☆ Whatever "it," was, it was clear that the young Evelyn Luton did not have "it." Born the third child of four in a family that was already living beyond its means, the young Evy (as she was known to her two older brothers and younger sister) didn't make enough of an impression to stand out from the crowd. Without any notable skill in sports or academics, and without being the most charming or most attractive of her siblings, Evy didn't have much to help distinguish her from the pack. Quiet and unassuming, she was perfectly average at almost everything, which trained her to be perfectly content with everyone's mediocre expectations for her.
It wasn't until Evy turned eleven years old that her ordinary, uninteresting life was shaken with the news of her parents' separation. Once her parents, who both had been professors at the University of Cambridge, officially divorced, her father, an American, moved to New York, where he took up a teaching position at New York University. Evy stayed in the UK with her mother and siblings, although she often visited her father in the States. Feeling herself torn between two worlds and feeling either unable to or uninterested in expressing her emotions about the splitting apart of her family, Evy internalized her feelings, withdrew from her family, and immersed herself in music. In Etta James, Joni Mitchell, and Grace Slick, Evy found companions in her silent troubles. When her beloved maternal grandfather died several months later, a hearbroken Evy volunteered to sing at his funeral and amazed everyone: to their surprise, their little girl had a big voice. Evy had finally found what made her stand out, and stand out in a big way.
Encouraged by her mother to nurture this budding talent, Evy applied and was accepted to the Brit School. The shy Evy jumped at the chance to follow her love for music and leave her family worries behind, moving to London to live with an aunt and eventually her brother, Freddie, while she attended school. At the Brit School she received vocal training and found her natural skills pushed and honed by her instructors and classmates. There she also began to write her own music. After leaving The Brit School in 2006, she joined a band called Ashok and contributed to their album Plans. After what she called "creative differences" (and what was actually an awkward alcohol-fueled escapade between her and another member of the band), Evy left Ashok, canceling her contract with them. For a few months, Evy played in pubs around London, working at a Tesco to support herself as she tried to make her musical dream a reality. At the same time, Eva met and fell in love with another aspiring musician and began a passionate but volatile relationship with him. Some months later, after a drunken encounter that involved Evy singing Etta James' "Something's Got Hold On Me" in the toilet of a bar, a manager signed Evy and began the journey that would lead her to her to her future band.
After reconnecting with a friend from The Brit School and meeting several other musicians who were similarly bumming around London, Eva formed the band that would become The Theory Of. In the spring of 2008, Evy traveled with the other members of her newly formed band to perform at Coachella for the first time. While at the festival, she discovered that she was unexpectedly pregnant. Overwhelmed with the news that she would be a mother at the tender age of twenty, Evy poured herself into the band, leading the fledgling group to perform wherever possible as they wrote the music for the album that would become Lungs. Two and a half months later into her pregnancy, Evy miscarried. The tension resulting from this loss and from an already difficult dynamic led to the breaking down of her relationship and a renewal of a devastated Evy's motivation to make her mark in music.
After a year of playing and recording, The Theory Of released their debut album, Lungs, in the UK on July 6, 2009, Evy's 21st birthday. The album eventually peaked at number one in the UK and number two in Ireland, selling over 100,000 copies in the UK two months after its release. The success of Lungs led to an immediate change in Evy's life: suddenly the little girl who nobody had noticed was known and recognized, sometimes even on the street. She treated this change with suspicion and some contempt: perpetually dry and slightly cynical, Evy assured herself (somewhat unconvincingly) that she would not allow herself to become changed by the demands and opportunities of her new-found popularity. Overwhelmed by the attention and pressures of her new career, Evy continued to be a slave to her work, pouring herself into each performance. This made touring both an exhilarating and isolating experience: although she was surrounded by people who would come to hear her sing, Evy often found herself lonely, depressed, and experiencing occasional anxiety attacks that she attempted to hide from those around her.
Following almost three and a half years of touring for Lungs and a short-lived but serious (at least on Evy's side) relationship with an older actor, Evy and the band returned to London in 2010, where they began to record what would become their second album, Ceremonials, at Abbey Road Studios. The album was ultimately released on October 31, 2011 and immediately reached number one in the UK charts and number six in the US. This sophomore album was met with even more successful than Lungs: it was nominated for both Brit and Grammy Awards and led Evy and the band on another extensive worldwide tour.
After almost five years of touring, Evy took a break from performing with the band and allowed herself to relax. Considering herself to be in so-called "semi-retirement," Evy continued to perform sporadically both individually and with The Theory Of but slowed down. Given the space and time to process everything that had happened to her in the years since her career began, Evy both enjoyed and felt overwhelmed by the freedom afforded by this break. It wasn't until 2014 that The Theory Of officially announced that they were reuniting and working on the third studio album, How Big How Blue How Beautiful, due to be released in June 2015.
