Hollywood Undead is an American Nu metal band from Los Angeles, California. Hollywood Undead was formed in 2005 by two of the six members, Aron Erlichman, going by the nickname of Deuce, and Jorel Decker, going by the nickname of J-Dog. The band members wear masks to show a creative side to Hollywood Undead, usually performing with the masks on for two to three songs, then taking them off for the rest of the show. The band posted their first song titled "The Kids" on their Myspace profile, which led to positive reviews. Not long after, the band recruited friends Jeff Philips (Shady Jeff), Jordon Terrell (Charlie Scene), Dylan Alvarez (Funny Man), George Ragan (Johnny Three Tears), and Matthew St. Claire (Da Kurlzz). The band members got their band names for a reason. Aron Erlichman got the nickname Deuce, which was shortened from Tha Producer, because he was one of the bands producer. Jorel Decker became J-Dog mostly from his initials. Jordon Terrell goes by the name Charlie Scene, which is a mix up with Charlie Sheen in order to cause confusion. Dylan Alvarez goes by the name Funny Man, which is meant to be ironic because in the Desperate Measures interviews,
Charlie Scene explained that Dylan Alvarez was given the name because he was so un-funny, it was funny. George Ragan got the name Johnny Three Tears, with Johnny being a name he likes, and Three Tears was the band he was in before Hollywood Undead. Jeff Philips went by Shady Jeff, and Matthew St. Claire became Da Kurlzz due to his curly hair. Though they have all been childhood friends, J-Dog stated in an interview saying, "Whoever was in the room at the time and played an instrument was in the band." Shady Jeff is no longer in the band as of 2007, leaving for reasons currently unknown.
The band first signed a record deal with Myspace Records in 2005, but the band later left after Myspace tried to censor their music. Hollywood Undead finally found a record label that would not censor their music, signing with A&M/Octone Records. On September 2nd, 2008, Hollywood Undead released their debut album Swan Songs. The album sold 21,000 copies in its first week. On November 10th, 2009, the band released the album Desperate Measures as a CD/DVD set with six unreleased new songs, three of which were cover songs, and an unreleased remix of Everywhere I Go. In 2010, Deuce was no longer in the band. Nobody really knew why Deuce was no longer in the band, until interviewer Bryan Stars of Youtube interviewed Johnny Three Tears and Da Kurlzz. The two stated that the band had to constantly satisfy Deuce while they were touring. Da Kurlzz told the interviewer, " We bent over backwards to accomodate Deuce." Johnny Three Tears then told him, "It was so bad, that I don't think there would've been another record if he was still with us. It was just that he didn't like being on the road, so we had to do things to make him happy. He also claimed to be writing all the songs, and all this bullshit." Later on, Charlie and J-Dog were interviewed by Martini Beerman of rock.com. The two were interviewed to explain the final events of Deuce's departure. Charlie told the interviewer, "He wanted to have his personal assistant come on the tour. None of us have personal assistants, we're not egomaniacs. We don't need that, and he wanted the band to pay for it, and we did for like four months. After that we were like, we're not gonna pay $800 to have your buddy out on tour. We went to the airport to fly out for our next tour, and he didn't show up. We were like, what the fuck do we do? We called him and he didn't answer. So for the first two weeks of that tour, I sang all his parts." After the first two weeks of the tour, the band asked long time friend and American Idol Daniel Murillo to fill in for Deuce. Daniel accepted and joined the band temporarily, therefore dropping out of the American Idol competition. In mid-January, the band announced that Daniel Murillo was an official member of Hollywood Undead, going by the nickname of Danny.
The band wasted no time writing material for their second studio album American Tragedy. The band started their own iheartradio station on April 1st, 2010. In recent interviews at the time, the band stated intentions to record American Tragedy in the summer of 2010, and then release it in the fall. The band confirmed that producer Don Gilmore, who worked with Hollywood Undead on their debut album Swan Songs, was going to work with them for American Tragedy. The band finally concluded recording around mid-November, and they started mixing the album the day after Thanksgiving. Hollywood Undead started a marketing campaign for their second studio album American Tragedy. They co-headlined The Nightmare After Christmas Tour with Avenged Sevenfold and Stone Sour to support the album. On December 8th of 2010, they released the artwork for the album's first single, Hear Me Now. The song was released for playing on the radio and on the band's Youtube page, and on December 21st, was released as a digital single online. J-Dog commented that is was his favorite song that the band had done thus far, because the lyrics tell of a person who is depressed and hopeless. On January 11th, 2011, Hollywood Undead officially announced that the new album would be titled American Tragedy. On the twelfth, they put a preview of American Tragedy on their Youtube page. Nine days later on the 21st, the band released their new single Comin' In Hot, which became available as a free download. The Comin' In Hot trailer revealed that the album would be released in March 2011. In a recent interview at the time, Hollywood Undead stated that American Tragedy would release on the 8th of March, but on February 22nd, was announced that the release date would be pushed back to April 5th. February 6th, Hollywood Undead released their all-new single Been To Hell for free download. J-Dog stated that he would continue to release sample music until the album's release date. The songs were released for Hollywood Undead website members, Hollywood Undead e-mail subscribers, and to their official Facebook page. American Tragedy became much more of a success than Swan Songs, selling nearly 67,000 copies in its first week, wheras Swan Songs only sold 21,000 copies in its first week. Deciding to continue promoting the album, Hollywood Undead headlined The Revolt Tour with the bands 10 Years, Drive A, and New Medicine. The Revolt Tour was very successful and lasted from April 6th to May 27th in 2011. After The Revolt Tour, the band headed to Europe, Canada, and Australia, where they played several shows each. After that, they headlined The Endless Summer Tour, along with special guests All That Remains and Hyro Da Hero, which took place July 18th to August 7th, 2011. In the same month, the band stated that they were going to be releasing a remix album which would feature multiple American Tragedy songs to be remixed. The band held a remix contest for the songs Bullet and Le Deux. The remix winning fans won money, band merchandise, and their winning song on the new album. The album was announced to be titled American Tragedy Redux, and a music video was released for the song Levitate (Digital Dog Club Mix). The album was officially released on November 21st, 2011. Before the release of American Tragedy Redux, the band went on to perform The World War III Tour, with special guests Asking Alexandria, We Came As Romans, Borgore, and D.R.U.G.S. After The World War III Tour, Hollywood Undead then headed on to perform on the Buried Alive Tour, reuniting with Avenged Sevenfold, again with Asking Alexandria, and Black Veil Brides. The tour lasted November 11th to December 14th.
After the album American Tragedy Redux and The World War III Tour, Charlie Scene announced that the band was planning for a third studio album. The band had already been writing and recording demos on The Buried Alive Tour. Charlie also stated that the album would sound a lot more like Swan Songs than American Tragedy. Charlie told an interviewer, "I would say that this time the label gave us full creative control. I think it's going to be a lot more like Swan Songs than American Tragedy. It'll be a mixture of both; I mean, we all grow as artists, we get older, and we've been doing it a long so I think it'll be a lot more like Swan Songs and I think the fans are gonna like it a lot."
