Early years In 1977, a
punk band was formed in
Rhyl, Wales, billed as the Toilets. opening with "Shout to the Devil", which later appeared on the album
Declaration. They moved from North Wales to London in September 1981, and the band recorded a one-off 7" single. 1,000 copies were pressed that month, featuring "Unsafe Building" on the "electric" side and "Up For Murder" on the "acoustic" side.
Mid-career The band had been recording an album from July 1983, and by the time of the
Top of the Pops appearance, they had recorded the backing tracks to most of the songs. After completing a U.S. tour and a headline tour of the UK in late 1983, the band returned to the studio to record the backing tracks for the rest of the songs. On 6 November 1983, the band recorded an acoustic radio session for the BBC. This session saw the debut of three brand new songs: "Walk Forever by My Side", "One Step Closer to Home" and "Unbreak the Promise". On 7 November, the band returned to the recording studio to finish recording the album, now titled
Declaration. In December, the Alarm returned to the U.S. for a third headline tour. The weather was atrocious, and on 6 December, the car in which the band was travelling crashed, but none of the four members was injured. They returned to the UK on 17 December and appeared as part of an Anti-Nuclear Benefit Concert at the
Apollo Theatre in London. While the band had been in the U.S., Alan Shacklock and sound engineer Chris Porter finished mixing the album. The band played a handful of gigs supporting
The Police over Christmas, and by 5 January 1984, the album had been mixed and finalised.
Declaration was released by I.R.S. Records on 14 February 1984. This came as much of a shock to his colleagues as to the audience. Following this show Peters signed his legal right to one quarter of the Alarm name and logo over to the other three. Peters and Sharp both embarked on solo careers. a "best of" collection of songs from their 2000's output. The collection included a remix of the single "45 RPM" as well as remixes and alternate takes of 20 other songs. This was followed by the studio album
Direct Action in April 2010 and then by
The Sound And Fury in 2011, an album of 12 re-imagined tracks from the catalog of the Alarm and of Mike Peters. 2013 saw the release of
Vinyl, which featured tracks written for the soundtrack album and performed by Mike Peters and The Alarm with guest vocals from the film's actors
Phil Daniels and
Keith Allen. The film, written and directed by Sara Sugarman, is loosely based on the true events surrounding The Poppy Fields and release of the single "45 RPM". It also features a cameo appearance of Mike Peters.
Vinyl is a British comedy film that has aging rock star Johnny Jones (Phil Daniels) fool the media into believing his music is that of a fresh, young rock group from North Wales. The Alarm took the step of touring the soundtrack album with a showing of the film at selected venues in the UK during March and April 2013. In 2014, Peters started the process of "reimagining" the Alarm's full, original albums for the 21st century. He began with
Declaration [30th Anniversary] in 2014, followed quickly by
Peace Train , a collection of b-sides reimagined
. Some of the songs have updated lyrics to match the passage of time, and others contain edited verses, or lyrics from demo versions of the songs before they were recorded for the albums and singles. Peters continued this process for
Strength : [30th Anniversary] and its companion album
Majority in 2015. The band released the album
Equals on In Grooves Records in July 2018. This was followed by the companion album
Sigma, released a year later. Peters' wife Jules currently plays keyboards in the band, and James Stevenson plays guitar, bass guitar, bass pedals and a bass/six string double-neck guitar made for him by
Gordon-Smith Guitars. In 2021, the band wrote and recorded the album
War in 50 days, reflecting on the pandemic and lockdown situation. "The Red Wall of Cymru", as recorded by the Alarm, is Wales' official anthem for the
Euro 2020. It features fans recorded in football grounds all across Wales. Peters died on 29 April 2025 after a battle with cancer. From 2025 onwards, Evan, Mike’s son, is fronting shows as The Alarm Presented by Evan Peters and Eddie Macdonald has founded The Alarm 2.0 joined by Smiley, James Stevenson, Matt Peach and Craig Adams. ==Influence==