Anberlin

Anberlin

Anberlin is an alternative rock band hailing from central Florida that was formed in 2002. The band has released three full-length albums and an EP in their five-year run.

History

SaGoh 24/7 (1998-2002)

SaGoh 24/7 was a Christian punk band whose members, except for original drummer Sean Huston, all would later play in Anberlin: Stephen Christian, Deon Rexroat, Joseph Milligan, and Nathan Young. The group released two albums, Servants After God's Own Heart in 1999, and Then I Corrupt Youth, in 2001, both on Rescue Records. As the group began to fall apart, Christian and Milligan began working on an acoustic side project, which transmutated into Anberlin after Milligan suggested pursuing more of a rock sound. A few of the SaGoh 24/7 songs would later become Anberlin songs, and some others were reworked to fit the band's new sound.

Formation and Blueprints For the Black Market (2002)

The bandmates started the group in 2002, after the end of SaGoh 24/7.

Even though their debut album, Blueprints for the Black Market, was released barely a year after the band formed, Anberlin was already amassing a dedicated fan base through steady touring with other bands on their label (Tooth & Nail Records) and promotion via their MySpace.

Blueprints for the Black Market was quite successful. Spurred on by popular singles "Readyfuels" and "Change the World," it sold over 60,000 copies and raised Anberlin's profile.

Never Take Friendship Personal (2005)

They released their second album, Never Take Friendship Personal, in February 2005. The album was praised by critics, garnering favorable reviews and winning the band new fans. The album's title derived from the departure of guitarist Joey Bruce. His leave from the band left its mark on the band. Bruce had other intentions in mind for the band and didn't share the same philosophy as his other bandmates had. Stephen Christian said in an interview that Bruce was all about the sex and drugs, and wanted fame. Their friendship was said to have ended. Bruce is now the singer/guitarist for the band Mouse Fire.

Prior to its release, the band promoted the album by releasing a track per week on their Purevolume and Myspace website accounts, as well as on their own website. Two "radio singles" were released from the album: "A Day Late" and "Paperthin Hymn". Both have been quite successful on alternative rock radio. A video for "A Day Late" has been released and the video for "Paperthin Hymn" was released on March 17, 2006.

Furthermore, Anberlin recorded covers of the Bob Dylan song "Like a Rolling Stone", the Depeche Mode song "Enjoy the Silence," The Cure's "Love Song," and the popular Christmas song "Baby Please Come Home," included on compilation albums in 2005.

Singer Stephen Christian is also working on some solo music under the name of Anchor & Braille with Aaron Marsh of Copeland, which is expected to take the form of a full length album in 2008.

Anberlin released an exclusive download on PureVolume on September 4, 2006 of their song A Day Late done in an acoustic version, during Tooth and Nail's New Music Release week on Tooth and Nail's PureVolume, MySpace and their website.

Cities (2007)

Anberlin performing during the 2007 Warped Tour while in Las Cruces, NM.

Anberlin's third album produced by Aaron Sprinkle in 2006 was released on February 20, 2007 under the title Cities.

In an AP interview about their new CD, vocalist Stephen commented that the lyrics throughout the band's discography are progressively becoming more adult. "The first CD (Blueprints for the Black Market) was childish in the manner that it was Man vs. World in the lyrics. The second (Never Take Friendship Personal) was Man Vs. Man. Cities is more adult in the manner that it's Man vs. Self."

The band released a digital EP on iTunes on December 28, 2006. On this EP is one song from their new album Cities titled "Godspeed" and one unreleased song titled "The Haunting."

On February 19, 2007, Anberlin announced that guitarist Nathan Strayer amicably left the band and that Christian McAlhaney, formerly of Acceptance, would take over as the new guitarist. Cities sold 34,000 copies in its first week of release, debuted at #19 on the Billboard 200 chart, and, like their second album, "Never Take Friendship Personal", received fairly good reviews from critics.

The band's video for the single "Godspeed" was filmed sometime in May in Los Angeles.

The band is also involved with the organization To Write Love on Her Arms.

The band signed to Universal Republic Records on August 16th, 2007 and are planning on releasing a new album in mid-2008.

Source of name

Various interviews credit vocalist Stephen Christian with providing conflicting origins of the band's name:

1. Christian had long planned to name his first daughter Anberlin. Struggling to find a name for the band, Stephen suggested it. "We were all sitting around trying to come up with a name. None of us were married or had kids, but one day I was going to name my daughter Anberlin, so I figured we could name the band that until we thought of something better. So we chose Anberlin and no one has thought of anything better." He no longer plans to use Anberlin to name his first daughter, however: "If I ever have a daughter and name her Anberlin, she'll think she was named after the band instead of the other way around."
2. Christian stated in another interview that the band's name was created when he was thinking about cities in Europe he wanted to visit. In his mind he listed "London, Paris, Rome, and Berlin." Stephen thought that "And Berlin" would be a cool name for a band and so when the band was looking for a name Stephen suggested "And Berlin," which was then modified to "Anberlin."
3. Christian stated in yet another interview when asked about the origin of the band's name: "There are several stories that have circulated on the internet, but the actual story is when I was in college my favorite band was Radiohead; on one of their songs off the record Kid A there is a background noise on the song 'Everything In its Right Place' (about 2 minutes 31 seconds into the song). While Thom is singing try to say I always thought the background noise sounded like Anberlin, I always thought that Anberlin would have been a great band name and well ... it was/is."

