In response, Reynolds took to Twitter, denouncing what he described as "click-bait horse shit filled with vile and hate meant to feed humanity's need to laugh at each other's imperfections and fails."[127] Foster issued an apology to Reynolds on Twitter, expressing regret over the joke and praising him for his humanitarian efforts. Taylor, on the other hand, criticized Reynolds and claimed that his words were taken out of context, tweeting, "As long as people are stupid, letting salacious headlines do their thinking for them, there will always be controversy. Do some research and find the truth...".[128] Healy responded in a radio interview, stating, "You're a millionaire in a huge band. You don't say, 'Oh, I'm gonna do this, and also can I be void of criticism?' It's like … no."[129]
On the other hand, the band has been praised by some for their genre-bending style, and for keeping arena rock popular during the 2010s, a decade which saw guitars and bands dwindling in mainstream music.[130]