Perfect Circle is an American rock supergroup formed in 1999 by guitarist Billy Howerdel and Maynard James Keenan Tool vocalist. A Perfect Circle has released four studio albums, three first releases in the early 2000s: Mer de Noms , their debut album in 2000, and followed up by Thirteenth Steps in the year 2003.; then in 2004, Emotive - a cover cover album album that has been radically re-worked. Shortly after the release of Emotive ', the band went on hiatus; Keenan returned to the Tool and started working solo under the band name Puscifer; and Howerdel released a solo album, Keep Telling Myself It's Alright , under the Ashes Divide Moniker. The band's activities are sporadic in subsequent years; the band was reformed in 2010, and played live and inactive performances between 2010 and 2013, but became inactive after releasing their biggest hits album, Three Sixty , and a set of live album albums, A Perfect Circle Live: Featuring Stone and Echo by the end of 2013. The band was reformed in 2017 to record the fourth album, Eat the Elephant , released on April 20, 2018.
Tend to downtime due to Keenan's other musical commitments, the band has featured various musicians in other roles throughout the alternating periods of activity and inactivity. The band's original incarnations included Paz Lenchantin on bass, Troy Van Leeuwen on guitar, and Josh Freese on drums. Primus drummer Tim Alexander had stood as a drummer before Freese in the band's early live performances, but this was before releasing any material. Band collaborators and producers Danny Lohner and Marilyn Manson, Jeordie White, also became members for a short period in the early 2000s. The band's current lineup features James Iha's Smashing Pumpkins guitarist, bassist Matt McJunkins, and drummer Jeff Friedl, the latter also contributing to the associated Puscifer and Ashes Divide projects. Despite the varied players and many lineup changes, the Augh Circle song style content remains consistent with Howerdel as a music composer, and Keenan writes lyrics and vocal melodies. The band's studio albums are generally well received critically and commercially, with three studio albums selling 4 million copies collectively in 2005.
Video A Perfect Circle
History
Formasithan More de Noms ) -2000)
The Perfect Circle was originally conceived by Billy Howerdel, a former guitar technician for Nine Inch Nails, The Smashing Pumpkins, Fishbone and Tool. Howerdel met singer Maynard James Keenan in 1992, when the Tool opened for Fishbone, and the two became friends. Three years later, Keenan offers Howerdel, who is looking for lodging, a room at his home in North Hollywood. This gave Howerdel a chance to play his music demo for Keenan. Pleased to hear what he heard, Keenan said, "I can hear myself sing [the songs]." Although he initially wanted a female vocalist, Howerdel agreed that Keenan would be suitable, and A Perfect Circle was formed shortly after. Both complement the band's early lineup with bassist and violinist Paz Lenchantin, former Failure guitarist Troy Van Leeuwen, and Primus drummer Tim Alexander. The band played their first show at LA's Viper Club Reception in August 1999, followed by a large-scale show that was widely publicized at the Coachella Festival in October next. While originally in talks to release an album on Volcano Records - the record label Tool - Keenan stated that they instead chose to go with Virgin Records, which Keenan felt better understood that Keenan intended for the band to be an equally important band for the Tool, not a small side project. After the initial show and securing a recording contract, the band entered the studio to begin work on their first album. Alexander was soon replaced by Josh Freese, who previously worked with Howerdel on the album Guns N 'Roses Chinese Democracy , with Alexander the studio's only contribution being drums on the album version of the song "The Hollow".
The band's debut album, Mer de Noms (French for "Sea of ​​Names"), was released on May 23, 2000. The album was well received commercially and critically. It debuted at number four on Billboard 200, sold 188,000 copies in its first week and made it the highest selling debut album for rock bands. Mer de Noms then got platinum by the RIAA, showing 1 million copies sold, on October 31, 2000. The album was also well received by critics. This release earned the band the "Best Debut Album Award" from the California Music Awards. In the album review by Rolling Stone, Pat Blashill writes that Keenan "adds almost operatic anxiety to Howerdel songs" and concludes that "A Perfect Circle sounds like a despairing dream about the old rock. that's the point. " AllMusic's review states that "there is little question that the combination of jealousy from the sounds of Keenan's pain and Howerdel's songs as well as the production skills made for one of the best splashes of 2000 in whatever is left of 'modern rock'."
