30 Seconds to Mars
Written by YH STAFF   
Sunday, 27 September 2009

It's happened before. In fact, it's kind of a clich. It seem every actor wants to be a rock star, and every rock star wants to be an actor. Make up your minds already.Keanu Reeves had Dogstar, the band for which he plays bass guitar. Keanu admits to having limited skill, but does it for the fun. In between Oscar ceremonies, Russell Crowe is front man for the band, 30 Odd Foot of Grunts, and lets not forget the Bacon Brothers, an admirable past time for Kevin Bacon (when he's not shooting Hanes commercials.) Even Emmy winner Kiefer Sutherland has his own rock record label.And of course, there are the musicians that want to be actors. Justin Timberlake makes his debut in the movie, Alpha Dog, and Gavin Rossdale earned a fair amount of praise for his turn in Constantine. But a musician usually has limited success as an actor " think of Brittany Spears.But when actors become musicians, it is NEVER something you hear on the radio, at least not on rock radio. For some reason, it is hard to buy an actor with actual street cred picking up a microphone and belting out a song. It just doesn't feel right.But every once in a while, an actor impresses us and actually makes the crossover. One promising young man has made both careers legitimate. At least for now. Of all the new bands that have made a splash this year, none is more popular and edgy as 30 Seconds to Mars, and guess who fronts that band?Jared Leto, the actor, er, the musician, er, you get the idea.Jared rose to fame on the critically acclaimed but short lasting television show, My So-Called Life. But his roles gradually grew darker and darker, culminating in his latest turn as the assassin Mark David Chapman in the film, Chapter 27.But if his acting choices are dark, his screamo music is downright black.He founded his band in the 90's and released an album that went nowhere. He was just another one of those actors who picked up a guitar. But something changed on the last record -- they intentionally tried to make it more radio-friendly.A Beautiful Lie was released in 2005. It has sold 600,000 copies so far, which in the current economic climate of the music industry is pretty damn good. He even managed to land two alternative rock radio hits, ''The Kill'' and ''From Yesterday.ùWhat will the future hold for Jared's band? Who knows? But right now, they are the hottest band out there, and we salute one of Young Hollywood's finest proving that you don't have to be one or the other. You can actually do both.Rock on.

SHARE:

Share on Twitter
Share on Facebook
Share on Myspace
Delicious
Share on Digg
Share on Stumbleupon


< Prev   Next >
 

Add comment


Security code
Refresh