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Madina Lake is a quiet, sleepy, lakeside town perched in the valley of its guardian mountains. Set in the 1950's, the town is lost and isolated from the rest of the world. Its grounds are the setting for many strange occurrences. It's a microcosm of a society, enriched with social, political and meta-physical nuances. A place where lies, crimes, and deceit, are buried by its inhabitants. Such a place compels a soundtrack…

Most artists claim they would suffer for their art. The founding members of Chicago’s Madina Lake gamely faced death for theirs; falling from helicopters, ingesting maggot-covered rotten meat and eventually being hospitalized, all in the name of rock n' roll. A year before they were recovering from their adventure in hospital, identical twins Nathan (vocals) and Matthew Leone (bass) had joined forces with guitarist Mateo Camargo and drummer Daniel Torelli - musicians who shared the siblings’ vision for creating hook-laden, pop culture-inspired pop punk with a message – to form Madina Lake, named after the fictional ‘50’s town from a story Matthew penned. The town is turned upside down when it’s famous socialite, Adalia, mysteriously disappears. "Madina Lake is a microcosm of what's happening in America today," explains Nathan. "Everyone wants to be famous and live louder than everyone else." Tackling the consequences of society's fixation with pop culture and materialism might seem like heady stuff for a rock band, but Madina Lake isn't out to bring listeners down. Their sense of humor might be due in no small part to the time they experienced that “living louder” lifestyle firsthand. Egged on by friends, the Leone brothers applied for and were accepted to appear on a special twins episode of the reality TV show Fear Factor. “The producers asked us ‘Why do you want to be on the show?’” Nathan recalled. “We were like ‘We don’t. We’re not athletic types, we’re skinny little rock dudes!’ I guess they liked that we didn’t care.”

Accepting the Fear Factor challenge in hopes of scoring the big cash prize to kick-start their career, the brothers were faced with what many consider to be the vilest stunt ever attempted on the show - chewing meat off rotting cow jaws and wading it through a chest-deep trench of offal to a grinder before drinking the ground-up maggot-infested sludge. Other tasks involved jumping from a helicopter and carrying out a daring rescue on a moving oil tanker. Though an infection nearly killed them, their ambition proved solid - they won.

The band went to Los Angeles to record their debut album with Mark Trombino (Jimmy Eat World, Finch, Blink 182) behind the board. Set for release on March 26, ‘From Them, Through Us, To You’ bounds from speakers with subtly catchy hooks and poignant vocals of brilliantly-crafted lyrics. Anthemic album opener ‘Here I Stand’ starts with a delicate introduction before erupting into fast guitar. "At first listen it sounds like it's about losing a girl and being bummed about being alone," Nathan says. "It's really about what you do if you might not be able to realize your dream. How do you live your life?"

The album's debut single is the turbulent, secret-revealing ‘House of Cards’ which is led by a driving beat and tormented vocals. Nathan explains the track is about "people who keep a million secrets. No one will admit it, but if you pry a little you'll find out the weirdest things about people." ‘Adalia’, titled after the missing socialite, is fittingly experimental for a song Nathan says is about "girls that really struggle with things like depression and anxiety…the super-famous social butterfly who has all the demons underneath." Fans are invited to gradually solve the mystery of her disappearance by following a steady trail of clues from the band’s art and website, which began with the release of US EP The Disappearance Of Adalia (released digitally in the UK due to overwhelming demand).

While many songs that tell the Madina Lake story are ultimately about people or society, in general the band is not afraid to get highly personal as displayed on the track ‘Me Vs. World’. Set against dark, hook-laden instrumentals are lyrics about "feeling completely outcast, alone, and not understanding how the world works and why people don't feel the same as you”; the song is at once about the twins’ loss of their mother at a young age, and about the struggle of adolescence. "We're not going to be afraid to talk about what we believe," Nathan elaborates. "We don't put constraints on ourselves. We want to carve a brand new path and do our own thing."

Copyright 2008 © Roadrunner Records

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