Biography
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Years Active
1997 – present (26 years)
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Founded In
Snellville, Gwinnett County, Georgia, United States
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Members
- David Murphy
- David Phipps
- Hunter Brown
- Jeffree Lerner
- Zach Velmer
Since forming in Atlanta 15 years ago, instrumental electronic rock band STS9 has experienced a meteoric rise to the forefront of the international music scene. Consistently ranked among Pollstar magazine’s list of top-grossing touring acts, STS9—Hunter Brown (guitar/sequences), Alana Rocklin (bass guitar), Jeffree Lerner (percussion), David Phipps (keyboards/synths) and Zach Velmer (drums)–continues to average over 5,000 tickets per city, boasting a genre defying list of opening acts along the way such as Snoop Dogg, Ghostland Observatory, Bassnectar, Thievery Corporation, Pretty Lights, NAS, Big Boi of Outkast and countless others.
STS9 truly does it all: from headlining stages at festivals such as the Ultra Music Festival, Bonnaroo, Outside Lands, Lollapalooza and Electric Daisy Carnival, to selling out shows around the country as an acoustic set-up in opera houses or as an electronic act in amphitheatres, to performing with Jay-Z in arenas, to running their own record label, 1320 RECORDS, to using their voice as a platform for change and raising significant amounts of money towards activism efforts (including $150,000 to The Make it Right Foundation, paving the way to rebuild a house in the Lower 9th Ward of New Orleans). Pushing boundaries is all in a day’s work for STS9.
2013 was yet another big year for STS9. The band’s headlining Winter and Spring tour —their first months-long coast to coast outing in over two years—sold out the majority of their destinations with massive shows at Oakland’s Fox Theater, The Palladium in Los Angeles and Chicago’s Congress Theatre. The group then hit the festival circuit throughout the summer as they prep for the release of their next album, with headlining and/or main stage sets at Summer Camp, Wakarusa, Camp Bisco, and All Good. STS9 later hit the road for a co-headlining tour with Umphrey’s McGee, with huge stops at Chicago’s Northerly Island, Atlanta’s Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre, Philadelphia’s Mann Music Center, Boston’s Bank of America Pavilion, and the Filene Center at Wolf Trap outside of Washington, DC. The Summer concluded with the band’s annual sold out two-night run at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Colorado, while the entire year ended with a 5-Night run at The Tabernacle in Atlanta.
In 2014, fans will continue to be treated to STS9’s largest touring production rig ever. Building off the groundbreaking “Great Cycle Spectacle” design, the band is leaving no stone unturned when it comes to delivering one of the most visually stunning shows on the road today.
The release of the bands latest studio EP, WHEN THE DUST SETTLES (the eleventh album in their full discography), keeps with XLR8R Magazine’s exclamation that STS9 is "one of the country's most intriguing, innovative outfits around.” The EP was released in 2011 and debuted at #1 on the iTunes Electronic Charts and in Billboard’s Top 25.
STS9’s self-owned record label, 1320 RECORDS was founded on the principles of collaboration, cooperation, and community. The goal is clear: bring the music to the people in the most conscious, unique innovative and savvy ways possible. By doing so, the distance lessens between artists and fans, putting the power back in the hands of those that make music and those that live for it.
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