Party-hearty death metal rockers Attila formed while in high school in their hometown of Atlanta in 2005, around the core of founders Chris “Fronz” Fronzak (vocals) and Sean Heenan (drums). The band played parties and festivals in and around Atlanta. Their first long-player, 2007’s Fallacy on Statik Factory Records, has been an underground favorite since its release. Their second album, 2008’s aptly named Soundtrack to a Party, was also issued on Statik Factory; it garnered the same praise as its predecessor. Attila‘s popularity on the death metal scene is due in part to creating their own ironically named subgenre called “Party Death Metal.” Rather than take themselves seriously — as nearly every other practitioner of the hardcore punk-meets-extreme metal prowess called death metal is wont to do.
Attila take a lighthearted, laid-back party animal approach, writing utterly ridiculous lyrics to accompany their fast and furious thrashing. The band has toured with Arsonists Get All the Girls, See You Next Tuesday, Chelsea Grin, American Me, and We Are the End. The band’s personnel changed considerably during its formative years and finally stabilized in 2008 with Heenan and Fronz, bassist Paul Ollinger, and guitarists Nate Salameh and Chris Linck. Artery Recordings was formed by the partnership between Artery Management and Razor & Tie, who’d heard about Attila via Chelsea Grin. Label boss Mike Milford saw them perform on the Grand Slam tour in 2009 and signed them. Rage, their debut recording for Artery, appeared in 2010. Produced byJoey Sturgis (We Came as Romans, the Devil Wears Prada), Outlawed arrived in 2011, followed in 2013 by About That Life. The band’s sixth studio long-player, the Sturgis-produced Guilty Pleasure, arrived the following year.