Tony Blair isn't the only Brit with a soft spot for Texans. Dallas’s “choral symphonic pop” outfit, the Polyphonic Spree, has become the latest Top 40-proof American band to blow up in the U.K. Singer and songwriter Tim DeLaughter, 37, put the group together in 2000—a year after his band Tripping Daisy folded when guitarist Wes Berggren died of an overdose—and he knew what he wanted from the start. “It was always going to be a lot of people, because I wanted all this instrumentation on there,” he says. “I wanted to create this sound that mixed classical and rock and spirit.” Today the Polyphonic Spree comprises 23 members, including a nine-person choir, a flutist, a harpist, and whatever you call someone who plays the theremin. “I do know all their last names now. That was a challenge at the beginning,” says DeLaughter. Just three months after forming, the group recorded its first album. The Beginning Stages of..., which doesn't quite capture the thrill of the celebrated live shows, where psychedelic vibes ricochet between the band and the audience, whipping up feelings of goofy euphoria and quasi-religious uplift. A new record due later this year promises to be an improvement. Meanwhile, the British are going cuckoo for polyrock. At a concert in London in October. Jarvis Cocker of Pulp put on a white robe and joined the choir for two songs, and both Peter Gabriel and the D.J. team Death in Vegas have commissioned the group to remix singles for them. “I think it’s one of the best things Peter Gabriel's ever done,” DeLaughter says, proving that, despite the hippie trappings, this Texan's a cowboy at heart.