The promotion begins shortly after the recording for the album is over. Initially, they served as the opening act for Nine Inch Nails on the 2000 Fragility v2.0 tour, but then embarked on a series of headlining tours around the world, touring for about eight months in a row. Because Keenan is well known through other bands, he often wears long wigs on his bald head when performing, to distinguish himself from his Tool person. The album produced three singles as well: "Judith", "3 Libras", and "The Hollow". All three perform well commercially; peaking at the fourth, twelfth, and fourteenth on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart respectively.
Step Thirteen (2001-2003 )
Activity began to slow down for the band in late 2000, with Keenan returning to the Tool to complete the recording of what would be his next album, Lateralus . Keenan returned to A Perfect Circle for a tour from January to March 2001, until returning to the Tool again for the remainder of 2001 for a release and tour to support Lateralus . The initial plan was for Howerdel to collaborate remotely in writing the material of the New Perfect Circle with Keenan as he toured the Tool, sending ideas back and forth to each other, even though Keenan found it too difficult to balance them, eventually reducing his role as he focused on the Tool. Efforts continued into mid-2002, with Howerdel primarily focusing on writing new material while sporadically working with Van Leeuwen, Lenchantin, and Freese. In June 2002, Van Leeuwen estimated that about 80% of instrumental material had been completed while they waited for Keenan's return. However, lineup changes and disagreements on the direction of the album will cause the album not to be released for more than a year. Both Lenchantin and VanLeeuwen both have been working on solo material during band downtime, and then moved on to join other bands. Lenchantin will go on to join new band Billy Corgan, Zwan in April 2002, while Van Leeuwen began to tour Queens of the Stone Age shortly after. Former Marilyn Manson player Jeordie White, formerly known as Twiggy Ramirez, replaced Lenchantin on bass in January 2003. Shortly after, VanLeeuwen permanently left the band, and longtime band collaborator Danny Lohner filled out temporarily as second guitarist to close the album.
Keenan joined the session in early 2003, and the music began to take a different direction with the new ranks and Keenan influences. Outside of the new personnel, the dynamics have changed: With Mer de Noms , Howerdel has written and finished all the music, with Keenan just donating the lyrics and vocals. This time, Keenan is more active in vetoing or changing musical ideas, determined to make something different than just another hard rock album, for fear it becomes excessive. The session became tense, with Howerdel preferring a heavier composition written while waiting for Keenan to return to the band, and sometimes offended by Keenan's suggested mellower rearrangement. White will play the role of mediator between the two; being more recent in the band helped him provide an outsider perspective, helping them find common ground. The band released their second album, Thirteenth Step , on September 16, 2003. The album debuted even higher than Mer de Noms , charted at number 2 in the opening and selling weeks more than 233,000 copies. The album, and the new sound that accompanies it, fared very well too. The AllMusic review praises the new bands, describing it as "moodier, tense, and more atmospheric (if that may be) a recording of its predecessor... The wide dynamic pats so prominent on the band's debut all absent here The thrashing guitar has taken rear seats for carefully crafted melodies in which the atmosphere is maximized and drawn tight over the listener. But not a radical departure from the Mer de Noms, there is a real development here.... Lyrics, musical, sonic , Thirteenth Step is a positive proof that mainstream rock has a lot of life and visions left in it. "
The tour in support of the album started in the US in July 2003, and lasted until the end of the year, with a short European tour of the tour extending to Europe with Deftone in September. Lohner, who can not tour on a permanent basis, was replaced by former guitarist of The Smashing Pumpkins, James Iha. In January 2004, the group left the country to play shows in Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. They returned to the US in March and completed the tour in June, for a total of about a year of touring. Meanwhile, three singles were released from the album: "Weak and Powerless", "The Outsider" and "Blue". "Weak and Helpless" made it to Billboard Modern Rock Tracks and Mainstream Rock Songs, while "The Outsider" then peaked in the top 5 of both. "Lackless and Powerless" and "The Outsider" are also the only band's songs that have substantial cross-over success, charting on the Billboard Hot 100 all-format chart, each at 61 and 79.
