Little Boots

Victoria Christina Hesketh (born 4 May 1984), better known by her stage name Little Boots, is an English electropop singer-songwriter and DJ.

She was previously a member of the band Dead Disco.

Sharing an interest and love of The Killers, Ladytron, The Rapture and Siouxsie & the Banshees, they formed the electropunk band Dead Disco in August 2005, The band got their name through randomly picking words from a hat.

With Dead Disco, Hesketh sang lead vocals and played synth, while Catherwood and Franceon played guitar and bass, respectively.

With only a few songs written, Dead Disco began playing gigs around the north of England; their live gig in the headline slot at the "In the City" event in Manchester gained them enough recognition to get a recording stint with James Ford.

Working with Ford in his London attic studio, the band issued a limited release of their debut single "The Treatment" in April 2006 on the record label High Voltage.

Their second release "City Place" was a digital-only release through Playlouder Records.

With the success of several sell out gigs and an appearance at the Leeds Festival, the band moved to Los Angeles to begin recording their debut album with Greg Kurstin.

However, it was around this time that Hesketh herself began to write songs not in keeping with the band's "indie" style.

With her departure from Dead Disco in August 2007, Hesketh decided to begin a new solo career in pop.

She returned to her parents' house to begin writing her own songs and posting covers on social networking sites such as YouTube and Myspace.

Within a year she had narrowed down a list of her songs to create an album and by getting in touch with Greg Kurstin, with whom she had previously worked with Dead Disco, Hesketh started production on her debut album Hands.

Choosing a new musical direction, Hesketh left Dead Disco; they officially revealed their disbandment on their Myspace blog in December 2008.

In an interview with The Times, Hesketh spoke about her gradual shift away from the band: "All the time I'd been hiding my own songs and finally I had to make the sort of music I actually wanted to listen to. [...] Before I used to always think, 'What would a jazz performer do?' or 'What would the band do?'—Now it's so easy because it's 'What would I do?' It's just me."

In a later interview Hesketh noted that the bands' label was pressuring the group to have a certain style and that her bandmates lost confidence in her because she wanted to write "cheesy" songs.

In early 2008 she began using the stage name Little Boots, which came from a nickname given to her by a friend, a reference to her unusually small feet.

She shares her nickname with the ancient Roman emperor Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, who was better known by his nickname Caligula (Latin for "Little Boot").

After appearing on several shows including Later... with Jools Holland and Last Call with Carson Daly, Hesketh entered production on her debut album Hands.

Since performing as a solo artist, she has released four albums: Hands (2009), Nocturnes (2013), Working Girl (2015) and Tomorrow's Yesterdays (2022), and a number of associated EPs and remixes.

Hesketh has toured internationally both as a DJ-only act as well as with a full band.

Hands reached number five on the UK Albums Chart and the singles "New in Town" and "Remedy" became top twenty hits.

Hesketh was born in Blackpool, Lancashire.

Her father has a car sales business and her mother is a writer.

The oldest sibling with three brothers, she was raised in Thornton, Lancashire.

From the age of five, Hesketh played the piano and began lessons at six with Ruth Birchall, eventually winning a music scholarship.

During this time she was taught how to play the flute, was a member of the school choir and travelled regularly to Manchester to take lessons on her harp.

Trained initially in classical singing by Janet Wunderley, by the age of thirteen Hesketh was writing her own songs.

Hesketh attended the private Rossall School in Fleetwood, and then the state Blackpool Sixth Form College; it was around this time that she entered the ITV talent competition search Pop Idol aged sixteen.

Reaching the third round, she was eliminated by the producers of the show and did not reach the panel of judges.

She stated, "It gave me a thicker skin and it made me realise that it wasn't a short cut to getting where I wanted to be."

After singing with the Lancashire Youth Jazz Orchestra and performing with a jazz trio for some time Hesketh decided to prioritise her education and studied cultural studies at the University of Leeds, attaining a first-class honours degree.

She subsidised her course by playing "awful, schmoozy lounge versions of Norah Jones songs" in hotels around the north-west.

"It paid me loads of money, but it's not what I wanted to be doing" she said.

It was during her time at Leeds University that Hesketh, along with two of her fellow students, formed the all-female band Dead Disco, Hesketh herself eventually becoming the lead singer.

While studying at the University of Leeds, Hesketh answered an online advertisement posted by Lucy Catherwood and Marie France looking for a lead singer to start a band.

The album was recorded in Los Angeles with Greg Kurstin and Joe Goddard, and by January 2009 she had begun to compile the album's track listings.

With increasing media attention regarding her then-yet-to-be-released debut album, Hesketh topped the BBC Sound of 2009 poll and received a Critics' Choice nomination at the 2009 BRIT Awards.

Hands was released in June 2009, accompanied by a limited edition 12-inch vinyl release (limited to 1000 copies).

The album peaked at number five on the UK Albums Chart and has produced the top twenty hit "New in Town" and top ten hit "Remedy".

The album also did well in Europe and Japan.