Artifact

This record is about

overcoming challenges.

It's very important to

fight for what you feel is right.

We were backed into a corner.

For us, it was all or nothing...

Sometimes you have to

fight in order to be free.

"This Is War" is an album

about conflict.

We had a huge battle

with our record company.

The album kind of documented

this really turbulent time

in our lives.

There has always been a serious

distrust between an artist

and their record label.

I never heard of a label

that doesn't screw an artist.

That's the business model

is screwing the artist.

None of us in a band ever dreamed

that we would be so lucky

to have the success that we've had.

Now here we were faced

with the possibility

that everything was gonna be

ripped right away from us.

There is a kind of economic

perfect storm brewing

disastrous situation

they're losing their jobs

rising gas prices

My friends and fellow Americans,

I am very pleased and

very privileged to introduce to you

the next vice-president

of the United States:

Governor Sarah Palin

of the great state of Alaska.

You can hear the bugles blaring.

The sound of the battle cry.

The march of the drum

calling me from my slumber,

pushing me toward

A new day. A new fight.

Oh wow... Oh wow...

It's too f***ing bright.

It was 2008, we were on the road

for over 2 years and had recently

returned to Los Angeles to work

on our third album.

After over a decade of struggling,

we finally had a breakthrough

and achieved more success

than we ever dreamed.

Our second album A Beautiful Lie

sold over 3,5 Million copies

and gave us the chance to tour the world.

We were all incredibly excited

about this time in our lives

and we decided to make a film

about the next album but...

It quickly turned into something else.

Thirty Seconds to Mars is being sued for...

30 Million Dollars! Cute! Right?

This summer, the band's label Virgin/EMI

filed a breach-of-contract suit

against Thirty Seconds to Mars.

However, Jared insists

that the band was just exercising

their legal rights.

What do they want?

30 Million Dollars.

Really?

You're being sued

for 30 Million Dollars

What are you?...

Huh...

How do you sleep at night?

I have no idea where the number came from

other than...

It certainly wasn't

a wink to the press or

were we clever

to use the same number...

Thirty Seconds to Mars

have just sold a lot of...

a lot of albums

and never made any money.

We weren't really expecting

a bunch of money

we just thought it

bizarre that...

that all this revenue was being generated

and that we were still

2.7 Million Dollars in debt so,

we started to look into it.

Thirty Seconds to Mars suffered a

contract that really wasn't even

a direct contract with EMI,

it was bad deal.

They basically told us to shut up

and go make another album.

They weren't addressing our concerns

that we had with the contracts,

so we decided to terminate with EMI.

We've been signed for 9 years.

Under California law, you can't be held

bound to a contract for more than 7 years

which the courts and myself

and we all feel is pretty reasonable.

On July 4th 2008, we sent

a termination letter

to EMI. We sighted the 7-year statute

which legally ended our contract

with the company.

With any lawsuit,

there is two sides of the argument.

Your side of the argument was:

"Our contract is no longer valid

because of the 7-year statute"

and their side of it is:

"No, that is not applicable.

You have a commitment based

on a number of albums,

based on the amount of money we've spent

and you're not free to terminate this."

It really is David

against Goliath

and... and in this

case the label,

the Goliath was well, here's

a 30 Million Dollars lawsuit

like I am just gonna keep you awake,

they don't...

It doesn't keep them awake

suing for 30 Million Dollars, it's just:

I'm just stress you out,

you know, emotionally

and financially until you cave.

30 Million Dollars.

Yeah.

I think, it's so crazy

that it doesn't even

really register with me.

Like it's so f***in' like

just fantastically huge

that I don't really get it.

You would hope that, in success,

that they would even take

the initiative to be:

Okay look, you guys,

you have the worst record

deal on the planet.

Let's make this right

because we know at some point

you're gonna educate yourselves,

you're gonna realize that

you've been stolen from

and you've been highjacked.

They don't do that.

No.

They make the artist do that

and they don't want to do what's fair,

what's right,

You have to threaten them

with legal actions,

you have to threaten them

with creating precedences

in order to get them just to make

a slightly fair deal that still leaves them

with the complete lion share of everything

and the complete domination

of Thirty Seconds to Mars.

Musical taste actually

begins to form in the womb,

the developing fetus

has a fully functioning

auditory system

at 20 weeks and is hearing

all of the sounds of the environment.

Music is everywhere.

It's really woven into

the fabric of everyday life.

Perceptual studies

have shown that,

in the higher

hierarchy of needs,

the two things that

people care most about,

are music and sex.

So, there is no question

that music is a primal need

and it's unbelievably powerful.

No other art form

works like music.

Paintings are beautiful

but, you know,

once you see it

eventually you

see everything in it.

With music, it's forever changing.

For a piece of music to succeed,

it has to take you through

some kind of emotional journey.

The right chord sequence,

the right few seconds of a song

and you are right there.

That's exactly how I feel.

I love in trying to interpret what

the music is saying both

lyrically and musically,

that's why I like music

and once I've tried to figure it out,

I have personally crazy fantasies of what

the person was thinking about

when they wrote that

and why they wrote that

and how does it relate to me.

That's what music is.

You mix the right word at the right time

with something that's beautiful

and moving and sort of.

That makes you,

you know,

the hair on the back

of your neck stand up,

it's an incredible moment.

That's probably why we need it

because it's wonderful.

The song has a story in it,

there is a heart behind it,

there is a frequency within it

and you, as a person,

delivered it

and that why people care.

Music is the most powerful

vehicle in the world.

Period.

Despite the lawsuit,

we decided to move forward

and start making our new album.

And that meant financing it ourselves.

So, we built a studio in the basement

of the house in the Hollywood Hills,

hired Flood and began the process.

Flood is like this superstar producer.

A legend. A guy that has made albums

that will live forever.

I mean 20 years

I've been listening to his work.

I used to look on the

back of albums and CDs

and tapes and who is this guy Flood?

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