Mark Foster is in Southern California driving to his next interview. It’s early May and his band Foster the People has not yet released their debut album Torches. I first heard the record’s single “Pumped Up Kicks” in February 2010 when a friend- former band touring member Zach “Reazon” Heiligman- emailed it to me with note saying it was something he worked up with his old summer camp pal from Minnesota.

Foster the People had played their first gig only a month earlier; they formed three months prior to that. Frontman Foster says he had been friends with drummer Mark Pontius and bassist Cubbie Fink for about two or three years a piece. “I had been jamming with [Pontius] and doing avant-garde electronic music,” says Foster, who was also writing hip-hop tracks with Heiligman around that time.

“We spent a lot of time experimenting with different sounds, some of which transcended into the Foster the People project,” Heiligman adds.

Before this, Foster worked as a composer for TV commercials in LA, which he says helped “sharpen my skills as a producer and taught me how to work quickly,” and perhaps informed the catchy lyrics, infectious synths and hook-laden melodies that would later find their way onto Torches.

With the exception of an article early on in BlackBook magazine (Feb. 2010) declaring this same tune to be 2010’s “song of next summer,” the band flew under the radar, virtually unnoticed, for most of last year.

“We were busy working out the details of the live show and balancing all of the attention we were attracting,” says Heiligman, who’s since moved into more of a behind-the-scenes and production role rather than touring in the live setting. “Now, I feel as though the band has grown and evolved into a group of guys that have perfected a way to translate great recordings into phenomenal performances.”

According to Foster, the trio went into the studio this past September and worked on their new record in small bursts for several weeks off and on during a four-to-five month span. Also, this past January, they put out a self-titled 3-song EP.

“I write almost all the songs in the studio and so early demos can sound pretty stagnant,” Foster says in reference to the band’s higher-energy shows. "The guys bring life to the music and grooves that I wouldn’t have thought of myself. We’re all multi-instrumentalists, so I’m moving from piano to guitar to drums, and triggering samples. It’s kind of a dance party.

“There are so many good bands out there that try to put on a front and make their music super esoteric – and it’s not communal,” Foster continues. “A lot of bands are creating a culture that only lets people in that they approve of. But we went into it with a different attitude: ‘Let’s make good music that we enjoy.’ We’re not trying to be a super exclusive indie band.”

He originally named his group “Foster and the People” but when someone mistook this for “Foster the People” after a show they performed for charity, the name stuck – Foster thought the new moniker helped drive home his greater mission of playing music while also helping others.

“I like to observe the people around me,” the Cleveland native says. “I tend to be drawn to outsiders – the hustlers – people that are struggling. There’s something compelling and human about adversarial relationships. I like to find the humanity in someone that is polar opposite of myself and then make them completely relatable.”

While The Beach Boys, New Order and The Clash were huge influences, Foster laughingly says that the band is best described as if “Brian Wilson and Aphex Twin got together and had a man baby who he grew up listening to Motown and heard a drum machine along the way.”

In concert, Foster delivers his high-energy show just as he said he would – displaying his love for the synthesizer and his multi-instrumentalist skills as he deftly moves from keys to percussion to lead vocals, sometimes with the help of autotune and other various effects, and adding some hand motions and dance steps as well.

“Mark recently reached out to me to start writing for the next Foster the People record,” Heiligman says. “The guys have been busy touring but luckily technology allows for Mark and I to work on tracks even when he’s halfway around the world. Mark is great with melody and it’s always exciting to me; I enjoy his musical sensibilities.”

Foster mentions his proclivity for hip-hop music, noting that you can hear undertones of it on Torches, especially on “Life on the Nickel.” “I’d love it if Lupe [Fiasco] or [Kid] Cudi got on that track,” he says, optimistically adding, “We’ll see.”