article: Their emotionally-charged, radio-friendly rock anthems like Radioactive and Sucker For Pain have won Grammy Awards, number one albums and a scarily loyal fanbase. But behind closed doors, the band's frontman Dan Reynolds was struggling with severe depression. Things came to a head on their last world tour. Playing 110 dates in 42 countries on five continents left the singer "numb". "It came to a point where I didn't have an option," he tells the BBC. "It was lose my family and lose my life or seek help." After the band's final concert of the tour in Amsterdam last February, the star told his bandmates he was taking a year off to tackle the condition, which has plagued him since childhood. "When I was younger, in school, I would just let it pass, and ride out the valleys and the peaks and the ups and downs," he says. "Then I tried medication and it was too scary for me, because I felt like it was going to change the music." So last year, he "went to a therapist and sat down and basically faced it head on for the first time". Having decided not to take antidepressants, his treatment took "a more holistic route" than before - changing his diet, cutting out sugar and practicing yoga and meditation. The latter, in particular, "has been huge" for the singer, who says he has trouble "quieting" his brain. Reynolds was supported through the last year by his wife, fellow musician Aja Volkman, and bandmate Wayne Sermon, whom he's known since childhood. "We're brothers, so if he's not in a good place, then none of us are," says Sermon. The guitarist admits everyone in the band has "demons that came out" after their ascent to fame - including his own issues with trust and "questioning people's motives". "When you're under a microscope, it's going to magnify all the problems you had before," he says, "But I don't want to be to be down about it, because I feel like we've come out better people. All of us." Those changes are the foundation of Imagine Dragons' new album Evolve. The artwork shows a human form ascending from a place of eternal darkness to one of light and colour, while the music is inventive and vibrant - especially when compared to the claustrophobic onslaught of their last record. "Smoke + Mirrors was super-angsty" admits Reynolds. "This album is a celebration of opening the blinds and the light shining through." On the lead single, Believer, he writes about his personal transformation while acknowledging: "My life, my love, my drive, it came from pain." "I was raised in a really conservative household and carried a heavy guilty conscience with me because of religion," he explains. "Letting go of that was really freeing and wonderful. But I've also learned to be happy for the things I learned from it and grateful for the love that I found. "If it wasn't for all of those things working in the exact way they did, Imagine Dragons would cease to exist." The seventh of
summary: Over the last five years, Imagine Dragons have become one of the biggest bands on the planet.