Televators - The Mars Volta

At the Drive-in broke up in 2001 due to differences of opinion on what direction to take the band. One side( Cedric Bixlar-Zavala, Omar Rodriguez-Lopez) wanted to take it in a more progressive experimental direction, and the other wanted to focus on the rock aspects of the music and take it in a more traditional rock direction. The band split and both sides went the way they had wanted, forming The Mars Volta and Sparta.

Now, as much as I love At the Drive-in, if the sole reason for them splitting was to form The Mars Volta I say it was worth it. Listening to a Mars Volta album is unlike anything else. You get sucked into the storyline of each album so intensly that when it ends, and the silence begins again (there is no silence on any of the albums) it is a rough jolt back to the real world. But because the instrumental aspect of the music is so incredible the lyrics get overlooked just about everytime in reviews and conversations (I know I always talk about the music), but Bixlar-Zavalas poetry on the records is amazing and matches the intensity of the music perfectly.