About
Avid skaters and surfers from Southern California, Incubus first came together as teenagers at Calabasas High School in the early '90s. They gigged early and often at rundown joints across L.A. County and self-released their first album of hip-hop-inflected hard rock and psychedelic urban punk, titled Fungus Amongus, in '95. Their second record was picked up by Sony and went gold, leading to double platinum status and Top 10 tracks from the two albums that followed. More radio-friendly than the band's earlier stuff, Make Yourself and Morning View were still bolder and more unusual than Incubus' modern rock peers, working with scathingly funky breaks and scratchy guitars and even -- with the seven-minute long "Aqueous Transmission" -- delving into sound-collage abstraction. By the '04 release of A Crow Left of the Murder, Incubus had renegotiated their contract with Sony and reached their popular peak, headlining sold-out world tours and playing festivals like Lollapalooza and the Bridge School Benefit. They released their sixth album, Light Grenades, in late 2006.
- Jonathan Zwickel
