Audio By Carbonatix
To call A Life of Science “ambitious” would be an understatement.
The Phoenix band’s debut concept album, The Apneist, has grown
into a multimedia project that spans both coasts and makes the
cross-promotional efforts of bands like Coheed & Cambria seem
almost underwhelming by comparison. A Life of Science released The
Apneist digitally on iTunes in late April, but that marked only the
first stage of a multi-tiered assault on the senses that is slated to
include a film, a novel, and a comic book series — all based
around the album’s storyline.
The creative force behind A Life of Science is the duo of
singer/bassist James Keenan, 25, and guitarist Zakk Geist, 24. The
longtime friends met in grade school and have been musical
collaborators since their early teens. They began writing music for
The Apneist in 2007, eventually bringing drummer Angel Garcia
and guitarist Scott Passamonte onboard to complete the lineup. The
scope of the project expanded as the songwriting progressed, Keenan
says.
“Originally, we were just going to do your classic concept album,
with the story and lyrics,” he says. “Then, as we started telling
everybody about it, we really started to get attached to the story.
(Our friends) were like, ‘Why stop there? Why don’t you do a comic book
and a video and really make this as multimedia as possible?’ We were
like, ‘Oh, yeah, yeah, right. Sure, we’ll do that.’ But then we started
to realize, wait a minute, so-and-so writes novels. Wait a minute, we
know video production people. Wait a minute, we can do this.”
Wed., June 3, 6 p.m., 2009
