Created in 1998 by Jared Leto and his brother, Shannon, 30 Seconds to Mars began as a small family project. Things began to speed up quickly, however, and Matt Wachter later joined the band as bassist and keyboard player. After a small revolving door of guitarists (as the band's first two guitarists, Kevin Drake and Solon Bixler, left the band due to issues primarily related to touring), the three auditioned Tomo Milicevic to round out the band's roster. According to an interview from Virgin Records, the band's name "actually comes from a thesis that [the band] found online [that] was written by a former Harvard professor. And one of the subsections of the thesis was titled 'thirty seconds to mars' and he goes on to talk about the expediential growth of technology that relates to humans and saying that we are quite literally thirty seconds to mars. What it means to us is, we thought it best described our music, in short."[1][citation needed] Although Leto is a Hollywood actor, he originally preferred not to use this information to promote the band; in fact, the band used to refuse to play at venues that used his fame to promote shows.[citation needed] 30 Seconds to Mars' first, self-titled, album, produced by Bob Ezrin, was released in 2002 to mixed reviews and achieved sales of just over 100,000. The band's second album, A Beautiful Lie, was released on August 30, 2005. For this effort, the band traveled (during the course of three years) to four different continents, including five different countries, to perfect their sound and also to allow for Jared's film career. The album was produced by Josh Abraham, whose producing credits also include Orgy, Velvet Revolver, and Linkin Park. Because A Beautiful Lie was leaked five months before its release, the band decided to include two bonus tracks: "Battle of One" (an original song that was also set to be the album's title track when it was first announced) and "Hunter" (a cover of the Björk song of the same name). To further promote the album, the band also enclosed "golden tickets" in 12 copies, which grant their owners access to any 30 Seconds to Mars concert free of charge, along with backstage access. On August 31, 2006 the band won the MTV2 Award for "The Kill" at the MTV Video Music Awards, one of their two nominations. The second nomination was for Best Rock Video; however, they lost to AFI's "Miss Murder". The music video is loosely based on the film The Shining. A Beautiful Lie was certified Platinum by the RIAA in January for distribution of over 1,000,000 albums. In October, the band began their "Welcome to the Universe" tour, sponsored by MTV2. They were supported on this tour by Head Automatica, The Receiving End of Sirens, Cobra Starship, and several other bands including Street Drum Corps. On November 20, MTV2 premiered the video for "From Yesterday"; the video is the first American rock video ever shot in its entirety in the People's Republic of China.[2] As of Spring 2007, the band is supporting The Used as a part of the "Taste of Chaos" tour and have scheduled a string of dates in Europe supporting Linkin Park. They are also scheduled to play Roskilde, Rock am Ring, Pinkpop, and Download festivals; on April 29th they will perform at the MTV Australia Video Music Awards, at which they have been nominated for three awards, and after this will then begin working on their third album. On March 1, 2007, bassist Matt Wachter announced his departure from the band live on stage during the band's El Paso, Texas "Taste of Chaos" set. This was confirmed the following day with a statement on the band's website.[3] He has since been replaced by Tim Kelleher (not the actor), who has been seen playing at the band's concerts. It is unknown if this is a temporary or permanent change. On April 4, 2007, the band posted a link on their MySpace blog to vote for the next single. The choices available were "A Beautiful Lie," "The Fantasy," "Savior," and "The Story."
Jared Leto is an American actor and musician. He is known for his critically-acclaimed portrayal of a drug addict in Requiem for a Dream. Leto is also the vocalist and guitarist of the rock band 30 Seconds to Mars.
and inspiration, shaping Shannon's life, personality, and musical creativity. Being close to his mother and brother, Shannon had a great support system. That support helped him tremendously while he explored his many options and talents. Shannon has delved into acting on a small scale, but seems to have found his niche in music. Shannon is the drummer for 30 Seconds to Mars, one of the most popular up and coming bands today. Shannon got his start with drumming on pots and pans at age 4, progressing to a practice pad at age 6. Soon after, at age 8, he was playing on his very own set of drums. At the age of 12 he started playing in a jazz band. He was unable to join them for a second season because the teacher found out he couldn't read music and he didn't get called back for the audition.
In his spare time, Shannon enjoys photography, which has proved to be a productive and creative outlet for him as well. He shared his photography talent on the 30 Seconds to Mars self-titled album, as well as several professional photo shoots and photos of many Echelon in their different fashion creations, tattoos and body art. He also enjoys playing video games, playing practical jokes, and loves to experiment with different, sometimes eclectic, hairstyles.
30 Seconds to Mars has recently toured the United States and Europe. They will be heading to Australia and Japan in the near, near future. It seems the sky is the limit for this amazing band.
Tomislav (Tomo) Milicevic (Written 
in Croatian and pronounced Militchevitch) is born in Sarajevo (ex-Yugoslavia and Bosnia-Herzegovina today), on September 3rd 1979, but is family is of Croatian origin. He has an elder sister, actress and model, Ivana and a younger brother, Filip. When Tomo turned 8, the whole bunch, parents - Damir and Tonka Milicevic - included, emigrated to the US, specifically Detroit, Michigan.