STUDIO ALBUMS ☆
How Big How Blue How Beautiful (2015)
Ship To Wreck, What Kind Of Man, How Big How Blue How Beautiful, Queen Of Peace, Various Storms & Saints, Delilah, Long & Lost, Caught, Third Eye, St. Jude, Mother
Ceremonials (2011)
Only if for a Night; Shake it Out; What the Water Gave Me; Never Let Me Go; Breaking Down; Lover to Lover; No Light, No Light; Seven Devils; Heartlines; Spectrum; All This and Heaven Too; Leave My Body; bonus: Remain Nameless; Strangeness and Charm; Bedroom Hymns
Lungs (2009)
Dog Days are Over; Rabbit Heart (Raise it Up); I'm Not Calling You a Liar; Howl; Kiss with a Fist; Girl with One Eye; Drumming Song; Between Two Lungs; Cosmic Love; My Boy Builds Coffins; Hurricane Drunk; Blinding; You've Got the Love; bonus: Bird Song; Falling; Hardest of Hearts; Ghosts; Swimming
★ eps
Lungs: The B-Sides (2011)
Swimming; Heavy in Your Arms; Ghosts (demo); You've Got Dirtee Love; Dog Days are Over (remix); Falling; Are You Hurting the One You Love?; Addicted to Love; Bird Song; Hospital Beds; Hardest of Hearts
A Lot of Love. A Lot of Blood (2009)
Dog Days are Over; Kiss with a Fist; You've Got the Love; Hospital Beds; Dog Days are Over (remix)
other recordings ☆
soundtracks
"Over the Love" from The Great Gatsby (2013)
"Breath of Life" from Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)
"Heavy in Your Arms" from Twilight: Eclipse (2010)
featured recordings
"I Come Apart" by A$AP Rocky featuring Eva Luton (2013)
"
Midnight" by Cosmo featuring Eva Luton (2013)
"Sweet Nothing" by Calvin Harris featuring Eva Luton (2012)
"Here Lies Love" by David Byrne and Fat Boy Slim featuring Eva Luton (2010)
- Evy, who is fond of puns, picked Eva Luton as her stage name because it "made her laugh." She and her bandmates chose the name of their band by continuing the joke: they are often introduced as "The Theory Of Eva Luton."
- Personality-wise, she is an ENFP (The Campaigner) and an Enneagram type 8 (The Challenger). Although she doesn't believe in astrology, in some ways she is a typical Cancer.
- Although she is known professionally as Eva, family and some friends continue to refer to her as "Evy," her childhood nickname.
- Evy is active on Twitter and Instagram, where she has become known among fans for her "rants" on topics as varied as Woody Allen, music piracy, and hair dye. She occasionally follows celebrity gossip and early in her career, she was known to comment about websites like Oh No They Didn't.
- As someone with an obsessive personality, Evy tends to pour herself wholeheartedly into activities and people, occasionally to an unhealthy degree. Although this affects most aspects of her life, it is most visible in some of her bad habits, especially her sometimes excessive drinking and television watching.
- Evy has been treated for depression and anxiety since touring for Lungs began. She now takes anti-depressants and has seen an improvement in her symptoms, although she refuses to stop drinking despite the way it interacts with her medication.
- Evy has dual citizenship in the United States and England because her father and mother are American and English, respectively. She credits her personality to this "mutt" status, claiming that she is a mixture of the arrogance and self-deprecation that her two cultures are famous for.
- When Evy was nineteen, she accidentally got pregnant by her then-boyfriend. She lost the baby toward the end of her first trimester and her relationship soon after. She never talks about this because she considers it to have been the worst time in her life. Only those who were close to her at the time know that she had been expecting.
- Although both of her parents are professors, Evy never went to university. This is a source of both insecurity and pride for her: while she is glad that she forged her own path, she often feels like the more educated members of her family look down on her.
- She has three tattoos: a birdcage on her finger, "and yes I said yes I will Yes" on her ribcage, and two stars behind her ear. She has three piercings in each ear, although she doesn't wear them all.
STORYLINES ☆
- Ari Siego: former touring buddy; close friend
- Brennan Strawn: close friend for several years; occasional collaborator ('Sweet Nothing')
- Seren Waverley: close friend; someone who will call her out for her shit and vice versa
- Branton Orloff: ex (2007-2008); inspiration for much of Lungs, including 'Kiss with a Fist,' 'Cosmic Love,' 'Drumming Song,' 'I'm Not Calling You a Liar,' and 'Dog Days are Over'
- Daniel Vanderlaar: ex (2010), since reconciled; inspiration for much of Ceremonials, including 'Shake it Out,' 'No Light, No Light,' 'Leave My Body,' 'Bedroom Hymns,' and 'Lover to Lover'
- Zofia Allyne: close friend, former occasional fling
- Alex York: friend from The Brit School
- Luke Park: friend since Glastonbury 2013; hooked up once or twice and ended somewhat awkwardly
- Peter Darling: friend; dated very briefly before deciding they were better as friends
tour dates ☆
coachella
Apr. 12, 19 - Indio, CA
bbc radio one's big weekend
May 23 - Norwich, England
the governors ball
June 5-7 - New York, NY
Merriweather Post Pavilion
June 9 - Columbia, MD
Blue Hills Bank Pavilion
June 10 - Boston, MA
Bonnaroo
June 11-14 - Manchester, TN
Bestival
June 12-13 - Toronto Island, Canada
hurricane festival / southside festival
June 19-21 - scheesel, germany / neuhausen ob eck, germany
Rock Werchter
June 25 - Werchter, Belgium
Roskilde Festival
July 1-4 - Roskilde, Denmark
Théâtres Romains De Fourvière
July 5 - Lyon, France
Festival Internacional de Benicàssim
July 16-19 - Benicàssim, Spain
Super Bock Super Rock 2015
July 16-18 - Lisbon, Portugal
Complexo Parque Das Nacoes
July 18 - Lisbon, Portugal
Splendour in the Grass
July 25 - North Byron Parklands, Australia
Glastonbury
July 24-28 - Worthy Farm, England
Lollapalooza
July 31-Aug. 2 - Chicago, IL
Osheaga Festival
July 31-Aug. 2 - Montreal, Canada
Red Rocks Amphitheatre
Aug. 3 - Morrison, CO
Sziget Festival
Aug. 11 - Budapest, Hungary
Øyafestivalen
Aug. 13 - Oslo, Norway
Way Out West Festival
Aug. 13-15 - Gothenberg, Sweden
Flow Festival
Aug. 14-16 - Helsinki, Finland
Electric Picnic
Sep. 4-6 - Stradbally, County Laois, Ireland
