Atreyu

Orange County, CA
http://www.myspace.com/atreyurock

11/13 Boise, ID - Knitting Factory
11/14 Seattle, WA - Showbox SoDo
11/15 Portland, OR - Roseland
11/17 Sacramento, CA - Sacramento Memorial Auditorium
11/18 San Jose, CA - Events Center
11/20 Las Vegas, NV - House of Blues
11/21 Los Angeles, CA - The Wiltern

more dates here...

Since they muscled their way onto the Orange County metal scene in 1998, Atreyu have sold over a million albums by constantly challenging themselves and their audiences with charged music and acrobatic performances that both have pushed the boundaries of catharsis and emotional exorcism. But even those who have grown used to the unexpected from Atreyu will be blown away by the musical growth, determination and depth of the band’s Hollywood Records debut Lead Sails Paper Anchor.

Embracing new styles of singing and playing, a previously unexplored level of melodicism and a genre-shattering range of instrumentation – including Turkish saz, trumpets, strings, piano, opera vocals and pedal steel guitar – Atreyu have created an exultant disc that expands the parameters of heavy music and unabashedly exposes the band members’ love of ‘80s metal, thrash, industrial, hardcore, alternative and even alt-country. At the same time, Atreyu have written some of the heaviest, most brutal tracks of their career. “Can’t Happen Here” starts with the sound of machine guns, helicopters and screaming children, then breaks into a marching snare beat before bursting into a melodic mix of raging vocals, abrupt rhythmic shifts and a trademark Atreyu monster hook refrain. And just try to find progressions as driving and pounding as “Becoming The Bull,” “Honor” and “Doomsday.”

“We wanted to push everything about the band further than ever,” explains drummer and songwriter Brandon Saller. “We wanted the heavy parts to be as heavy as anything we’ve done, and at the same time we wanted to go full force with ideas we’ve never even approached.”

“It’s totally us, but it comes from a musically more mature place,” adds singer Alex Varkatzas. “You can really hear us pushing ourselves to make everything as good as we possibly could.”

Atreyu named the record Lead Sails Paper Anchor after an acoustic-based ballad Varkatzas wrote about feeling homesick on the road – a condition the singer likened to sailors being adrift at sea.  “The image just came to me,” he says. “With lead sails, a ship wouldn’t be able to move and then a paper anchor would be completely useless. And sometimes that’s how I feel on tour until we get onstage – completely useless and shitty because my heart’s at home.”

While Lead Sails Paper Anchor resounds with the band’s most triumphant melodies to date, Varkatzas’ lyrics are harsh and sobering, born from a year of family trauma, personal struggle and a desperate yearning to cope with anxiety, depression and pain. “This record took place at an even more turbulent time in my life than the last one, but it’s a different kind of turbulence,” Varkatzas explains. “There’s no girlfriend crying songs here. This is about real shit. So it’s a much more grown up record in that sense.”

“This really feels like a new beginning for us,” “Saller says. “We’re actually at a label that believes in our band and trusts our instincts. So we didn’t hold back anything this time. We wanted to give it everything we had. This is 100 percent Atreyu and that’s what we’ll always be.”