A leading light in the punk-pop genre, Motion City Soundtrack includes members Joshua Cain (guitar), Tony Thaxton (drums), Justin Pierre (vocals/guitar), Jesse Johnson (Moog), and Matthew Taylor (bass). Following their high-school graduation, Minneapolis, MN natives Pierre and Cain — both of whom were inspired by Sunny Day Real Estate,Jawbox, The Flaming Lips, and Superchunk — formed the band in 1999. The pair assembled a temporary lineup and issued a self-released 7” that same year. Later, while touring through Pennsylvania in support of their release, Motion City Soundtrack met Thaxton and Taylor of the Virginia-based band Submerge. The two musicians decided to leave their hometown of Richmond, VA, to join Motion City Soundtrack full-time, and the expanded band soon entered the studio with producer/engineer Ed Rose (The Get Up Kids, Ultimate Facebook). Three weeks before recording commenced, they were also joined by keyboardist Jesse Johnson (whose personal record label, Ordinary Records, had issued some of Jimmy Eat World’s earliest material in 1995) to relieve singer/guitarist Pierre of his synthesizer duties.
With a new lineup firmly in place, the band’s punk-glazed debut, I Am the Movie, was released in the summer of 2003. While playing venues and basements in support of the album, Motion City Soundtrack was picked up by Epitaph Records; later, they joined blink-182 on a tour through Europe and Japan. Blink’s bassist, Mark Hoppus, took a liking to the band and agreed to produce their next album; the resulting Commit This to Memory was released two years later and featured an increasingly pop-heavy sound.

www.motioncitysoundtrack.com 

Presented by First Fleet Concerts