Emotive (2004)
Emotive_.282004.29 ">After completing the tour to support Thirteenth Step in the first half of 2004, the band announced plans to enter a long hiatus while Keenan returned to the Tool and Howerdel pursued a solo career. In July 2004, Keenan performed at the Serj Tankian (System of a Down) concert and Tom Morello (Rage Against the Machine) Axis of Justice - an event for musicians to advocate for political and social causes. At the show, Keenan announced that the Perfect Circle will be releasing a collection of closing political songs. During the beginning of the tour cycle for Thirteen Steps, Howerdel and Keenan discussed potential ideas for the third studio album. The initial idea was to record the album cover songs, although initially they hesitated, feeling that they needed meaningful reasons to guarantee doing so. Keenan, who has been very critical of President George W. Bush during the tour cycle, proposed binding the concept together as a political-themed cover album, with Howerdel, while generally apolitical in public, feeling worth pursuing in their September 11 attacks on the political and social climate. The two put their plans on hold temporarily and decided to move forward on the project as the band's third studio album. Keenan emphasized that, despite his personal feelings for Bush, the album was less than the "anti-Bush" album, and more than "anti-apathetic politics" - encouraging people to research and become more involved.
The band rushed to complete the album in time to release it before the US Presidential Election in November, just barely a year after its previous release. Recording sessions run from late June to early September. Sessions, mostly Howerdel, Keenan, and Freese, contain contributions from past and present band members, including Lenchantin, Lohner, White, and Iha. Keenan, aware of time constraints and Howerdel's desire in the future to do a solo album, also encouraged Howerdel to donate lead vocals to about a third of the album. A variety of different songs were chosen for the record, from Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" to Led Zeppelin "When the Levee Breaks". Most songs are radical reinterpretations from the original, sometimes unrecognizable compared to the original. Howerdel explained that it was done deliberately, to make the song belong to them, and admitted that he, in 2010, still had not even heard of Crucifix's original "Annihilation" version, another song re-recorded for the album. He also stated that some songs had started as a genuine A Perfect Circle music song, until the band decided to use the lyrics of other songs on top of the composition, in turn turning it into a cover song.
The band's third album, Emotive , was released on November 2, 2004 - the actual US Presidential Election Day. However, the album received more polarization reception than the previous two albums, with some critics and fans not appreciating the band's movement to more political content, or the radical freedom they took with the album's cover version. Others accused the band of rushing out the third album to fulfill the contractual obligations of the band's three albums to Virgin Records, a claim denied as fake by Howerdel. The album still managed to receive positive reception from critics. Sales are equally positive, but less than previous albums. This position debuted at number 2 on the Billboard 200 charts, selling 142,000 copies in its first week - matching the top chart position [17] Thirteenth Step, but selling nearly 90,000 copies less. The album was certified Gold by the RIAA, showing 500,000 units sold.
