At the moment this has been lifted directly off
the official site at milliondead.com.
I will hopefully get around to actually typing out my own version
sometime soon.
Million Dead came together in London, mid-2001. Cameron Dean (guitar)
and Julia Ruzicka (bass) had both come to England from Australia
with forming a band in mind. They met and started writing, before
roping in Ben Dawson (drums), who had been Cameron's underling
in a record store. Ben then called up his old friend Frank Turner
who'd been the singer in various bands with him since age 11.
The name was chosen from a line in a song by swedish punk band
Refused, and in September of that year we recorded our first demo
and began gigging around the uk.
Over the next year support slots were begged, wheedled
and stolen with Cave In, 80's Matchbox B-Line Disaster, The Icarus
Line and Alec Empire. In late 2002 we came across the folks at
Integrity Records, and, hooking up with them and Xtramile Recordings
we put out our first single, 'Smiling At Strangers On Trains',
in February 2003. this saw support from John Peel (RIP), Mike
Davies, Mary Anne Hobbes, and Steve Lamacq and was followed by
a support slot with Pitchshifter on their farewell tour.
April 2003 saw us in Mighty Atom studios recording
our debut album, 'A Song To Ruin'. this was released in Septmeber,
hot on the heels of second single 'Breaking The Back' and a nomination
as best newcomer in the Kerrang Awards. More touring with Funeral
For A Friend ensued, and we rounded off the year with our very
first headline tour and third single, 'I Am The Party', which
was A-listed by MTV2.
2004 took us to Austin Texas for the SXSW Festival,
and then saw us out on the road for bloody ages in April and May
in support of our single for Xtramile Recordings, 'I Gave My Eyes
To Stevie Wonder'. Shortly afterwards, in June, original guitarist
Cameron left the band to get married, and was replaced by the
wonderful Tom Fowler (ex-Abjure, Pale Horse etc.). After a summer
of breaking the new boy in at various UK festivals, and the release
of 'A Song To Ruin' in Japan, Australia and Italy, we settled
in to write our second album. This was done in October, and in
November and December we headed in to Battery Studios with producer
Mark Williams to record.
Whch brings us to the present: the new album is
ready to go, first single 'Living The Dream' was released on March
21st, to be followed by download-only single 'After The Rush Hour'
on May 9th. The album, 'Harmony No Harmony' will follow on May16th.
Get ready...