The Mars Volta

The Mars Volta is usually described as one of the strangest rock-groups in America. The band became known for usually concept-based studio albums, psychedelic and hardly understandable lyrics as well as for wild, energetic and improvised live shows. The Mars Volta started as the side project of At the Drive-In members Cedric Bixler-Zavala and Omar Rodriguez-Lopez named De Facto, which also included audio technician Jeremy Michael Ward. The band released several rock-albums, but then Rodriguez-Lopez claimed he felt tired of it. This is how De Facto turned to The Mars Volta in 2001. The group quickly developed its own experimental sound, which combined progressive rock, jazz, punk, psychedelic and Latin influences.

The Mars Volta first album De-Loused In The Comatorium was realeased in 2003. It was telling the story from the first-person perspective of a drug-induced coma, in which the protagonist battles with the evil side of his mind. The Mars Volta members said that it is the story of their late friend Julio Venegas, who was in a coma several years prior to his awakening, after which he jumped from the overpass. De-Loused In The Comatorium became a commercial hit, even though it had no promotion. The Mars Volta started the tour with Red Hot Chili Peppers, but sadly Ward was found dead of a heroin overdose. Later, Rodriguez-Lopez and Bixler-Zavala said that it made them to abort drugs themselves.

In 2005, the band released its second album, Frances The Mute. Rodriguez-Lopez said that it was based on a diary Jeremy Ward (cousin of Michael) once found in a car while working as a repo-man – each track of the album is based on characters described within the diary. Frances The Mute an even bigger commercial hit than previous album, and Rolling Stone magazine praized The Mars Volta as the "new Led Zeppelin". The album was recorded in an unusual manner – Rodriguez-Lopez did not let the other members hear each other's parts, forcing them to play each part as if it was a self-sufficient song.

At the same time the band started to play experimental shows – for example, instead of playing a traditional set at Weenie Roast Festival (on May 20th, 2005), the band played a 40 minute improvisational composition. And in September, 2006, at the rock-festival in Toronto The Mars Volta performed a unique set that consisted of over 47 minutes of instrumental material, including a cover of the Pink Floyd composition Interstellar Interstellar Overdrive. The Mars Volta third album Amputechture also was released in September. It was their first non-concept album, although Rodriguez-Lopez said it featured the motif of "amputation". In the January 2008, the next album called The Bedlam in Goliath was published (and Rodriguez-Lopez said that he has already composed two new albums or even more). In 2009 the new album Octahedron was released. The musicians state that this record differs from their previous works.