Cedric Bixler-Zavala

"This is my failed attempt at Ghost noted shuffeling Tony Allen beats! Ha! There is a digital tabla machine running through some DD-5 delay pedal that is being played by a mini hand held tape recorder playing throughout! I wrote the bass line...hummed it to Juan...Omar came up with the guitar and chorus section and Adrian played flute on it. It was squeezed in during tracking drums for Amputechture, and rushed...very very rushed. I had other parts and chorus bits but I didn't want to get in the way of the record (studio time is expensive!). The samples are from 2 places [...] On 'Private Booths' the samples at the start are from an interview with a psychic who participated in the Montauk Project...I sampled it from a UK TV show called Disinformation (RIP!) [...] The other sample is from a movie called Shock Corridor by the late Sam Fuller. Side 2 'Sapta Loka' is a bit of an homage to ambient German music from the [1970s] ... it's one long Drone spliced in four places and stacked on each other playing at the same time.

Cedric Bixler-Zavala (born November 4, 1974) is an American singer.

He is the lead singer and lyricist of the progressive rock band the Mars Volta and the only constant member of the post-hardcore group At the Drive-In, for which he was the lead singer and occasional guitarist.

He is also the lead singer of the band Antemasque, and sings and plays guitar in his band Zavalaz.

Cedric Bixler-Zavala was born as Cedric Bixler in Redwood City, California to Dennis Bixler-Marquez and Rosa Zavala.

His father Dennis was born in Mexico City to a white American father of partial German ancestry and a Mexican mother.

His mother Rosa is Mexican-American and was born in El Paso.

His father is a professor of Chicano Studies at UTEP.

His parents were bilingual, but Bixler-Zavala says his command of proper Spanish is limited to "Spanglish".

His Spanish maternal surname, Zavala, is a Castilian version of Zabala, of Basque origin.

In the early 1990s, Bixler-Zavala played drums and was a vocalist for a band named Foss which included Beto O'Rourke on bass before the latter's political career.

Bixler-Zavala has a tenor voice type with a vocal range spanning from G#2 to D6, in addition to a speculated possible range reaching as low as E2 and as high as C7.

His vocal work spans many different styles, ranging from consistent rhythmic shouts (common in his singing with At the Drive-In) to controlled falsetto and head voice singing (a familiar trademark of his singing with the Mars Volta).

(Flea played bass on 2003's De-loused in the Comatorium and trumpet on 2005's Frances the Mute; Dave played with the Mars Volta from 2009 to 2010.) In February 2018, Bixler Zavala confirmed on Twitter that the Mars Volta would reunite, but later clarified that At the Drive-In activity will take precedence for the immediate future.

Under the pseudonym "Alavaz Relxib Cirdec" ("Cedric Bixler-Zavala" backwards), Bixler-Zavala contributed a two-song single to the GSL Special 12-inch Singles Series, released in December 2005.

Closer to the dub of De Facto and the ambient experimentation shown in Omar Rodríguez-López's records than the prog-rock of the Mars Volta, the two songs Bixler-Zavala has produced under this alias are entirely instrumental.

A shitty Casio and a banged up Chaos pad (very 2005!) are being run and it's all recorded through a hand held mini recorder dumped onto a ProTools file.

[...] Omar co-wrote the piece."

In 2009, Bixler-Zavala married actress and model Chrissie Carnell.

The couple reside in Los Angeles, California.

In 2010, he commented on Facebook about the recording process:

Late 2011 saw the release of the first 7-inch record from Bixler's new project Anywhere, a collaboration with Christian Eric Beaulieu of Triclops! and Mike Watt of The Stooges/Firehose/Minutemen.

In 2011, Bixler began working on another album, which he described as "mostly ballady type stuff... a very Sunday morning record. Very soft".

Eventually the solo project turned into a full-fledged band named Zavalaz, which features Bixler on lead vocals and guitar, Dan Elkan on guitar, Juan Alderete on bass and Gregory Rogove on drums.

The band is set to play a number of West Coast tour dates throughout June, supported by Dot Hacker and EV Kain.

Their self-titled debut album was released by ATP Records in June 2012.

On June 3, 2013, a snippet from song "Blue Rose of Grand Street" off their upcoming album All the Nights We Never Met was released on YouTube.

Bixler-Zavala returned to the studio after reuniting with Omar Rodríguez-López due to Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist, Flea, wanting them to reunite.

In 2014 they formed a supergroup together called Antemasque with ex-Mars Volta drummer Dave Elitch.

The band recorded and released their debut in 2014.

Fans have cited that as Flea and Dave have played with the Mars Volta prior, a Mars Volta reunion could be in the works.

In 2016, it was also revealed that Bixler-Zavala developed vocal nodules, causing shows to be canceled while on tour.

Bixler-Zavala is fond of Frank Zappaesque humor and writes in English, Spanglish, and Latin.

His lyrics have a wide vocabulary and often feature complicated wordplay.

Bixler-Zavala also uses portmanteaus: combining existing words, or parts of words, to create a new word.

The song "Noctourniquet", for example, combines "nocturnal" (active at night) and "tourniquet" (a medical device to stop bleeding).

He has stated: "I love to take common sayings, pervert them, mutate them a little. So you think I am singing one thing, but when you read it, it is different."

He has described Mark E. Smith of The Fall as "one of the pillars of influence for me as a lyricist".

When performing with At the Drive-in and The Mars Volta, Bixler-Zavala is known for his eccentric on-stage behavior.

He frequently does somersaults on stage, swings his microphone (once unintentionally hitting bandmate Ikey Owens in the head), throws objects such as cymbals, microphone stands, and trash cans into the audience, salsa dances, adjusts Omar Rodríguez-López's effects pedals and occasionally plays the maracas.