The band did not tour to support its release, and instead entered hiatus immediately after it was completed. Two singles were released to support the album, the first was the grim cover of John Lennon's "Imagine" The second single, "Passive", was one of only two original songs on the album, retracing back to a writing session for the Tapeworm Project Trent which has never been released by Reznor. In the late 1990s, Reznor started the project for songs that did not fit the Nine Inch Nails, which eventually evolved into a collaborative project with a number of other musicians. One song, "Vacant", featured contributions from Keenan and Lohner in 1999, but with a project that achieved hell due to creative and legal barriers from many participants in the early 2000s, A Perfect Circle began playing songs on live performances. With a project fully shelved by 2004, Keenan decided to work on the track as "Passive" for Emotive . In addition, two weeks after the release of the album, on November 16, 2004, the band released a compilation set of CD/DVD titled Amotion . DVD section contains music videos for six single bands; while the CD consisted entirely of remixes from singles from Mer de Noms and Thirteenth Step . Hiatus and other projects (2005-2009)
The band entered hiatus in January 2005, with members turning to their own separate projects. Keenan joins the Tool to record what will be the year 2006 10,000 Days , Howerdel began pursuing a solo career, and the rest joined various tour roles or other recording sessions. The band's fate remains uncertain in subsequent years. It was referred to as "hiatus or done until further notice" by Howerdel in October 2005, about "life support" by Keenan in April 2006, and "done for now" by Howerdel in May 2006. Toward the end of 2007, Keenan spoke more optimistic about the band's reform someday, but feels that it might be in a more limited capacity - to tour or release a new single instead of a full-length studio album. Keenan explains:
The real problem with running the Tool and A Perfect Circle at the same time is that both operate in the same way. They both toured live bands with labels, still working under the old contract mentality. So I think it's time to let A Perfect Circle go for now and let Billy explore himself. It's hard for a man who turns from being a guitar technician [to Tool] into a band with a magnificent and famous singer and must live in that shadow. It's important for Billy to go and do his own business and really explore his own voice and let people hear what he says and how he'll do it himself, and then we'll come back and do some Perfect Circles stuff.
During this time, Howerdel continues to work on projects with various members of A Perfect Circle. In 2005, he wrote and composed the soundtrack for Jak X: Combat Racing, in collaboration with Van Leeuwen, Lenchantin, and Freese on a number of tracks. Howerdel continued to work on recording solo albums from 2005 to 2007; The session was difficult, so he finally started collaborating with members of A Perfect Circle, including Lohner as producer, Freese as drummer, and Lenchantin as co-writer for a song. The material was eventually released under the name of Ashes Divide on Keep Your Myself It's Alright album in early 2008. Meanwhile, Keenan has moved from working with Tool, and started a solo project of his own kind, named Puscifer, in where he began releasing studio albums for 2007. Although both projects are running, both Keenan and Howerdel released a statement in 2008 that the band did not die.
Reform, tour, release compilation (2010-2016)
In early December 2008, Keenan has mentioned that he and Howerdel passively and separately have written new material for A Perfect Circle, although the band will officially remain hiatus and largely out of public view until mid-2010. The turning point is an unexpected collaboration between Keenan and Howerdel; Keenan is scheduled to perform a "Bohemian Rhapsody" rendition with guitarist Brian May in June at E3 2010, but may have to cancel at the last minute. Needing a guitarist, and knowing Howerdel was the area, Keenan reached out, and asked Howerdel to play the guitar for the show at the last minute. Although little time to prepare, the show was a success, and afterwards, the two felt more compelled to perform together again.
In September, the band officially announced the end of their hiatus, indicating they will return again to the live show. Keenan, Howerdel, Freese, and Iha all returned to their respective roles, though, with Lenchantin and White unavailable, the band recruited Matt McJunkins, a bass tour for Ashes Divide and Puscifer, to join as a bassist. The performances, which lasted until the end of 2010, included trips to five separate cities during the three night performances in each city, with each night full performances in one of each of their three albums - Mer de Noms , Third Steps , and Emotions - especially being the first time most of the material from the last ever shown live. Throughout the year the band will discuss the prospect of new material, but with uncertainty. Keenan continues to insist that logistics and industry trends make recording full of other albums impossible, and the one-time song will be more likely. Howerdel notes that he has written material and presented a rough demo to Keenan since 2008, but most of the material is in a state of change, some accepted by Keenan as potential matter of Perfect Circle, while others are rejected by Keenan, and/or kept by Howerdel for the release of Diver Ashes is prospective in the future.
