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Angels & Airwaves

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Angels & Airwaves

Angels & Airwaves is a rock band fronted by former Blink-182 and Box Car Racer guitarist/vocalist Tom DeLonge. The band includes guitarist David Kennedy, notably from Over My Dead Body, Hazen Street and Box Car Racer, former Rocket From The Crypt and Offspring drummer Atom Willard and former 30 Seconds to Mars bassist Matt Wachter, who replaced former The Distillers bassist Ryan Sinn in May 2007. The band has released two albums thus far: We Don't Need to Whisper (2006) and I-Empire (2007). They are planning on releasing a documentary involving their music, titled Start The Machine, as well as a feature film entitled I-Empire.

Band history

We Don't Need to Whisper

Tom DeLonge began working on the debut album, We Don't Need To Whisper, shortly after Blink-182 began their hiatus in February 2005. As rumours were floating around about the band's "indefinite hiatus", Delonge chose to abstain for half a year from any interviews surrounding the issue and his future plans. Instead he concentrated on writing and recording in his home-based studio. In September 2005, he finally spoke publicly in Kerrang! magazine, where he unveiled the name of his new band - "Angels & Airwaves". Upon fiddling randomly for several weeks with the AAA logo, Tom suddenly realized that if he were to invert the middle A into what appeared to be a V, he would have the name of his daughter, Ava. The band included his friend and guitarist David Kennedy from Box Car Racer, The Offspring drummer Adam "Atom" Willard and former The Distillers bassist Ryan Sinn.

Angels & Airwaves released their first single, "The Adventure", on May 18, 2006. They released their first album, We Don't Need to Whisper, a few days later on May 23, 2006. The album reached 4th on the Billboard 200, and went gold.

The song 'Start The Machine' is thought to be about the break up of Blink-182. The line 'I left the chill and voice of screams and kids and ran for shelter' is thought to be a reference to the screams of all the Blink-182 fans and when Tom went into hiding and made no public appearances.

On April 23, 2007 - Ryan Sinn's 28th birthday - it was announced that he did not play the Free Earth Day concert at the M.I.T. campus the day before (22 April 2007) due to difficulties with the band. Following this incident, on 15 May 2007, Sinn posted on the Army of Angels fan club message board, stating that he was no longer part of Angels & Airwaves. He was said to have received a call on the evening of 19 April 2007 concluding his relationship with the band.[1] Sinn is now performing with Love Equals Death.

DeLonge has since talked about Sinn's departure, telling Kerrang "He's a really great person and a really great bass player. But we had different priorities and he had things going on in his life that he needed to take care of. The rest of us were relying on him to tackle those things, but he couldn't do it. And so it put him into a defensive position."

Matt Wachter, previously of 30 Seconds to Mars, covered for him for the tour and was later confirmed as a permanent member of Angels and Airwaves.

I-Empire

Tom Delonge revealed in an interview with Kerrang! the new album would be titled I-Empire and would be released on Universal/Island records. He stated that the new album will be stripped down, a departure from the heavy effects found in We Don't Need To Whisper. DeLonge also revealed that I-Empire would contain 12 tracks, including "Star of Bethlehem", which was recorded in late 2006 and had already been released on the KROQ 2006 Christmas CD[2]. I-Empire debuted on the Billboard 200 chart at No.9 with sales of 66,000 in its first week. It also reached number one on the iTunes Top Albums chart. The sales have dropped considerably since then; third week sales put the album at No.103 on the Billboard 200 chart[3].

Angels & Airwaves have announced they are planning on releasing a documentary involving their music, titled Start The Machine, as well as a feature film entitled I-Empire after the upcoming album. The documentary has been submitted to several festivals for consideration, and DeLonge has said he hopes it will be released to theaters in 2008 before coming out on DVD.[4] In an interview with SuicideGirls, David Kennedy described the feature film as "all these vignettes that intertwine kind of like Pink Floyd’s The Wall meets Crash"[5]. On August 29, 2007, Angels & Airwaves updated their website with a new trailer for the upcoming album. The trailer shows a montage of video from the upcoming I-Empire film and the upcoming documentary, featuring the new song "Secret Crowds"[6]. Additionally, another trailer was uploaded detailing the motion picture endeavors of the band.

On June 18, 2007, the band released a newly designed website depicting a motorcyclist and a flash application with flashing text including "I-Empire, Fall 2007". The flash application also plays a short music clip, which is from the intro of "Love Like Rockets", along with a portion of the message from President Dwight D. Eisenhower via the Project SCORE Satellite in 1958. The portion of this message included on the website is, "Through the marvels of scientific advance, my voice is coming to you from a satellite circling in outer space... Through this unique means I convey to you and to all mankind, America's wish for peace on Earth..." The flash application ends with the quotation "If I had my own world... I'd build you an empire...".

The first single from the new album, "Everything's Magic", was leaked onto the internet, and on August 25, 2007 it was the most requested song on California radio station KROQ. "Everything's Magic" was filmed at Birmingham High School. Angels & Airwaves began streaming the song on their myspace profile on August 28, 2007. It also became available on iTunes. It reached number three on the iTunes Rock Chart on September 11, 2007, before the song was even made available for nationwide airplay. On December 28, 2007, Matt announced on Modlife.com Secret Crowds will be the next single[7] and the song went to radio on February 4, 2008.[8] The band shot the video for the single on January 20 and 21, 2008. At recent concerts, the band has covered "Not Now" by Blink-182 and "My First Punk Song" by Box Car Racer. According to Kevin Lyman, Angels and Airwaves will be playing all of Warped Tour 2008.[9]

Band members

Current members

Former members

Other personnel

Discography

Main article: Angels & Airwaves discography
Year Album U.S. UK Canada Australia
2006 We Don't Need to Whisper 4 6 3 8
2007 I-Empire 9[10] 29 11[11] 31[12]

References

  1. ^ Angels and Airwaves fan-site
  2. ^ Kerrang! interview on punkdisasters
  3. ^ Top Music Charts - Hot 100 - Billboard 200 - Music Genre Sales
  4. ^ Angels & Airwaves Thinking Big For 2008
  5. ^ SuicideGirls > Interviews > Angels And Airwaves
  6. ^ Angels and Airwaves - Modlife
  7. ^ PunkDisasters.com - The Stage is Set
  8. ^ FMQB: Radio Industry News, Music Industry Updates, Arbitron Ratings, Music News and more!
  9. ^ AbsolutePunk.net Chat: Kevin Lyman
  10. ^ Jay-Z Leapfrogs Eagles, Britney For No. 1 Debut
  11. ^ CANOE - JAM! Music SoundScan Charts
  12. ^ Australian Record Industry Assocation
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