Youthmovies - Split

Split

It was announced via their Myspace blog on Tuesday, December 29, 2009 that they had split. In co-ordinance three hours and fifty minutes later Foals posted a blog regarding this matter. Reasons for doing so may concern upon the fact Andrew Mears, rhythm guitarist and lead vocalist of Youthmovies, was once a member of Foals previous to when Edwin Congreave, the current keyboardist, had joined. The author of the post was Yannis Philippakis, the lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of Foals. He stated the following:

• Sadly, it has been announced that Youthmovies will be no more. Save for a few farewell shows in the coming New Year they will be calling it a day. Suffice to say none of us would be in the position we're in without their inimitable contribution to music, our lives and psyches. For me personally they have been never ending wells of support, inspiration and beatdowns. I would not be the monomaniacal entity i am without their silent spurring. For all of you unfamiliar with their output find every record they've ever made and listen to it religiously. It will bring you truth and harmony. Without Andrew in particular Foals would definitely NOT exist. Check their page for announcements of future projects and happenings.

The original post of that of Andrew Mears stated that of the following

I guess the nut's been cracked... we were going to wait to announce our demise until we had our final shows in place - if nothing else to make us feel better about the end of what's been an awesome, turbulent, terrible and wonderful period in our lives; it's a sad time for us and we wanted to be measured about it; but as is the case nowadays - the internet had its way. There's a part of me that would love this to be an amputated, acerbic mess of a break-up, for the romance of it, but we're still friends, still love to play and there's no attitude about any of this; we're all at good points in our lives, just very different ones. Life has spread us out over the country now and it's become a logistical nightmare to get our shit together. I think there was a good chance that had we made the next record, our distance would have had a bad affect on the music. We've always been close and it's the only way we know how to work with one and other. So, not wanting to tar what we've done in the past, we're calling it a day and looking to the future...Sam has a forthcoming record with Jonquil, and has begun to work on his solo 'solid gold dragons' project, which I can only assume will be a mixture of hilarious and obnoxiously accomplished. Al is starting a new band in London and helping to pull the strings behind great event after great event.Graeme has plans for some kind of drum group to do drumdrugs to and is moving in to production at the studio we've built with Jonquil and Foals. Ham, no doubt, will continue to make noise and electronic records under 'hamm' and 'hold my hand I'm dying'. I am in the process of recording a solo record under the name of 'pet moon'. I'm also working on collaborations with Mitch Cheney (sweep the leg johnny, hey tonal, rumah sakit), Oxford band 'Coloureds', as well as some of the old stalwarts. I can tentatively say I just finished my book - which I'm reading from on the 9th of January as a part of Sebastian Thomas' 'human drift' sculpture exhibition at Art Jericho, 6 King Street, Oxford. It runs from the 2nd. Collectively Sam, Al, Graeme and I (as well as members of Jonquil, Foals and the Oxford art community) will be putting on exhibitions, club-nights, printing literature, and releasing records as part of the 'Blessing Force' cult. Standby. You can also expect more from our 'vertical montanas' collective.Anyway I don't want to ramble on, just to say - thank you massively to everyone that's ever helped us out, we've only ever got by on the kindness of strangers and the strangeness of their kindness'. Thank you to everyone, who looked beyond our flaws and pomp and saw something sincere and necessary; thank you to our friends in bands - don't take any shit from anyone; thank you to our girls - you deserved better; thank you to the haters, the hungry and the money-grubbing industry types - aiming to be the antithesis of you has made us everything that we are. Thank you Al, Graeme, Sam and Ham - you are beyond friends, do yourselves proud, I love you.We are going to do our best to make these last few shows special, I hope you can make it.I guess it fits to say -Hurrah! Another year, surely this one will be better than the last, the inexorable march of progress will lead us all to happiness.Andrew xxx

In March 2010 the band toured one last time in England and Scotland along with regular collaborator Adam Gnade.