The band continued their live performances into 2011, including a North American tour that runs from May to August. Important occasions include Rock on the Range, Edgefest, Bluesfest, Kanrocksas Music Festival, Lollapalooza, performances at Red Rocks Amphitheater. Freese, who had already committed to playing drums for Weezer during the same time frame, was only able to perform at the opening event, and was replaced by Jeff Friedl for the rest of the show, which, like McJunkins, previously worked well divided Ash and Puscifer. Keenan and Howerdel continue to offend to record new music, but continue to declare that the process is slow, the logistics of money and availability make it difficult, and that a full album is still impossible, supporting a single song instead. Only one new song, "By and Down", is featured on the show. At the end of the year, Keenan revealed that no material was ready for release, and that in 2012, he and Howerdel moved back to their other projects - Puscifer and Ashes Divide. The band was inactive for 2012, outside of one live show in December. However, shortly before the show, in October 2012, Freese announced he would leave the band permanently, with Friedl being his permanent replacement.
The band played several live performances in early 2013, including the Soundwave Music Festival in Australia and Lollapalooza Chile, although Keenan reported that they still have not completed the new tracks due to their other commitments. Later that year, the band announced two separate compilation releases for November 2013. The first, the biggest hits album titled Three Sixty , contains a new studio recording, "By and Down", and the second one set the box titled A Perfect Circle Live: Featuring Stones and echoes . The box set contains four live music CDs: one for each of the three shows their entire album Mer de Noms , Thirdteenth Step , and Emotive finished in 2010, collectively dubbed Trifecta, and recording their 2011 performance at the Red Rocks Amphitheater, nicknamed Stone and Echo. This set also comes with DVD video recording from the 2011 appearance Stone and Echo . In promoting the release, Howerdel commented on the future release once again, stating that he felt they had "75% of the [next] Perfect Circle Recorded foundation ready", although he admitted that they were still without Keenan's lyrics or Keok's vocal melodies. , and can still change depending on Keenan's reaction to the material. He also admitted that they still disagree on the release media; Keenan prefers smaller releases, while Howerdel prefers full album formats. Shortly afterwards, the band again fell into several years of inactive public, with little going on beyond Howerdel's 2015 comments that repeated his commitment to the band, and early 2016 comments Keen reiterated he is still hoping to return to the band.
Eat the Elephant (2017- present)
The band became active again in 2017, with the announcement that they will reform to start the North American tour in April and May 2017, with the intention of using live performances of new material as motivation to complete the album recording, similar to how they have embarked on their first tour in 1999 to inspire the settlement of the Mer de Noms . In March, the band announced they had signed a new recording contract - their first in thirteen years - to release a fourth full studio album through BMG Rights Management. Howerdel initially provided a tentative time frame between November 2017 and early 2018 for the new album, while Keenan stated that the album will not come out in 2017. The second North American tour starts in October, and lasts until December 2017. The band went on to debut new songs during the tour, including the songs "Feathers" and "Hourglass".
The band's fourth studio album, Eat the Elephant , was released on April 20, 2018. Four singles were released before the album; "The Doomed" in October 2017, "Disillusioned" in January 2018, "TalkTalk" in February 2018 and "So Long, And Thanks For All The Fish" in April 2018. The album marks the first time the band chose to work with producers outside music: Dave Sardy. Sardy helped Keenan and Howerdel find common ground in musical ideas in the recording process, helping them find their way forward in completing the album. The band will tour extensively in 2018 to support the album, including performances at Rock on the Range and Coachella. In June 2018, the band extended their tour with new North American legs towards the end of the year, and released a music video for the song "The Contrarian". Iha is unavailable to perform in the April to July show due to her commitment to the 2018 Smashing Pumpkin reunion, and is temporarily replaced for live performances by Greg Edwards of Failure, though Iha is still a member of the band. Howerdel noted that he wanted to see the band stay active beyond the Eat the Elephant album cycle, but that future activity, as before, depends on the availability and limited commitment of Keenan to other projects..
