Duncan Lloyd

Duncan Lloyd, the creative force behind Maximo Park’s sound as its guitarist, singer, and songwriter, also maintains multiple other musical ventures while maintaining an active practice as a painter and photographer with gallery exhibitions. Growing up in Derby, he picked up the guitar during his teenage years and joined various bands while laying down independent recordings across his time in school. Relocating to Newcastle to pursue painting, he assembled Maximo Park alongside bassist Archis Tiku, keyboardist Lukas Wooller, and drummer Tom English; after Tiku and Lloyd had initially divided vocal responsibilities, the addition of frontman Paul Smith allowed the pair to focus fully on composition. With the band’s profile rising following the Mercury Prize nomination of its debut album A Certain Trigger, Lloyd expanded his musical scope. He continued contributing to Derby’s prolific improvisational collective Res Band while issuing his debut solo effort, Seeing Double, via Warp Records in 2008. In 2010 he launched the experimental endeavor Decade in Exile, which produced the Trail Places EP and a self-titled EP in 2013 before delivering the full-length Transit Pulse in 2014. By 2015 Lloyd had formed Nano Kino with vocalist Sarah Suri, a collaboration rooted in their shared admiration for the Cocteau Twins and Life Without Buildings; the project yielded the singles “Bike Ride” and “Never Seemed to Happen” along with the Surfing on the Void EP. His second solo album, I O U O M E, appeared in May 2017 and included the track “Heart in Delay,” a collaboration with Eternal Summers’ Nicole Yun.