M. Shadow

M. Shadows

Background information
Birth name Matthew Charles Sanders
Born July 31, 1981 (1981-07-31) (age 27)
Huntington Beach, California, USA
Genre(s) Metalcore
Hard rock
Post-Hardcore
Heavy metal
Experimental rock
Punk rock
Occupation(s) Musician, Songwriter, Singer
Instrument(s) Vocals, Piano, Guitar
Years active 1999–present
Label(s) Warner Bros.
Associated acts Avenged Sevenfold, Death by Stereo, Good Charlotte, Bleeding Through, The Confession
Website AvengedSevenfold.com

M. Shadows (born Matthew Charles Sanders on July 31, 1981) in Huntington Beach, California, (also known as Shads), is the vocalist/lead singer for the American hard rock band Avenged Sevenfold.
Contents
[hide]

* 1 Biography
o 1.1 Biography
o 1.2 Music career
o 1.3 Vocal style
* 2 Featured Guest appearances
* 3 References

[edit] Biography

[edit] Biography

In his youth, Sanders was notorious for his disorderly conduct and misbehavior. He was quoted as saying "I was in between being a good kid & a bad kid - I had a good heart, but a bad attitude." He was expelled from two different Huntington Beach schools, one for smashing a woman's car windows after a sixth-grade pizza party and another for defacing campus property in seventh grade. The latter event culminated in the untimely death of the school principal due to a heart attack, which earned Sanders the nickname "the kid that killed the principal."[1]

On the All Excess DVD, while all of the members were talking about how they got their stage names, M. Shadows said that he got his name because when he attended Huntington Beach High School and the band was just starting out, he was a darker kid (hence the name "Shadows") but he also wanted to incorporate his name, Matt, into his stage name. Matt was reduced to M and since has been known as M. Shadows.[2].

Shads is engaged to Valary DiBenedetto, his long time girlfriend and former tour manager. Val starred in A7X's video for Seize the Day. She is also featured in Warmness on the Soul and Dear God videos.


[edit] Music career

Matt used to play the bass before he started to sing. When he was growing up, he listened to a lot of punk rock and got into the metal scene when his father bought him Appetite for Destruction by Guns'N'Roses after he had seen them on the Headbanger's Ball. [3]

In following years, Shadows formed a number of bands with Avenged Sevenfold's rhythm guitarist Zacky Vengeance. He was previously a member of a punk group called 'Successful Failure'. While in this band he penned the song "Streets," which would later be recorded after Avenged Sevenfold was formed, and released on the first album, Sounding the Seventh Trumpet. The album was a mix of metalcore and a song that is soft(Warmness On The Soul)

Shadows feels a strong support for the troops serving the United States, having very close friends who are currently in service in Iraq. The song "M.I.A." ("Missing In Action") was written in tribute to these friends. The song "Gunslinger" from Avenged Sevenfold's self-titled album further expresses these feelings (though it was stated in the album's extra MVI that it's not just about troops - "it can be about anyone away from home, missing their families.") The song "Critical Acclaim" is an attack on people who criticize the soldiers fighting in Iraq.

[edit] Vocal style

In the band's debut album, Sounding the Seventh Trumpet, M. Shadows' vocals had a heavy metalcore influence and consisted mostly of screaming and guttural growls. This style gradually decreased in later albums into more conventional clean singing and had been almost completely jettisoned (with the exception of backing introduction screams) by the release of City of Evil, the band's major label debut. Despite having admitted having minor throat surgery this was not a cause for change and in an interview on All Excess, manager Larry Jacobson states that Shadows had decided several years before the making of City of Evil that it would be an all singing album. He had made it clear to their producer, Mudrock, that the album they were working on at the time Waking the Fallen would be half singing and half screaming, and that the next would be all singing. In the past Shadows would sing on all parts of the songs during live performances, supporting the theory that he was no longer able to scream or growl. Perhaps becoming fed up with those claims, Shadows has resumed screaming again during live shows, this can be seen in the band's new live video for the single "Afterlife". Some of Shadows' biggest musical influences are The Ramones, Black Flag, Metallica, Pantera, and Guns N' Roses. He is also very fond of Phil Anselmo's super group Down as well as strongly appreciating their first album NOLA.

[edit] Featured Guest appearances
Year Song Artist(s) Album
2007 "Buffalo Stampede" Cowboy Troy Black in the Saddle
2007 "The River (Good Charlotte song)" (with Synyster Gates) Good Charlotte Good Morning Revival
2007 "Like Always" Kisses For Kings[2] Demo
2006 "Falling Away from Me" (Live) (temporarily replaced Jonathan Davis (due to medical attention)) Korn[3] Download Festival 2006
2005 "Entombed We Collide" and "This is Not the End" (additional vocals) Death by Stereo Death for Life
2002 "Savior, Saint, Salvation" Bleeding Through Portrait of the Goddess