Several members of the band are ardent fans of the English football team Leeds United (as the band originates from Leeds). The band are named after the South African Kaizer Chiefs Football Club, the former team of long-serving former Leeds captain Lucas Radebe.
The band's main musical influences include The Beatles, The Beach Boys, The Kinks, Blur, Eric Burdon, The Jam, and other new wave bands. Andrew White (b. England; guitar), Ricky Wilson (b. Charles Richard Wilson, 17 January 1975, Keighley, West Yorkshire, England; vocals), Nick Baines (keyboards), Nick Hodgson (b. Nicholas Hodgson, 20 October 1977, England; drums) and Simon Rix (b. James Simon Rix, 18 October 1977, England; bass) formed the band in early 2003, having originally played garage rock under the Parva moniker. Their energetic brand of post-millennial guitar rock, which would have been branded "indie" in previous decades, quickly found favour on the local gig circuit. The quintet issued their debut, the XTC-soundalike Oh My God, before they had even signed a proper recording contract, teaming up with the Drowned In Sound website in May 2004 for a limited edition release. A contract with the B-Unique label followed and the band began to attract wider interest at the end of 2004 with the release of their storming I Predict A Riot. The topical lyrics, concerning alcohol-fuelled violence in small English towns, attracted as much attention as the band's anarchic update on late 70s new wave.
The band's explosion onto the global music scene in early 2005 was epitomised when they had their first single I Predict A Riot off their debut album Employment played on the radio around the world and opened Live8 in Philadelphia. Several years prior to 2003 the members of the band had been a garage rock group called Parva (before that they had been known as Runston Parva). However, after their label Mantra Records went bust in late 2002, the band went back to their roots and adopted a more britpop sound, helping the band reach their current popularity within the UK and beyond as a consequence.
The band re-released the single Oh My God on 21 February, which charted at #6. The debut album Employment was released on 7 March 2005 and entered the charts at #3 that week. Despite becoming favourite after being shortlisted, the album failed to win the 2005 Mercury Music Prize. They covered the Marvin Gaye classic, Heard it Through the Grapevine for the War Child album Help! A Day in the Life, giving a whole new slant on the song.
A DVD, entitled Enjoyment, was released in November 2005. The basis of the DVD is a (semi-false) documentary about the band narrated by Bill Nighy. It also includes all the promo videos, live performances and more.
An internet-only (so far) music video for their song Sink that Ship has been released in September 2005. The video appears on Electronic Arts' website as a promotional tool for their game Burnout Revenge but is completely unbranded.
Wilson auctioned off his red tambourine to radio show Xfm in late 2005 to raise money for the homeless charity Shelter. The winning bid was £375.00.
On February 5th, The Kaiser Chiefs Released their next single, Ruby, which was a major success reaching #1 in the singles charts.
The Kaiser Chiefs released their new album, Yours Truly, Angry Mob on February 23, 2007 in The Netherlands and Belgium, February 26, 2007 in the United Kingdom and on March 27, 2007 in North America. A double disc edition is also available, the second disc being a DVD.
It is known that three of the band members went to a school near Highroyd, Leeds. Also, Nick (drummer) announced during a gig in Newcastle Upon Tyne that his dad went to a school called St. Cuthberts in Newcastle. Other famous people from that school include Ant & Dec and Sting.
The band released their third album, Off With Their Heads, on October 20, 2008. It contains the hit single Never Miss a Beat.
Songfacts states that the band's fourth album, The Future Is Medieval was released through the band's website on June 3, 2011. In effect the world's first bespoke album, fans are able to create their own version of the record by choosing their favorite 10 tracks from the selection of 20 on offer. One-minute excerpts allow them to make their selections and each song is represented by an object.
After creating their own album, people can then share their version of the record with other fans, and earn £1 each time it is purchased by someone else.
5th album "Education, Education, Education and War!" was released on 31st March 2014 on Fiction Records, featuring the UK Top 40 single, 'Coming Home', and was their first UK number one album since 2007's 'Yours Truly, Angry Mob'.
Also on the Fiction label, their 6th album, Stay Together, was released on the 7th October 2016, with a notable shift towards dance-pop, hitting #4 on the UK Albums Chart.
In 2019, they moved to Polydor, and released 'Duck' on 26th July, featuring the singles 'Record Collection' and 'People Know How To Love One Another'. It peaked at #3 on the UK Albums Chart.
Performances
Kaiser Chiefs' first big festival show was at the dual-site Reading and Leeds Festival on 27 August 2004 and in the following year, on 16 May 2005, they appeared at the Pinkpop Festival in Landgraaf, The Netherlands. After that, things went fast. They were the opening act at the Philadelphia Live 8 concert on July 2nd 2005, one of only two British acts in the lineup (Def Leppard being the other). They performed I Predict a Riot, Everyday I Love You Less and Less and Oh My God. They played Reading and Leeds in 2006 before Franz Ferdinand and were extremely popular.
