Starlie (lead vocals) / Daisy Clementine (guitar) / Pyper America (bass) / Lucky Blue (drums)
“There’s a level of loyalty and commitment that comes with being in a band with your siblings, because they can do anything and you’ll never give up on them. You’ll never say, ‘This is too much’ or ‘You went too far,’ because you care about them so much,” says The Atomics’ Daisy Clementine Smith. “If we weren’t siblings, and we had the same personalities, who knows what would have happened to the band by now. But because we love each other so deeply, we’re just in it forever.”
Spend five minutes in the company of the Smith siblings — musicians and models Starlie, 23, Daisy Clementine, 21, Pyper America, 19, and Lucky Blue, 18 — and their camaraderie is palpable. “It was always a given that if I was ever going to be in a band, it was going to be with my sisters,” Lucky says. “They are my best friends.” Each of the kids were taught to play music by ear. The first song they learned was the instrumental surf-rock song “Pipeline,” made famous by The Ventures. “Roots music and blues progressions were something we all came to understand from the beginning,” recalls Lucky. The Atomics performed their first show on the steps of the city library, during a classic car show in Spanish Fork, Utah.
Managed by Simon Fuller’s XIX Entertainment, The Atomics have been collaborating with songwriters/producers Tim James and Antonina Armato of Rock Mafia to create a harmony-laden, surf-guitar-inspired alternative-pop sound on songs like “Voulez Vous” that draws on such influences as Dick Dale, The Black Keys, The Beach Boys, and Tom Petty. “We like the idea of having a retro sound, but we also want it to be cool and modern,” says Pyper. “Rock Mafia have helped us with that. We knew we liked having a toughness to our music, but wanted it to be something you could dance and groove to.”