Maps A Perfect Circle
Music styles, influences and inheritance
Music bands have been described as a number of different genres, although there are changes in sound and lineup changes, the writing process remains the same for bands; Howerdel mainly writes band instrumental music, while Keenan contributes lyrics and vocal melodies. Keenan, who was already well known for his work in front of the band Tool through the 1990s, always tried to maintain the sound of two different bands:
Music [Perfect Circle] is very different, so I answered differently. The process we went through in the recording with the Tool was very organic, but at the same time it was very thoughtful. There is a left brain process that dissects what we are doing and takes from the source of matter; this is very research-oriented and esoteric. With Perfect Circle the process is much more mechanical and computer-oriented, but at the same time also much more emotional and intuitive. More tools are the result of masculine left, and [A Perfect Circle] is more a feminine result of the right brain.
Howerdel has also described the Perfect Circle as a more emotional, vulnerable, and feminine approach to music than Tool. He has quoted among his influences, several albums that have a powerful influence in the way he plays: Adam Ant's
Tracy Frey of AllMusic describes the band's sound as "an extension of the alt-metal-fused-with-art rock style popularized by the Tool in the early to mid 90s." While similar to the Tool in intensity and melancholy, A Perfect Circle is less dark and more melodic, with a theatrical ambient quality that incorporates occasional strings and unusual instrumentation. While Keenan refers to the band's first album, Mer de Noms , as more than a hard rock album, to the next album, for fear of redundancy , he often pushed for a softer, atmospheric sound, something that he and Howerdel did not always look into his eyes, creating a voice that was recorded similar to combining heavy rock music with Disintegration -Engine Music In general, the genre classification commonly applied to label band music including alternative rock, alternative metal, hard rock, art rock, art metal, progressive rock and progressive metal. The band has also been put together. with the nu metal genre, the label that ci ted due to the emergence of a famous band coincides with the genre movement towards a more melodic heavy material similar to the sound of Perfect Circle, and its use is opposed by many publications.
Both Perfect Circles and Tools have been widely praised as a major influence on modern stone. In retrospective 2015, VH1 notes that, "at some point it sounds like Tool being a subgenre rock.Although it's a bit misleading as many of these bands really tear the Perfect Circle, because of the more easily understood melody, and the simpler rhythm. "Reviewers from outlets such as AllMusic and Rolling Stone cited the Mer de Noms and Thirteen Stats as a rare example of relevance and quality in contemporary rock music. OMH's music confirmed the band "literally defining alternative rock as we know it."
band members
Timeline
![A Perfect Circle - The Doomed [Audio] - YouTube](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uknDqLePvo2pz3aUdiRbtn0pNacJOwTJMcPD9PBSGPnFeYW-LnQuQPYqH7dNwoMTiEMI9T2xfj2Bt2CF9BsOh8-QS-hxFMMbnCmYFd_BsI9g1nZ_k7oaGG_iviecrRjarHKkmBEdwM=s0-d "A Perfect Circle - The Doomed [Audio] - YouTube")
Discography
- Mer de Noms (2000)
- Third Step (2003)
- Emotif (2004)
- Eat Elephant (2018)
References
![A Perfect Circle - Disillusioned [Audio] - YouTube](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uQMkut15J3zDpGKF68i-fOPru1HpAT3XY_fu1Oa62AWwvxE4ZpK6_N5IuQ99YaRC0YTNL8jhgLl2uMi6ffnAjaHIowkbha3kgVQ3CYZniyB_03W5OgAFuRvdlotA4A1zkM4U_VeKApdg=s0-d "A Perfect Circle - Disillusioned [Audio] - YouTube")
External links
- Official website
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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