June 2005 saw them headline at the May Ball at Queens' College, Cambridge, supported by Anada, before an acclaimed appearance at a rain-soaked Glastonbury festival during the same month, whilst August's appearance at the V Festival featured a very enthusiastic set despite Ricky Wilson having his leg in plaster. Also more recently they embarked on their own headline UK Tour, supported by Maximo Park and The Cribs. Their first US tour (with The Cribs) ran through the summer of 2005, and they followed it by playing a few shows on the Foozer tour. This was followed up by opening for Foo Fighters during their Australian tour in December 2005. They also played to Jools Holland and his audience on December 31, 2005.
Their song Ruby, from the album Yours Truly, Angry Mob was featured as a bonus song in Guitar Hero III, and I Predict a Riot from Employment was eventually released as downloadable content for the game.
Kaiser Chiefs are set to return to the European festival scene this summer, having been booked for Switzerland's Gurten Festival.
Starts With Nothing
Kaiser Chiefs Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
And it ends in nothing
You start with nothing
And you leave with nothing
It'll start with nothing
And will end in nothing
You arrive with nothing
And you leave with nothing
You're on your own on the last train home
Open your eyes you have arrived
You're on your own again
At the end
It starts with nothing
And it ends in nothing
You arrive with nothing
And you leave with nothing
Nobody knows where the money goes
You are alive and a passerby
And leave it all behind
Never mind
It starts with nothing
And it ends in nothing
You start with nothing
And you leave with nothing
It'll start with nothing
And will end in nothing
You arrive with nothing
And you leave with nothing
Yes that is my final answer
Yes that is my final answer
Yes that is my final answer
Yes that is my final answer
Yes that is my final answer
Yes that is my final answer
You're on your own on the last train home
Another tunnel on the circle line
With nothing up your sleeve
As you leave
It starts with nothing
And it ends in nothing
You start with nothing
And you leave with nothing
It'll start with nothing
And will end in nothing
You arrive with nothing
And you leave with nothing
The lyrics to Kaiser Chiefs’ song ‘Starts With Nothing’ speak to the cyclical and ultimately pointless nature of our existence. The repeated refrain “It starts with nothing and it ends in nothing” sets the tone for the entire song, emphasizing the idea that both our lives and the universe itself are ultimately meaningless. The verses go on to describe various aspects of this emptiness, such as the fact that we arrive in the world with nothing and leave it the same way, and that nobody knows where the money goes. The repetition of the phrase “You’re on your own” also highlights the sense of isolation that stems from this pointless existence.
The final verse seems to reflect on death itself, with the mention of the “last train home” and “leave it all behind”. The tunnel on the circle line could be interpreted as a metaphor for the journey through life ending in darkness. The chorus repeated six times, “Yes that is my final answer” echoes the famous catchphrase of the TV game show, ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?’ - this suggests that the answer to the question of existence is as simple and conclusively final as giving a response on a game show.
Line by Line Meaning
It starts with nothing
Life begins with nothing, without any possessions or wealth.
And it ends in nothing
Life ends with nothing, without any possessions or wealth.
You start with nothing
At birth or the start of your journey, you have nothing – no possessions or wealth.
And you leave with nothing
At the end of your journey, you take nothing with you – no possessions or wealth.
It'll start with nothing
Life always begins with nothing, regardless of who you are or where you come from.
And will end in nothing
Life will always end with nothing, regardless of who you are or where you come from.
You arrive with nothing
As you enter this world, you have nothing – no possessions or wealth.
And you leave with nothing
As you leave this world, you take nothing with you – no possessions or wealth.
You're on your own on the last train home
At the end of your journey, you are alone and no one can accompany you to your final destination.
Open your eyes you have arrived
When you reach your final destination, you will have no possessions or wealth to show for your journey.
You're on your own again
In life, you are often on your own, even at the end of your journey.
At the end
The end of your journey is a final destination where there is nothing to gain.
Nobody knows where the money goes
The concept of wealth is fleeting and its purpose is unknown.
You are alive and a passerby
You are only alive for a brief moment and are just a passerby on this earth.
And leave it all behind
At the end of your journey, you leave everything behind – possessions, wealth, etc.
Never mind
The loss of possessions or wealth at the end of your journey doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things.
Yes that is my final answer
A reaffirmation of the inevitability that life begins and ends with nothing.
Another tunnel on the circle line
Life is full of twists and turns, and this line represents another challenge or obstacle that one will have to overcome.
With nothing up your sleeve
At the end of your journey, you will have nothing to show for the twists and turns you faced along the way.
As you leave
As you reach the end of your journey, you will leave everything behind with nothing to show for it.
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
Written by: ANDREW WHITE, CHARLES RICHARD WILSON, JAMES RIX, NICHOLAS BAINES, NICHOLAS HODGSON
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind