Motion City Soundtrack
Motion City Soundtrack is an American rock band formed in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1997. The band's line-up consists of vocalist and guitarist Justin Pierre, lead guitarist Joshua Cain, keyboardist Jesse Johnson, bassist Matthew Taylor, and drummer Tony Thaxton. Over the course of their career, the group has toured heavily and released seven studio albums, the majority on independent label Epitaph Records. The band's sound, usually described as pop-punk and/or emo, makes notable use of the Moog synthesizer. Pierre mainly handles the band's lyrics, which often touch on themes of anxiety, alienation, relationships, and self-destructive behavior.
The band was founded by Cain and Pierre, and took several years to form a stable lineup. I Am the Movie, the group's debut album, was released in 2003. Their commercial breakthrough, Commit This to Memory, arrived in 2005, and its follow-up Even If It Kills Me was similarly successful. For many years, the band was a staple of the Warped Tour. They briefly signed to major label Columbia for My Dinosaur Life, but the label dropped the band shortly after and rejoined Epitaph for Go in 2012. Its follow-up, Panic Stations, arrived in 2015. The group disbanded the following year, but they announced a reunion in 2019, issuing their seventh album, The Same Old Wasted Wonderful World, in 2025.
The staff of Consequence ranked the band at number 75 on their list of "The 100 Best Pop Punk Bands" in 2019. In 2025, Terry Bezer of Screen Rant included the band in his list of "10 Forgotten Pop-Punk Bands Who Deserve To Be Better Remembered".
History
Formation and early years (1997–2003)
Motion City Soundtrack was formed in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1997 by singer-songwriter Justin Courtney Pierre and guitarist Joshua Allen Cain. Previously, the duo had separately played in a number of bands. Cain was in a group named the Saddest Girl Story, and recruited Pierre to join as a singer. He was subsequently in a band called Boxcar, and following its dissolution, he and Pierre founded Motion City Soundtrack together. The band's name was inspired by a defunct film project that was originally created by Cain's brother, Brian. Their early days were difficult, as they found it hard to break out of their local scene. When they could get weeks off from their jobs, they would tour. According to Cain, the members of the band soon realized that there "wasn't really anywhere to play in Minneapolis", and that they would have to "tour all the time" to rise in popularity. In its early years, the group went through several lineup changes. Through these, Cain and Pierre would often have to take over keyboard duties during shows. The group's first release was a 7-inch single, "Promenade / Carolina", released in 1999. Their next two releases, both extended plays—Kids for America and Back to the Beat—were released the following year.Over the course of the early 2000s, the band continued to tour and shuffle through members. In late 2001, while touring in Milton, Pennsylvania with the band Submerge, they convinced two of its members—bassist Matthew Scott Taylor and drummer Tony Richard Thaxton—to join the band. Thaxton initially took about a year to convince to join the band. Jesse Mack Johnson, a friend and co-worker of Cain's, joined the band as keyboardist just three weeks before the band recorded their first album. Johnson had never played the keyboard before but Cain taught him the parts that had already been written. After their first attempt at self-recording an album failed, the band culled together $6,000 to record with producer Ed Rose, best known for his work with the Get Up Kids. They recorded much of their debut album, I Am the Movie, in ten days. Initial copies were hand-packaged inside floppy disks, which were sold out of the back of their tour van for a year.
The band began receiving offers from various record labels, including Universal, Triple Crown Records, and Drive-Thru Records, and they performed at industry showcases. Meanwhile, Brett Gurewitz, founder of Epitaph Records, learned of the band from members of the group Matchbook Romance. He attended four of their shows in Los Angeles that Pierre later regarded as among his worst, as his voice was poor from constant touring. While they were interested in Universal, they chose to sign to Epitaph as they felt the contract was less restrictive and more honest. Eli Janney from Girls Against Boys helped the band secure management and a lawyer. Motion City became part of a slew of Epitaph signings, including Matchbook Romance, Scatter the Ashes and From First to Last, amid concerns the Southern California label had strayed too far from its roots, and seemed "a little too emo."
Breakthrough and success (2003–2006)
After signing with Epitaph, they recorded three new songs with the bands Reggie and the Full Effect and Ultimate Fakebook for a triple split EP which was never released. The new songs were added to the second release of I Am the Movie, which was released via Epitaph on June 24, 2003. Epitaph afforded the quartet wider distribution and a proper budget, which allowed them to re-record several songs on the album to match their original vision. During this time, the band visited the United Kingdom for the first time in 2003 while on tour with Sugarcult, followed by an inaugural stint on Warped Tour 2003. The band continued to tour heavily into the next year, with US dates alongside Rufio, Mae, and Fall Out Boy, plus Simple Plan and MxPx. A European leg—titled the "Totally Wicked Awesome Tour"—featured the group with Sugarcult, the All-American Rejects, and Limbeck. That year, the band also filmed music videos for the singles "The Future Freaks Me Out" and "My Favorite Accident". Their fame grew concurrently with a second appearance on the Warped Tour 2004, where they were considered by fans to be a "must-see" act.File:Motion City Soundtrack in Denver.jpg|thumb|The band performing in Denver, Colorado in 2005.