Anberlin and Christian music

Over the years, many fans and members of the media have considered Anberlin to be a Christian band. However, Stephen Christian denies these claims, stating in an interview, "I think we're categorized like that a lot because we're on Tooth & Nail Records, which, years ago, was known as a Christian label and never lost that reputation. I don't care who listens to our records. If it helps people in whatever circumstances they're in, that's amazing, but I definitely don't classify us as a Christian band." Elsewhere, Christian has remarked, "[My faith] affects every single aspect of my life, but I'm not a preacher, I'm an entertainer."

Despite these statements, multiple sources list the band as Christian rock, and the lyrics to several songs contain overt religious references. Furthermore, their songs have been included on Christian Rock compilation CDs and DVDs.

Stephen Christian said in an interview with Lightforce radio how the band tries to "step out of the bubble" and referred to themselves as being part of Christian music. He went on to talk in detail about what Christians should be doing in their lives, about loving and embraces other as Jesus would, and showing God's grace to others. He mentioned as well how the band Fall Out Boy said in an interview that they had not really heard about Jesus until they toured with Anberlin. [1]

Members

Current Members

• Stephen Christian - lead vocals (2002-present)
• Deon Rexroat - bass (2002-present)
• Joseph Milligan - lead guitar, backing vocals (2002- present)
• Christian McAlhaney (formerly of Acceptance) - guitar, backing vocals (2007-present)
• Nathan Young - drums (2002-present)

Former Members

• Nathan Strayer - guitar (2004-2007) (Now pursuing other musical interests and playing with The Mosaic as a side project)
• Jimmy Aceino - guitar (2003-2004)
• Joey Bruce - guitar (2002-2003) (Now playing with Mousefire)

Discography

Albums/EPs

Release Date	Album/EP	US Billboard Peak	Status
May 6, 2003	Blueprints for the Black Market		60,000+ copies sold[2]
February 1, 2005	Never Take Friendship Personal	#144	190,000+ copies sold[3]
December 26, 2006	Godspeed EP
February 20, 2007	Cities	#19	100,000+ copies sold[4]
Mid-2008	TBA 4th Album

Singles

Year	Title	Chart Positions			Album
		US Hot 100	US Modern Rock	US Mainstream Rock
2003	"Readyfuels"				Blueprints for the Black Market
2005	"A Day Late"				Never Take Friendship Personal
2006	"Paperthin Hymn"		#38		Never Take Friendship Personal
2007	"Godspeed"				Cities

Videos

Year	Song	Album	Link
2003	"Readyfuels"	Blueprints for the Black Market	watch
2005	"A Day Late"	Never Take Friendship Personal	watch
2006	"Paperthin Hymn"	Never Take Friendship Personal	watch
2007	"Godspeed"	Cities	watch

The band also released a DVD video which goes behinds the scenes in the making of Cities. It is included in the special edition Cities album.

Unreleased songs

There are several Anberlin songs recorded during album sessions that were not used on the finished products. Some of these have been released through other channels, such as "Downtown Song" from the Never Take Friendship Personal sessions which was released in 2005 on a Tooth & Nail compilation. Others have featured on preliminary track listings or been mentioned by the band, but have never been released or otherwise leaked. The band have stated that these out-takes will probably never be officially released, although there is a slim possibility that they may be candidates for future album sessions.

In addition to these there are also several songs recorded by SaGoh 24/7, which have been distributed on the internet as Anberlin songs. However, SaGoh was their old band with a notably different pop-punk sound, so these should not be considered Anberlin tracks.

Here are some of the known unreleased Anberlin songs:

• "Downtown Song" (also known as "The Downtown Song", "Just Another Downtown Song" or "Another Downtown Song"): Given a limited release on a "downloadcard" available only at the 2005 Warped Tour, as well as the sampler Tooth and Nail vs. Solid State. This song appeared on all of the early track listings for Never Take Friendship Personal, but was cut at the last minute.

• "Everywhere and In Between:" One of the most popular unreleased Anberlin songs. This was recorded as a demo before Blueprints For The Black Market, along with early versions of album tracks "Readyfuels," "Foreign Language," and "Autobahn" (then titled "Driving"). It is notably softer and more poppy than most Anberlin songs. There was some speculation that this song could have been re-recorded for the third album, but these rumors proved to be untrue. Although the demo version was never officially released, it has leaked to the internet and is well known in the Anberlin fan community.

• "New Fast Automatic:" Like "Downtown Song," this track appeared on every early running order for Never Take Friendship Personal but did not make the final cut. It has not been heard of since.

• "Calm Culture Massacre:" Little is known about this song, which was talked about during the Never Take Friendship Personal sessions. It reportedly sounded the most like a SaGoh 24/7 song that Anberlin had ever done, which is most likely why it was shelved.

• "Autobahn (Acoustic):" Released exclusively in 2005 on mp3.com

• "The Lesser Thans:" Played by this name in concert and was the early name for "Hello Alone," which was released on Cities.

External links

• Anberlin.com
• Cities album site
• Anberlin on PureVolume
• Anberlin on MySpace
• Anberlin on Buzznet
• Anberlin on YouTube
• Anchor & Braille (Stephen Christian's side-project)
• Stephen Christian's personal weblog
• AnberlinFans.com - Interactive fansite
• Anberlin videos