iC1s Reunite After a Decade to Release Long-Awaited Debut Album + Announce Celebratory London Dingwalls Date on November 8
FFO: Sam Fender, Inhaler, Oasis, Sex Pistols
“If you go and see a new band, go and see IC1s, they’re brilliant and post-everything” -Alan McGee (Creation Records)
“Highly exciting to watch and thought provoking to listen to. A must see for anyone who wants a real rock and roll band with attitude and ability” - Gary Powell (The Libertines)
“A proper, no messing about, rock and roll band” - Mark Beaumont (NME)
“They're a little bit Libertines, a little bit Ramones - but they're certainly 100% London” - Pete Donaldson (XFM/6music)
London’s hotly-tipped iC1s have finally announced the release of their long-awaited debut album ‘What Took You So Long?’ And what indeed – the title echoes the question hanging in the air for anyone who followed the band’s early promise over a decade ago.
The answer is a story about timing, turbulence, and, ultimately, arrival. Formed in 2010, iC1s - Daniel Coburn [vocals], Jesse James [guitar], John Campbell [guitar], Jake Osman [bass] and Andy Faulkner [drums] - quickly established themselves as one of the most exciting and riot-starting live acts of the era, winning early praise from tastemakers including Alan McGee (Creation Records) and Mark Beaumont (NME). With their anthemic, energised and unmistakably British sound, the band hit the road hard - supporting the likes of The View, Buzzcocks, The Rifles, Reverend & The Makers, and later, DMAs.
In 2011, the band signed to 25 Hour Convenience Store, the label run by Gary Powell of The Libertines. Their debut single on the imprint, “Levitate”, was recorded for just £50 in a South London basement and still managed to crack the UK Top 200. “Not Perfect” received airplay and support from Steve Lamacq on BBC Radio 6 Music and XFM, and the band were regularly championed as “next up”—culminating in a headline slot at HMV’s Next Big Thing Festival at London’s iconic Borderline.
Over the next few years, iC1s played Tramlines, Sound City, and The Great Escape festivals, toured widely, and sold out Scala in Kings Cross.
In 2014, they entered the studio with acclaimed producer Barny Barnicott (Arctic Monkeys, Kasabian) to record their debut album. But just as the music was coming together, the band was falling apart. A long legal battle with their former manager meant the album was shelved indefinitely—and the band split up…...
A decade passed.
Then, in November 2024, the band reunited for a one-off sold-out reunion show at Camden Assembly. What started as a nostalgic return turned into a revival. Two singles were recorded to mark the occasion, and by January 2025, the original lineup was back in the studio and the result is ‘What Took You So Long?’, the band’s first full-length album, released on Friday 3rd October 2025, available on both digital and vinyl formats.
“Some of these songs have been ringing around unheard in our heads for a decade, says Faulkner. “So this album's very much unfinished business - for us and all those that lived it together with us the first go round.”
What’s striking about ‘What Took You So Long?’ is that the wait has only made it more relevant. In the age of Sam Fender, Inhaler and the Oasis reunion, these stratospheric glory rock anthems, gang-chant rock’n’rollers and ferocious punk charges full of working-class struggle and defiance, doomed romance and sky-cracking ambition are the stuff of chart-toppers and festival slayers. “Growing Up Going Down” is the sound of a disowned, minimum-wage London vagabond pumping his woes to the size of an arena. “In the End” the rabble on the rampage: “not turning the tables, we’re tipping them over”. And “Not Perfect” the old air-punching fan favourite comes brilliantly of age.
“Every song is its own story,” says Coburn. “It’s a combination of all things. The hardships of growing up, the brilliance of being young, of falling in love and falling out of love, getting high, feeling low, fighting, fucking and failure. I should think there’s something in there that resonates with everyone.”
“This is our contribution to history,” says James. “In 100 years’ time, some kid might find ‘Growing Up Going Down’ and realise that we felt exactly the same way he does.” “If ‘rock 'n' roll’ and ‘anthems’ are your thing,” adds Campbell, “then this band is probably for you.”
In support of the release, iC1s will drop a trio of singles leading into the album. August 1 saw the release of power rock classic “Wack Jack” (20,000+ organic streams in one month) - “If we didn’t split up when we did, I honestly think it could’ve been our ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ or our ‘Wonderwall’,” says Coburn. Then on September 5 comes “Soul on Trial”, the stirring album closer which brought the band back together after ten years apart. “I wrote the music walking down Regent’s Canal one morning, rushed home and demoed the whole thing,” James explains. “I sent it to Dan that night and by morning, he’d written all of the lyrics. From there, we reached out to other guys after a decade of almost no contact at all.”
Finally, on September 26, came a re-release of the soaring anthem “Levitate”, one of iC1’s most colourful character songs. “There was this guy around our way, who would post videos of himself on social media claiming he could levitate and stuff,” says Coburn. “He couldn’t.”
The band also play their biggest headline show to date at Dingwalls, London, on Saturday 8th November 2025.
More than a comeback, ‘What Took You So Long?’ is a culmination that captures everything that originally made iC1s so vital, now layered with the experience of what it took to get here. A blast from the past, headed straight to the future. iC1s Debut Album: ‘What Took You So Long?’
Label: Be Lucky
Distribution: Righttrack / Universal Music Operations
Release Date: Friday 3rd October 2025
Formats: Digital / Vinyl / CD
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