Zebrahead
| Zebrahead | |
|---|---|
 Zebrahead 2015, left to right: Ben Osmundson, Matty Lewis, Ed Udhus, Ali Tabatabaee, Dan Palmer |
|
| General information | |
| origin | La Habra , United States |
| Genre (s) | Pop-punk , punk-rock , rap-rock , alternative metal |
| founding | 1996 |
| Website | www.zebrahead.com |
| Founding members | |
| Ali Tabatabaee | |
| Justin Mauriello | |
| Ben Osmundson | |
guitar |
Greg Bergdorf |
| Ed Udhus | |
| Current occupation | |
| Ali Tabatabaee | |
| Matty Lewis (since 2004) | |
| Ben Osmundson | |
| Dan Palmer (since 2013) | |
| Ed Udhus | |
Zebrahead is a five-piece punk rock band from La Habra ( Orange County , USA ).
history
The band was founded in 1996 by Ali Tabatabaee (spoken vocals), Ben Osmundson (bass), Greg Bergdorf (guitar), Ed Udhus (drums) and Justin Mauriello (vocals, guitar), a line-up that has strikingly multicultural traits: Tabatabaee is a native Iranian , Osmundson's roots are in Sweden and Bergdorf is of Filipino - German descent. Furthermore, Udhus is a Norwegian family (according to his own statement, his grandmother was also Portuguese ) and Mauriello is an Italian family. The latter band member left the band in 2004 due to creative differences and founded his own troupe I Hate Kate . This caused severe criticism among fans of the band, as Mauriello's vocals had a significant influence on the music.
As shown in a statement by Ali Tabatabaee in a video interview for Sonisphere, the band name "Zebrahead" came about during an early gig when the band did not yet have a name. In this situation, Tabatabaee thought of an American film called "Zebrahead". This name was found acceptable and has been retained to this day. According to their own statements, the band had no connections to the music industry at the time, but rather benefited from a lucky incident in which the owner of a club brought several producers to a performance by Zebrahead.
Mauriello was replaced by the Nebraskan Matty Lewis, former singer of the pop-punk band Jank 1000 from Omaha .
Zebrahead's twelfth album Panty Raid was released in 2009 and contains only cover songs.
After various tours, mostly focused on the European and Japanese region, the band announced on March 3rd, 2011 the beginning of the recordings for a new, independently written album. It was released under the name Get Nice! End of July 2011 on iTunes . The European sales start for the CD followed on August 5, 2011.
The song With Legs Like That was the entry music of the WWE diva Maria Kanellis, who was released in February 2010 .
In July 2012, Zebrahead announced that they were planning to record another album, which it later announced was called Call Your Friends and would be released worldwide on August 16, 2013.
In the summer of 2013, the band announced via Facebook that lead guitarist Greg Bergdorf would leave the band to spend more time with his family. He is replaced by Dan Palmer from the band Death by Stereo , who has already stood in for him during live performances. The album Call Your Friends was released in August 2013, followed by concerts in Japan and Europe. A club tour took place in Europe from October to November 2013. In January and February 2014 they went on tour again.
In April 2015 Zebrahead released the album The Early Years Revisited, a kind of greatest hits album. For this purpose, specially selected songs from previous albums of the band were selected and recorded in a new line-up with Matty Lewis (for Justin Mauriello) and Dan Palmer (for Greg Bergdorf). The album also contains a new bonus track or two if you buy the album as a vinyl LP.
In summer 2015, Zebrahead played at several festivals in Germany.
On August 21, 2015, Zebrahead released an EP called Out of Control . This EP does not only contain songs by Zebrahead, but also some songs by the befriended band Man with a Mission . On October 16, 2015, Zebrahead released their new studio album Walk the Plank , which was combined with a subsequent tour through Europe.
style
Zebrahead mix melodious and powerful pop-punk with often aggressive rap parts and especially put their older songs down with a bit of funk . The musical style has developed a lot from album to album. Where the mentioned influences of funk came to the fore in Waste of Mind , in Playmate of the Year pop-punk with influences from the 1990s moved more and more to the fore. With MFZB a style break was dared, in which the focus was placed on more aggressive rap passages. The sound became correspondingly harder. After separating from Mauriello, attempts were made to continue this style, with the vocals of Matty Lewis introducing a completely new sound. This was often discussed controversially. After the Nebraskan became established, the band's style also consolidated. Phoenix combined hard and calm melodies while Get Nice! included a mix of all styles up to Playmate of the Year . The unique selling point of the album were passages that were used very often, in which Lewis lyrically resorted to simple "Whoa-oh-oh" exclamations. The themes of her plays include relationship stories and, less often, social criticism; Southern Californian lifestyle also shapes her often slang- emphasized texts.
