David 'Davey Havok' Marchand was born on November 20th 1975
in Rochester New York. After moving to Ukiah California, he discovered skate boarding and Punk Rock. He credits some of his
favourite bands as the Misfits, the Cure, the Smiths and Minor Threat.
AFI or A Fire Inside was formed by Havok in the summer of 1991.
The garage band was made up by Adam (still currently a member), Mark and Geoff (ex-Tiger Army and current HorrorPops member).
The band broke up in 1993 when Davey moved to Berkley, Adam moved to Santa Cruz, Mark moved to Southern CAlifornia and Geoff
moved to New jersey.
In December of that year, the band returned to Ukiah and played
a reunion show after a fan convinced them to do it.
'We played that reunion show, there were like 200 people there
or something like that which for us was just amazing and the show was so fun. We were all like, Wow this is so fun. This is
really what we wanna do with our lives. We don't wanna anything else. This is what makes us happy. Going to school and studying
something that's gonna bring us to an end we don't enjoy, its not what we're all about so we just said fuck it, we're
just gonna do the band.'
As Davey puts it, the band finally got their shit together enough
to release a 7" called Dork with fellow Ukiah band Loose Change (Jade Puget's band at the time)
Dexter Holland of Nitro Records (and singer of the Offspring)
soon got wind of the up and coming punk band and signed them to his label.
Their first Nitro release was Very Proud of Ya in 1996. The
album was fast paced punk rock with basic lyrics and head banging music. Their next album, 1997's Answer that and Stay Fashionable,
(which had previously been released by WingNut records in 1995) was much of the same, but the joining of Hunter for the
next album, Shut your mouth and open your eyes brought a new feel to AFI's sound. Songs like A Single Second and
Third Season showed the growth that was developing in the bands song writing.
Jade's arrival for the Black Sails in the Sunset was
a coming of age, so to speak, for the band. A new maturity in the songs emerged with such classics as God called in Sick Today
and The Prayer Position being written under the new (and current) line-up.
The Art of Drowning and EP All Hallows continued the new softer
punk rock sound, with the latest installment to AFI's credentials Sing the Sorrow showing how far the band has come lyrically
and musically since Very Proud of Ya.
AFI began to receive mainstream listening when Totalimmortal
received regular play time on radios around the US due to the Jim Carrey movie, Me, Myself and Irene.
AFI now enjoy much success with their current album, at one
point being in the top 40 with the albums singles Girl's Not Grey, Silver and COld and The Leaving Song Pt II.
Havok has enjoyed the success the band has received and loves
his time with the band. In the beginning, he says that all he wanted out of punk rock was to have fun, however his life would
not be complete without AFI. When asked what AFI meant to him, his answer was simple: 'It means everything....There's nothing
I'd rather do. There's nothing I could see myself doing.'
-copyright 2005 Lou Hartley
