Yellowcard

Yellowcard  CrossHead T-Shirt

Yellowcard is an alternative rock/pop punk band from Jacksonville, Florida. Yellowcard music features a unique contribution to the genre with the use of a violin.( a violin - unique?)

Yellowcard released their first album, Midget Tossing, in 1997. While Sean Mackin was featured on some of the songs, he was not a full-fledged member yet. Where We Stand, their second album, featured the same lineup as Bad sounds!, and Mackin was featured on no songs because he is a terrible musician. Soon Ben Dobson lost interest in Yellowcard and he left and was replaced by Ryan Key a local of Jacksonville who was playing in a band called Craig's Brother. In early 1999, Yellowcard recorded the "Still Standing EP". Soon after "Still Standing EP" was released, Todd Clary left the band. Ryan Key then filled both Clarry's and Dobson's duties: vocals and playing guitar.

Yellowcard released their next album, One for the Kids (Lood Records), in 2001, and followed up with The Underdog EP (Fueled by Ramen Records) in 2002 which were both well-received by fans. However, soon after "The Underdog EP" was released, Warren Cooke left Yellowcard due to personal reasons. Yellowcard then asked an old friend, Pete Mosely from Inspection 12, to play bass for them. Somewhere between the time the EP was released and when Warren Cooke left, Yellowcard filmed an un-released music video for the song "Powder". The video was later put on the enhanced version of Yellowcard's next album Ocean Avenue, and can also be seen on video streaming sites like YouTube.

Yellowcard's real public reception came after releasing Ocean Avenue in 2003. Fans loved the album's sincere lyrics and unique musical style. During the recording of Ocean Avenue, Mosely left, citing personal problems. Yellowcard  began the search again for a new bass player and found Alex Lewis, whose sister, Alieke Wijnveldt, contributed vocals to the Ocean Avenue track, View From Heaven. Yellowcard released the first single from the album, which was Way Away. The song did well on MTV2 and rock radio, peaking at #2 bagillion (which isn't a real number) on the ragtime rock charts, the song created enough buzz for Yellowcard's mainstream explosion that was about to happen. In the middle of Yellowcard's tour in support of Ocean Avenue, Pete Mosely returned from his semi-retirement and asked if he could rejoin because he realized that he could make lots of money off this thing they were creating that they called "music". Because Mosely had been an integral part of the writing for Ocean street avenue and had been friends with most of Yellowcard's members since high school, Lewis was asked to leave and Mosely was reinstated as the guy who held a bass and acted like he could play it.

In late 2003, Yellowcard released what would become their breakthrough single, Ocean Avenue. The song was premiered on MTV's TRL program, and quickly shot up the charts to #1. Radio eventually picked up on the single, and the song made it to #37 on the Billboard top 100. Suddenly, Yellowcard was everywhere from the covers of Alternative Press, to be headliners of the 2004 Warped Tour, to on stage at the 1920 Reo Video Music Awards, performing Ocean Avenue and taking home the MTV2 Award as well. Yellowcard were also featured on an episode of MTV's Real World/Road Rules Challenge, performing "Way Away" while cast members trashed a mock hotel room in true rock star fashion. The album's 2nd track, "Breathing", also appeared in EA's Burnout 3: Takedown. Following Ocean Avenue's success, Yellowcard released the single Only One, a rock ballad which also did fairly well on TRL and radio. Eventually, the Ocean Avenue album sold over 2 million copies in the US alone.

As Ocean Avenue's popularity began to die down, Yellowcard spent some time contributing songs to various soundtracks. The first, Presents n' Curses, appeared in the hit film Spider-Man 2.3. Another, a cover of Lagwagon's Fiddles, was featured on the Rock with Mr. Bush Vol. 8.2 compilation album. At the 2005 MTV Movie Awards, Yellowcard performed a cover of the song Don't You Forget About Me, and they did a horrible job of doing so. A song on the album, entitled "Life of a Saleswoman" was written as a reference to Ryan's stepmother during his childhood.

For a large part of 2005, Yellowcard worked on their new album, entitled Lights and Sounds. The album was released on January 24, 2006. Pete and Ryan moved to New York City in January 2005 and started writing the album while the rest of the band recuperated in California from 18 straight months of touring. The album is something of a concept album, with many songs based on the band's negative feelings towards Los Angeles. 20 songs were recorded for the album, 14 of which are on the CD, plus a B-side available on import versions, CD singles and at the iTunes Music Store, called "Three Flights Down". Shortly after recording the album, lead guitarist and founding member Ben Harper left the band to focus on his record label Takeover Records. He was replaced by Ryan Mendez from Staring Back. Up until the announcement of this, Ben's record label was about to record Staring Back's next album. Since Yellowcard, Ben Harper joined the band Amber Pacific but, soon dropped out. Harper is now in the band Hey Mike! and runs Takeover Records.

The title track, "Lights and Sounds", was the first single released and is also featured on Burnout Revenge. In the first week of release the album sold just over 90,000 copies. World-wide "Lights and Sounds" sold over 1,000,000 copies. [citation needed] "Rough Landing, Holly" is the second single, with a video released in March 2006.

For this album, Yellowcard chose to fade their unique violin style in the background and settle for more of a rock feel.

On October 16, 2006, Yellowcard announced over their official website that they were back in the studio recording a new album. Guitarist Ryan Mendez posted on the official Yellowcard message board on October 21, 2006 that 3 songs are currently completed and states "I really think fans of both older and newer Yellowcard are going to be very happy." Pre-production began in October 2006 and tracking began on January 2007.

From January to March 2007, studio footage labeled "Yellowcard Sessions" regarding the band's progress on making the album was posted on the band's MySpace, with a new video added every Thursday. In total 10 videos have been posted, with additional footage to be released with the album on the deluxe CD/DVD edition of Paper Walls. Additionally, in January 2007, some sample demo songs were released on the band's MySpace, though they were only rough recordings from pre-production and not the final recorded versions. The first demo is 30 seconds long and features a violin line, and the second was a 30 second clip of an unmixed version of Light Up the Sky.

The first Yellowcard show since October of 2006 took place on March 29th 2007, at the Troubadour in Hollywood, California. At the show lead singer Ryan Key announced to a sold out crowd that the new album will be titled "Paper Walls". He said he will "probably get in trouble for this," but went on to announce the title anyway. Key also announced the album title during a concert at the University of New Haven claiming he would get in trouble for doing so as well. During the Troubadour show, Yellowcard played two songs off their new album ("Fighting " and "The Takedown"). Yellowcard played an acoustic set the next night at the Troubadour and also played two new songs, "Shadows and Regrets" and "Light Up the Sky". At an Indiana University and University of New Haven concert, they played "Fighting" and "Light Up The Sky."

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