In an early, self-descriptive quote it says: “We're not political, we're not out to save the world, if you listen to the lyrics it's just about being yourself and having fun. We're not sad, we're not complaining that the world's treating us like crap. … We want to keep this upbeat. ”In other words, translated:“ We are not political and we are not there to save the world. Our lyrics are about being yourself and having fun. We are not sad or complaining that the world treats us like dirt. We want to maintain this positive outlook on life. "
meaning
In their homeland, the band is still considered part of the underground scene due to unfavorable support conditions (according to the music industry itself ) and has so far not been able to recommend itself for the mass music scene in Europe. The situation is different in Japan, where they are among the greats of the rock scene and have already performed in front of around 50,000 spectators (e.g. on the occasion of a performance in the Chiba Marine Stadium in Tokyo on August 12, 2006).
While their record Playmate of the Year reached platinum in the Japanese market (250,000 records sold), the successor LPs MFZB and Broadcast To The World (those within a month) made it - for the time being - to gold status (100,000 units), while the second album -Waste of Mind plant is about to begin. Overall, the total number of CDs sold is currently approximately 950,000.
In 2000 Zebrahead was nominated for the American Grammy Award "Best Metal Performance" by a lucky coincidence : Lemmy Kilmister , singer of Motörhead and a good friend of the band, had asked the five Californians in advance of the event whether they would like him to record the Metallica covers "Enter Sandman" could support, since his own musician colleagues were out of the country at the time. Zebrahead didn't hesitate and went into the studio with Kilmister to provide musical accompaniment to his singing. In the end, however, the work, which was wrongly profiled as an independent Motörhead production, lost out to a performance by the band Black Sabbath .
Zebrahead fans particularly praise their live performances, which are considered very energetic, as well as an extremely friendly relationship with the fan community, aided by the establishment of a fan club whose members are identified as such by special t-shirts in order to benefit from additional services on the part of the band . In their tour history so far, Zebrahead u. a. together with bands like 311 , Reel Big Fish , The Offspring , Less Than Jake , MxPx , Green Day , The Matches , Beastie Boys , Simple Plan , Itchy Poopzkid , Sum 41 , blink-182 or Sugar Ray , although most recently Great Britain and the rest of Europe have been repeatedly and extensively traveled (four times in 2006 alone).
Discography
Albums and EPs
- 1998: Yellow (self-titled)
- 1998: Waste of Mind
- 2000: Playmate of the Year
- 2001: Stupid Fat Americans (EP)
- 2003: MFZB
- 2004: Waste pf MFZB (B pages)
- 2005: Buried Tracks (Fan Club Limited Edition)
- 2006: Broadcast to the World
- 2008: Mashup to the World (EP)
- 2008: Not the New Album (EP)
- 2008: Phoenix
- 2009: Panty Raid (cover versions)
- 2011: Get Nice
- 2013: Call Your Friends
- 2014: Way More Beer! (Live)
- 2015: The Early Years Revisited
- 2015: Out of Control (EP)
- 2015: Walk the Plank
- 2017: The Bonus Brothers
- 2019: Brain Invaders
- 2020: Wanna sell your soul? (EP)
DVDs
- 2004: The Show Must Go Off - Live at The House of Blues in Anaheim USA (Episode 12) (Kung Fu Films)
- 2004: Blood, Sweat & Beers - Live in Tokyo, Japan (self-published)
- 2007: Broadcast to the World: The Fucking DVD (self-published)
- 2014: Way More Beer! (Self-publication)
Singles
- 1998: Get Back
- 1999: The Real Me
- 1999: Feel This Way (Japan only)
- 2000: Playmate of the Year
- 2001: Now or Never (Japan only)
- 2003: Into You (Japan only)
- 2004: Rescue Me
- 2004: Hello Tomorrow
- 2004: Are You for Real? (Japan only)
- 2004: Falling Apart
- 2006: Anthem
- 2006: His World
- 2006: Postcards from Hell
- 2007: Karma Flavored Whiskey
- 2007: The Walking Dead
- 2008: Mental Health
- 2008: Hell Yeah
- 2008: The Juggernauts
- 2009: Girlfriend (Avril Lavigne Cover)
- 2010: Underneath It All (No Doubt Cover)
- 2011: Ricky Bobby
- 2011: Get Nice!
- 2011: She Don't Wanna Rock
- 2011: blackout
- 2013: Call Your Friends
- 2015: Devil on My Shoulder
- 2015: Worse Than This
- 2016: So What
- 2016: Blue Light Special
- 2019: All My Friends Are Nobodies
- 2019: We're not alright
- 2019: When both sides suck, we're all winners
- 2019: If you're looking for your kniff, I Think my back found IT
- 2019: The perfect crime
- 2020: Shock and awe by the sea
Web links
- Official website
- Zebrahead at Allmusic (English)