Disclosure

Disclosure first gained recognition through a pop-leaning blend of house, garage, dubstep, and bass elements, paired with precisely chosen vocal features, establishing the English brothers Guy and Howard Lawrence as one of dance music’s most commercially potent production units. They surfaced at a moment when electronic dance music acts faced narrowing routes to mainstream acceptance, yet set themselves apart by drawing on a broad knowledge of club traditions that extended back to the disco period. Following their 2010 debut, the pair moved swiftly toward polished, meticulously crafted pop compositions, anchored by the worldwide 2012 success “Latch,” which introduced the then-little-known Sam Smith. That same direction shaped the number-one, Grammy-nominated full-lengths Settle and Caracal, released in 2013 and 2015, respectively, and brought AlunaGeorge, Eliza Doolittle, Mary J. Blige, and the Weeknd into their roster of collaborators. A run of singles marked their 2018 return, after which the equally star-studded third album Energy arrived in 2020. In 2021 they delivered their first official DJ mix for the DJ-Kicks series, then pivoted further toward unadorned club sounds with the self-released 2023 album Alchemy and tracks such as the 2024 single “Arachnids.”

Raised in the Surrey town of Reigate by musical parents, Guy and Howard Lawrence grew up surrounded by records and picked up several instruments during childhood. While attending Reigate College they also steeped themselves in hip-hop, house, dubstep, and bass, the newest strains of the U.K. hardcore continuum. Already familiar with soul, funk, and disco from their home environment, the brothers traced contemporary club sounds to their roots in 1980s Chicago house and Detroit techno, linked those influences to 1990s U.K. garage, and fused the range of references into an increasingly singular modern hybrid. Material they posted to MySpace in 2010 attracted attention from Moshi Moshi, which issued the raw dubstep-leaning cuts “Offline Dexterity” and “Street Light Chronicle” as a single before the year ended. Through the middle of 2012 they continued refining their sound on singles and EPs for Transparent, Make Mine, and Greco-Roman; the last of these labels put out The Face EP, Disclosure’s first release to foreground live vocalists rather than treated samples.

A U.K. agreement with PMR, distributed through Universal, propelled them into the mainstream via “Latch,” an atmospheric, rolling ballad co-written with Jimmy Napes and fronted by Sam Smith. More pop-focused than their earlier work, the October 2012 track carried both the Lawrences and the previously unknown singer into widespread visibility, reaching number 11 on the U.K. chart during a 55-week run. By the May 2013 release of the parent album Settle they had scored further hits with the AlunaGeorge team-up “White Noise,” which climbed to number two, and the Eliza Doolittle showcase “You & Me,” which peaked at number six. In the United States, secured by a separate Universal arrangement through Cherrytree and Interscope, “Latch” entered the Hot 100 in April 2014, climbed to number seven across nineteen weeks, and was later certified multi-platinum. Settle topped both the U.K. album chart and the U.S. electronic chart, earned a Mercury Prize nomination at home, and received a 2014 Grammy nomination for Best Dance/Electronic Album.

Their American profile kept climbing. The brothers contributed two tracks to Mary J. Blige’s The London Sessions, issued late in 2014, and weeks afterward earned a second Grammy nod—this time for Best Dance Recording—for the Blige-led deluxe version of “F for You.” The accumulating success and accompanying world tour expanded the guest list for their sophomore album. Released in September 2015 on PMR in the U.K. and Capitol in the U.S., Caracal placed lead vocals from Gregory Porter, Sam Smith, Lorde, and the Weeknd on its singles while underscoring the duo’s R&B leanings through cuts featuring Kwabs, Miguel, and Nao. Like its predecessor, the set topped the U.K. pop and U.S. electronic charts, debuted inside the Billboard 200 Top Ten, and was again nominated for Best Dance/Electronica Album.

After the three-track EP Moog for Love, highlighted by the Al Green collaboration “Feel Like I Do,” the Lawrences stepped away briefly. They resurfaced in 2018 with a string of singles that began with “Ultimatum,” a bright partnership with Fatoumata Diawara that brought a fourth Grammy nomination. The next year they reached the Top Ten in both the U.K. and U.S. as producers of Khalid’s “Talk,” earning yet another nomination—this time for Record of the Year. Khalid then appeared on Disclosure’s first 2020 single, “Know Your Worth.” Additional features with Aminé and Slowthai on “My High” and with Diawara on “Douha (Mali Mal)” built anticipation for the August arrival of the third album Energy, which registered across multiple Billboard charts.

Once their major-label obligations concluded, the duo issued the five-track EP Never Enough on their own in 2021. They also curated the seventy-fifth installment of !K7’s DJ-Kicks series, concentrating on deep, luminous house and closing with an atmospheric jungle selection. They launched the Apollo Records imprint and released 2022 singles with Zedd (“You’ve Got to Let Go If You Want to Be Free”) and RAYE (“Waterfall”). Alchemy, a vocal- and sample-free album, followed in 2023, moving the emphasis toward funky house and garage while including one drum’n’bass cut, “Higher Than Ever Before,” co-produced with Cirkut; that track earned a 2024 Grammy nomination for Best Dance/Electronic Recording. After Alchemy (The Remixes), the brothers’ first new 2024 material was the upbeat disco-house single “She’s Gone, Dance On,” which entered the U.K. chart, succeeded by the Chris Lake collaboration “in2minds” and the more shadowy, atmospheric “Arachnids.”