Everclear climbed to prominence in 1995 with a grunge-punk approach from the Northwest that offered little in the way of innovation, yet the trio’s memorable melodies and Art Alexakis’s confrontational “us against them” themes struck a chord with disaffected Gen-X listeners. The band’s sonic identity drew heavily from the rock, post-punk, and singer-songwriter leanings of its frontman, encompassing influences such as X, the Replacements, the Pixies, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, and Elvis Costello. Equally vital to the group’s ascent was its relentless touring pace and determined self-promotion strategies.
Born April 12, 1962, in West Los Angeles, California, Art Alexakis grew up in a lower-middle-class home raised by his single mother. His father abandoned the household during the singer’s early years, an event that would surface repeatedly in Everclear’s most resonant tracks. The successive losses of his brother to a heroin overdose and his girlfriend to suicide spurred him to overcome his own cocaine dependence in the mid-’80s; he subsequently launched the country-punk outfit Colorfinger in San Francisco. That band issued a lone LP on Alexakis’s Shindig imprint, but both the album and an accompanying EP vanished from circulation once distributor Rough Trade collapsed. Colorfinger soon disintegrated, prompting Alexakis to relocate to Portland, Oregon, his girlfriend’s hometown. There in 1992 he encountered bassist Craig Montoya (born September 14, 1970) and the band’s original drummer, Scott Cuthbert. The three cut a demo EP for four hundred dollars and placed it with Portland’s Tim/Kerr label. Frustrated by the company’s minimal marketing push, Alexakis engaged an independent promoter and personally dispatched copies to press outlets and distributors.
Several additional tracks were folded into the EP, which was retitled World of Noise and issued in expanded form by Fire Records in 1993. The following year brought nonstop roadwork, a personnel shift that installed Greg Eklund (born April 18, 1970) behind the drum kit in place of Cuthbert, and a June signing to Capitol Records. The resulting sophomore album, Sparkle and Fade, surfaced in 1995 and reached a broader listenership. Alternative radio embraced the singles “Santa Monica” and “Heroin Girl,” propelling the record to platinum certification. Alexakis simultaneously emerged as a prominent voice in alternative media, reporting from the 1996 political conventions for MTV. So Much for the Afterglow arrived in 1997 and achieved double-platinum status, fueled by three Top Five modern-rock successes: “Everything to Everyone,” “I Will Buy You a New Life,” and “Father of Mine.” Around the same period Alexakis became a father, an experience that intensified his political engagement; he testified before Congress on child-support legislation and campaigned alongside multiple presidential tickets. In 1998 Billboard magazine named Everclear Modern Rock Artist of the Year.
A two-part concept project followed in 2000: the pop-leaning Songs from an American Movie, Vol. 1: Learning How to Smile appeared in early autumn, while the harder-edged Songs from an American Movie, Vol. 2: Good Time for a Bad Attitude arrived months later. (Learning How to Smile had originally been conceived as an Alexakis solo outing because of its departure from the band’s customary three-piece rock format.) Both sets yielded charting singles, with the AM-radio-friendly “Wonderful” enjoying the strongest performance. Everclear delivered the more conventional Slow Motion Daydream in 2003, followed in October 2004 by the retrospective Ten Years Gone: The Best of Everclear 1994-2004. In the interim Alexakis undertook a short solo acoustic tour in 2003, after which the lineup surrounding him underwent complete turnover. He became the sole remaining original member as the group expanded beyond a trio to include bassist Sam Hudson, guitarist Dave French, drummer Brett Snyder, and keyboardist Josh Crawley.
Now independent of Capitol and operating once more in the indie realm, the reconstituted Everclear issued Welcome to the Drama Club on Eleven Seven Music in association with ADA/Warner Music Group in September 2006. Led by the single “Hater,” the album paid tribute to some of Alexakis’s formative influences. Drama Club entered the Billboard Top 200 and reached number 11 on the Top Independent Albums chart; the band subsequently embarked on a fall college-club tour. The Vegas Years, a collection of covers, appeared in 2008, while 2009’s In a Different Light offered acoustic reworkings of the band’s catalog. Two years later Everclear again revisited its past, recording fresh versions of its hits alongside several covers for Return to Santa Monica. Their first collection of original material in six years, Invisible Stars, surfaced in summer 2012 and peaked at number 119 on the Billboard charts. Three years after that the group delivered the heavier Black Is the New Black on The End Records.
Alexakis issued his debut solo album, Sun Songs, in October 2019.
