in 2005 in small bars throughout ontario, singer/bassist dave monks, guitarist josh hook, drummer greg alsop and keyboardist graham wright began informally playing together.  the next thing they knew, the high energy foursome now known as tokyo police club signed with paper bag records soon after being noticed at the pop montréal festival.

lead singer david monks describes the band's music as "wide-eyed post-punk with a tendency to get over excited: so much so that someone has to come and tell it to settle down".  their debut l.p., elephant shell, dropped april 22, 2008 nearly a year and a half after their debut e.p a lesson in crime. 

there's some good video on-line.  click here for a song recorded as part of austin, texas' epic festival south by southwest (sxsw).  click here for a song recorded at miami's studio a.  click here to watch a few songs from a gig at boston's venue the harp on october 4, 2006.  click here for  a few videos.  finally, click here or here for two interviews by this is fake diy and genart.org respectively.  also, don't forget the album cover image always links to sample songs and the band's image to their website.

tokyo police club have a few shows coming up, click here to find out if they are playing near you.

as always, please buy this album from your local independent music store and not from retailers like wal-mart (soulless, globally-homogenizing, community-killers) or i-tunes (albums should be listened to as an entire composition with album cover and liner notes in hand).  incidentally, these two companies sell more music than any other retailer in the united states.  that my friend, bites.