walking upstream…
Foster the People
photo: jason persse · cc by-sa 2.0 ↗Foster the People
sourcesGRAMMY.com — "Foster The People Pump Up The Creativity" (Beach Boys · Songfacts — Foster the People (Aphex Twin, Motown, Brian Wilson cited as main sources of inspiration) · Clash Magazine — "Super Vision · Torontette — 2011 interview (Beach Boys concert as a kid; Blur/New Order/Clash/Bowie/Aphex Twin influences list) · Wikipedia — Mark Foster (musician) (Beach Boys as major influence; 2012 Grammy performance together)
Formed in Los Angeles in 2009 when singer-producer Mark Foster teamed with bassist Cubbie Fink and drummer Mark Pontius, Foster the People turned a track Foster wrote while stuck writing music for commercials — "Pumped Up Kicks" — into one of the era's most inescapable singles, its breezy falsetto hook wrapped around a much darker narrator. Torches (2011) made them festival-stage regulars on the strength of that song's viral spread, while Supermodel (2014) and the records after it pushed toward grittier, more live-played arrangements without abandoning the harmony-stacked pop chassis underneath.
the sound in question
2010
Pumped Up KicksFoster the People
walk the tributaries ↓
The Beach Boys1960s · Rock / Pop / Psychedelic pop
Foster has said the Beach Boys were "the first band that I fell in love with," tracing it to seeing them live as a kid, and that "a lot of those harmonies and styles will just inadvertently come out when I'm writing songs sometimes" — he's pointed specifically to the pre-chorus of "Coming of Age" as a spot where that surfaces.
listen: upstream & here
1966
God Only KnowsThe Beach Boys
2014
Coming of AgeFoster the People
listen forThe stacked, close-harmony backing vocals piling up under the main hook on "Coming of Age" — Brian Wilson's trick of turning a simple melodic line into a small choir, reframed here over a poppier, more percussive backbone.
The Clash1970s · Punk rock / Post-punk / Reggae
Ahead of Supermodel, Foster said he'd been listening to a lot of the Clash and named their sprawling triple album Sandinista! directly, saying its "percussion vibes ... really influenced" the record — part of a stated push toward grittier, more live-played, percussion-forward arrangements after Torches's synth-pop sheen.
listen: upstream & heresource: NME — "Foster the People ↗
1980
The Magnificent SevenThe Clash
2014
Are You What You Want to Be?Foster the People
listen forThe dense layer of hand percussion and chanted group vocals opening "Are You What You Want to Be?" — a shift from programmed grooves toward the loose, exploratory, live rhythm-section feel Sandinista! is built on.
Aphex Twin1990s-2000s · IDM / Ambient / Acid techno / Electronic / Experimental
Foster has described the band's own sound as if "Brian Wilson and Aphex Twin got together and had a man baby who grew up listening to Motown and heard a drum machine along the way" — naming Richard D. James's glitchy, electronically mangled production as a direct source for the skittering synths and drum-machine textures on Torches.
listen: upstream & heresource: Relix — "Spotlight ↗
1999
WindowlickerAphex Twin
2011
HoudiniFoster the People
listen forThe clipped, slightly warped synth stabs and mechanical-but-funky drum-machine pulse driving "Houdini" under the falsetto hook — IDM-adjacent electronic fidgeting smuggled into a radio-friendly pop chorus.