Thirty Seconds to Mars
Thirty Seconds to Mars | |
|---|---|
| Background information | |
| Years active | 1998–present |
| Members | Jared Leto (vocals, guitar) Tomo Milicevic (guitar) Matt Wachter (keyboard, bass) Shannon Leto (drums) |
| Past members | Solon Bixler (guitar) Kevin Drake (guitar) |
30 Seconds to Mars is an alternative rock/progressive metal band from the USA, featuring actor Jared Leto as vocalist.
Band history
Created in 1998 by Jared Leto (vocals and guitar) and his brother, Shannon (drums), 30 Seconds to Mars merely began as a small family project. Things began to speed up quickly, however, and Matt Wachter later joined the band as bassist. After a small revolving door of guitarists (as the band's first two guitarists, Kevin Drake and Solon Bixler, left the band due to issues primarily related to touring), the three auditioned Tomo Milicevic to round out the band's roster. Matt Wachter plays keyboards for the band.
Although Jared Leto is a Hollywood actor, he prefers not to use this information to promote the band; in fact, the band refuses to play at venues that use his fame to promote shows.
30 Seconds to Mars' first – self-titled – album, produced by Bob Ezrin, was released in 2002 to critical acclaim, but only achieved sales of just over 100,000. The band's second album, A Beautiful Lie, was released on August 30 2005. For this effort, the band traveled (during the course of three years) to four different continents, including five different countries, to perfect their sound and also to allow for Jared's film career. The album was produced by Josh Abraham, whose producing credits also include Orgy, Velvet Revolver, and Linkin Park.
Because A Beautiful Lie was leaked five months before its release, the band decided to include two bonus tracks: "Battle of One" (an original song that was also set to be the album's title track when it was first announced) and "Hunter" (a cover of the Björk song of the same name). To further promote the album, the band also enclosed "golden passes" in a select number of copies, which grant their owners access to any 30 Seconds to Mars concert free of charge, along with backstage access.
Logo
The band's phoenix logo (which the band named "Mythra") bears the phrase "Provehito in Altum", the band's motto. Roughly translated from Latin, this means "Launch forth into the deep". The logo was primarily used for promotion of the band's debut self-titled album, whereas for their second release, A Beautiful Lie, the new Trinity logo was created consisting of three skulls, along with the band's name and motto.
Other tracks
In addition to the tracks on their two full-length releases thus far, the band has also recorded a few other tracks. Among these tracks are "Phase 1: Fortification" and "Valhalla", the latter of which was present on an early demo. "Phase 1: Fortification" was released on an overseas single for "Capricorn (A Brand New Name)". Another track featured on certain imported 30 Seconds to Mars titles is "Anarchy in Tokyo", a song that was recorded during the process of their self-titled debut. "Revolution" was also recorded for the self-titled album, but wasn't included because it didn't fit the theme of the album, and because of fear that listeners would take the lyrics too literally, especially after the September 11, 2001 attacks. [1] "Occam's Razor" was also recorded, but was never included on any of the band's releases. As a result, it is considered the most difficult to locate of the five unreleased tracks.
Demo versions of songs on the band's self-titled debut were also slightly different, along with different names. For example, "Fallen" was previously called "Jupiter", and "Year Zero" was previously called "Hero". Also made available are the demo versions of "Buddha For Mary" and "93 Million Miles"; the latter originally had lyrics referring to the band Deadsy, whose members Dr. Nner and P. Exeter Blue I provided extra instrumentation on several tracks, but the lyrics were changed after the two bands were involved in a small feud.
Echelon
Echelon is a street team for the band 30 Seconds To Mars, which helps in bringing friends to the shows, convincing friends to buy band merchandise, phoning local radio stations to request the band's songs, putting up posters, posting to band forums or related bulletin boards online, and maintaining zines or websites dedicated to the band. They are beyond the shadow of a doubt the hugest fucking dorks humanity could ever possibly concvieve
Discography
| Date of release | Title | Label | U.S. album-chart position | U.S. sales | U.K. album-chart position | U.K. sales |
| August 27 2002 | 30 Seconds to Mars | Virgin Records | 107 | 102,000 | ||
| August 30 2005 | A Beautiful Lie | Virgin Records | 44 | 219,000 |
Singles
| Year | Title | Chart positions | Album | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| US Modern Rock | US Mainstream Rock | Hot 100 | |||
| 2002 | "Capricorn (A Brand New Name)" | — | 31 | — | 30 Seconds to Mars |
| 2002 | "Edge of the Earth" | — | — | — | 30 Seconds to Mars |
| 2005 | "Attack" | 22 | 38 | — | A Beautiful Lie |
| 2006 | "The Kill" | 5 | 18 | 85 | A Beautiful Lie |
Songs featured in media
- "Echelon" (The Core) (2003)
- "Attack" (Madden NFL 06) (2005)
- "Battle of One" (Madden NFL 07) (2006)
References
- ^ Redmon, Jess. Shoutweb.com: On the Record: 30 Seconds to Mars: Welcome to their universe (May 2002)