The band joined Blink-182 for touring stints in Europe and Japan later in the year, at the recommendation of the band's bassist, Mark Hoppus. Cain invited Hoppus to produce Motion City's sophomore album, and he accepted. The album, Commit This to Memory, was recorded at Seedy Underbelly Studios, a suburban home converted into a studio in Los Angeles' Valley Village region. It was written partially in their hometown of Minneapolis and in Los Angeles, during a period in which Pierre was seeking treatment for alcohol abuse. Commit This to Memory was the first album by the band to feature material crafted by each musician in the group, as previous releases had featured songs written in the years prior to each member joining. In addition, the band also had more time and funds to create the album. During its recording process, Motion City embarked on their first headlining tour, titled "The Sub-Par Punk Who Cares Tour 2004". At the year's end, the band had played over 270 concerts.
Commit This to Memory, which was leaked to file sharing websites months before its official debut, saw release on June 7, 2005, peaking at number two on Billboard Independent Albums chart. Pierre estimated that by 2015 the album had sold nearly 500,000 copies. The band's music videos found regular rotation on networks such as MTV2, and the band also performed on Late Night with Conan O'Brien. However, their mainstream breakthrough brought detractors, and they became a target for critics of pop punk: " frequently characterized as the sort of ultra-commercial punk poseurs who water down the genre to the point of drowning it," wrote Michael Roberts of Westword. The group continued to tour constantly, and started attracting larger crowds. They began the year with the inaugural Epitaph Tour, alongside Matchbook Romance and From First to Last. It was followed by dates on the Warped Tour 2005, and the Nintendo Fusion Tour with Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco, and the Starting Line, which was their largest nationwide tour to that point.
Continued success (2007–2011)
The band's follow-up, Even If It Kills Me, was recorded in New York City with Eli Janney, Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne, and Ric Ocasek of the Cars. The group, though big fans of his work, were disappointed with Ocasek's role. "He just confused me the whole time," said Pierre later, who noted that he was afraid to disclose that the experience was a "bum-out." Pierre struggled with writer's block during the sessions and found himself writing lyrics while recording the songs, which he had never done before. The band was also worried their songs would not be catchy enough after their last album was so successful. During this time, Pierre's substance issues nearly disbanded the group. "I think it's an understatement to say it is tough to be tied to Justin's emotions," Cain remarked at the time. Following completion of the album, Pierre entered a rehabilitation program for alcohol and drug abuse. The band was apart for a six-week stretch in mid-2007, marking their longest break apart in five years. "It might sound clichéd, but we all had a chance to do some growing up," said Cain.Even If It Kills Me was released on September 18, 2007, and represented a large leap from the group's last chart performance: it peaked at number 16 on the Billboard 200 and number one on the magazine's Independent Albums chart. "This Is for Real" became their best-charting single, peaking at number 48 in Australia. Cain later felt that the band placed far too much emphasis at the time on "numbers and trajectory instead of the creative process." The following year saw a rise in profile for the band: they worked out promotional deals with Coca-Cola and Pepsi, their music was licensed in various television shows, movies, and video games, and they toured heavily. The band released an acoustic EP featuring songs from Even if It Kills Me in May 2008. After the release of that EP, the band toured on the Honda Civic Tour with Panic at the Disco and Phantom Planet, and then joined the last weeks of the Warped Tour 2008. In September, they headlined on The Left Handed Forms of Human Endeavor Tour.
Motion City signed a multiple-album deal with Columbia Records several months before releasing their previous album. Following the move, the guitarist Joshua Cain said, "It just felt right to make the move when there was the right interest there." With the new signing, the band's promotional team aimed to develop a balance between the benefits of a new major label and their previous grass-roots approach. Their next album saw the band reunite with producer Mark Hoppus, and the album was mostly recorded at his studio in North Hollywood, Opra Music, between April and June 2009. Hoppus said that the band wanted to follow in the tracks of Commit This to Memory, but to push things further. Pierre later recalled that the atmosphere in the studio was more loose than their first time working with Hoppus. The band picked the title My Dinosaur Life after a quote Pierre kept repeating—they felt it a nice representation of the album's themes, which include growing old and feeling out of place. After completing the album, the band toured with Blink-182 on their reunion tour, and Pierre undertook a promotional tour called On the Dino Trail wherein he performed acoustic sets.
My Dinosaur Life was released to acclaim from music critics upon its debut on January 19, 2010, and it represented the band's all-time best chart performance, peaking at number 15 on the Billboard 200. They supported Weezer on several dates during this time, and they began a headlining tour in late January in the US. In the first three months following the album's release, the band continued to tour heavily: they traveled to Australia for the national Soundwave festival, as well as to Japan and the UK. The band also began to receive radio airplay for the first time in their career, and they released a music video for the single "Her Words Destroyed My Planet". The group embarked on a large tour with Say Anything between October and November 2010, and premiered a self-shot video for "A Lifeless Ordinary" during that time. Columbia dropped the band later that year, with the commercial performance of My Dinosaur Life leading to the split. "I guess we didn't do as well as they hoped or expected us to," said Pierre that year. "And we felt that having all their resources at our disposal would perhaps propel us into another dimension. But we are what we are regardless of what label or machine is behind us. We did exceptionally well, though, if you want to look strictly at sales numbers in today's climate."