Ryland Blackinton

Cobra Starship was an American dance-rock band from New York City, New York, formed in 2005 by Gabe Saporta.

He recorded the first album as a solo project, While the City Sleeps, We Rule the Streets.

Saporta later enlisted guitarist Ryland Blackinton, bassist Alex Suarez, drummer Nate Novarro, and keytarist Victoria Asher, all of whom provide backing vocals.

Over the course of ten years, Cobra Starship produced four albums and two Billboard Hot 100 top 10 singles.

Cobra Starship was formed in 2005, after Midtown bassist Gabe Saporta took a trip to Arizona.

During this time, Saporta went on a "vision quest" in the desert, spending time with Native American tribes and smoking peyote.

He began to create his vision for a new band, a melodic style of music heavily influenced by synthpop and hip-hop.

Upon returning home, Saporta rented a house in the Catskill Mountains and began writing what would become the band's debut album, While the City Sleeps, We Rule the Streets.

He posted "Hollaback Boy", a parody response to Gwen Stefani's "Hollaback Girl", on Myspace.

The song gained Saporta notoriety on the internet, and he eventually signed to Decaydance Records, the label of his good friend, Fall Out Boy bassist Pete Wentz.

The group released its debut album, While the City Sleeps, We Rule the Streets, in 2006, which contained the single "Snakes on a Plane (Bring It)".

Midtown's management company soon set Saporta up with an opportunity to record a song for the soundtrack to the 2006 Snakes on a Plane.

Along with members of The Academy Is..., Gym Class Heroes, and The Sounds, Saporta recorded "Snakes on a Plane (Bring It)", which became a minor hit.

During the recording of While the City Sleeps, We Rule the Streets, Saporta began recruiting new members to complete the group's lineup.

He first enlisted drummer Nate Novarro, whom he met on tour while Novarro sold merchandise for fellow touring act Hidden in Plain View.

After seeing Saporta in Entertainment Weekly, guitarist Ryland Blackinton and bassist Alex Suarez emailed Saporta, asking to join the group.

While the City Sleeps, We Rule the Streets was released October 10, 2006.

It featured the single "Snakes on a Plane (Bring It)"; the song's music video had been featured during the closing credits of the film Snakes on a Plane earlier that summer.

In October 2006, they supported Thirty Seconds to Mars on their Welcome to the Universe Tour.

With the group's lineup now solidified, Cobra Starship began touring across the United States.

The band released its second album, ¡Viva La Cobra!, on October 23, 2007.

While on the 2007 Honda Civic Tour, the group began writing music together for the first time.

The members recorded their individual parts on their laptops in the band's bus.

By the time Cobra Starship entered the studio to work on a new album, much of the material was already written.

Recorded in twenty days at Mission Sound Studios in Brooklyn, New York, ¡Viva la Cobra! was released on October 23, 2007.

It was produced by Patrick Stump, who was also credited as singing some backup vocals.

The album has been described as "11 tracks of unabashed party jams, full of big hooky electropop, super-produced guitar crunch and the occasional T-Pain-style vocoder thrown in for good measure."

The album was toured heavily worldwide.

Cobra headlined the Really Really Ridiculously Good Looking Tour, with guests Metro Station, The Cab, and We The Kings, from January to March 2008.

They also played on Warped Tour 2008 and headlined the SassyBack tour, which toured from October 7 through November 30, 2008, with guests Forever the Sickest Kids, Hit the Lights, and Sing It Loud.

The album art for the ¡Viva la Cobra! album was used to promote the fourth-generation Apple iPod Nano in purple.

Following the success of Katy Perry's "I Kissed a Girl", Cobra Starship recorded their own cover version, "I Kissed a Boy", in summer 2008.

The song was released on August 25, 2008, on Fall Out Boy's Citizens For Our Betterment mixtape Welcome To The New Administration.

Cobra Starship is one of nine artists who participated in thetruth.com's Remix Project, where they remixed the Sunny Side song "Magical Amount".

Their third album, Hot Mess, was released on August 11, 2009.

Cobra Starship also began the Believers Never Die Tour Part Deux tour in the beginning of April 2009, opening for Fall Out Boy, alongside All Time Low, Metro Station, and Hey Monday.

They spent time performing many shows in the US, mostly all in April and the beginning of May 2009; however, they also played a few shows in the UK at the end of May 2009, supported by Sing It Loud, Cash Cash, and UK band Mimi Soya.

In 2009, the band went to a cabin in Pennsylvania in an attempt to produce new material.

Their fourth and final album, Night Shades, was released on August 30, 2011, in the United States and October 28, 2011, in the United Kingdom.

Cobra Starship officially announced its dissolution on November 10, 2015.