Biography

Based out of Los Angeles, post-hardcore quintet Letlive formed in 2002. With a frantic, driving sound, the band fuses some of the technical fury of At the Drive-In with a more direct, passionate delivery. The band made its debut in 2004 with Exhaustion, Saltwater, and Everything in Between, released on At One Records. They followed up quickly the next year, releasing Speak Like You Talk, all the while slowly building up their credentials. During these years, the band had a bit of a rotating lineup of members, which finally firmed up in 2009 with a roster consisting of singer Jason Aalon Butler (the group's only founding member), guitarists Jean Nascimento and Jeff Sahyoun, drummer Anthony Rivera, and bassist Ryan Jay Johnson. That year, Letlive signed on with Tragic Hero, which released their third album, Fake History, in 2010. Shortly afterwards, the group made the jump to punk giant Epitaph, which reissued Fake History in 2011 with a handful of bonus tracks. This album was seen as something of a breakthrough for the band in certain circles, and their audience grew, based in large part to their increasingly explosive live shows. They followed up in 2013 with fourth album The Blackest Beautiful. Increasingly inspired by the political landscape in America, the band re-entered the studios with producer Justyn Pilbrow to record their fifth album, the left-leaning, politically charged If I'm the Devil... The album, released in June 2016, found the band finally feeling they had defined the Letlive sound. ~ Gregory Heaney