Ilan Rubin - Biography
Ilan Rubin (born July 7, 1988) is an American musician, best known for being former drummer of Lostprophets & industrial rock act Nine Inch Nails during their last tour. On October 20, 2011, it was confirmed that he'll be replacing Atom Willard as the drummer of Angels & Airwaves.
Contents |
Childhood and early life
Rubin began playing drums at the age of 8, when he discovered his Father's 1968 Silver Sparkle Ludwig drum kit set up in the garage. After three months of "toying" with the kit, he had taught himself to play and was jamming with his older brothers and by the age of 9 was ready to play for F.o.N., a band that eventually would do three stints on the Vans Warped Tour, where, in addition to playing with F.o.N. Ilan would fill-in on drums with bands such as NOFX. In 1999, F.o.N. opened Woodstock on the "Emerging Artist Stage" and, as a result, 11-year-old Ilan gained entry into the Guinness Book of World Records as the youngest musician to ever play on a Woodstock stage.
Still at the age of 11, he submitted a video to Modern Drummer Magazine, taken of him doing a solo during an F.o.N. performance, which was picked by the magazine as the winning entry in its "Best Undiscovered Drummer Under the Age of 18" contest. The winner of the 18-and-over category came from Argentina, and both drummers were invited to perform at the 2000 Modern Drummer Festival, by which time Ilan had turned 12. He has taken lessons from Blink-182's drummer Travis Barker and David Uosikkinen, drummer of famed '80's band, The Hooters. He is also an accomplished guitarist and classical pianist.
Recording career
Prior to Lostprophets
Immediately prior to working with Lostprophets, Ilan was the drummer for the band Denver Harbor, which included his older brother, Aaron, as bassist, who had played guitar in F.o.N.; as well as 2 ex-members of the punk band Fenix*TX. Denver Harbor was dropped from their label 1 year after their only full length album, Scenic, was released in 2004 but not before the band did a few round-trip tours of the United States and one week in Japan with a re-united Fenix TX.
Lostprophets
Ilan was the drummer for the Welsh band Lostprophets (although he is American). He replaced Mike Chiplin, founding member and original drummer, who was kicked out of the band in 2005 for walking off stage after his kick drum pedal broke. Before finding Rubin, Lostprophets hired session drummer Josh Freese to record the tracks on Liberation Transmission. Then, after Ilan joined, he played the remaining two tracks on Liberation Transmission: "For All These Times Son, For All These Times" and "Everybody's Screaming!!!". The drummer on the demos for this period are unclear with all tracks, depending on the time the demos were made, potentially being recorded by either ex-drummer Mike Chiplin, frontman Ian Watkins (who occasionally plays drums in demos) or Ilan. Either Rubin or Freese may have recorded the B-Side, "Every Song", which comes from the album sessions. Rubin, however, toured from 2006-2008 with the band and appeared in the videos for "Rooftops (A Liberation Broadcast)", "A Town Called Hypocrisy", "Can't Catch Tomorrow (Good Shoes Won't Save You This Time)" and "4:AM Forever". He left the band in late 2008 but not before he tracked all of the drums and helped pen some of the music on the band's fourth studio release "The Betrayed".
The New Regime
Ilan's first solo album, under the pseudonym 'The New Regime', called Coup, was recorded throughout 2007 and 2008 and released in November 2008. While touring with Nine Inch Nails and following the conclusion of the "Wave Goodbye Tour Ilan had been working on his second album, 'Speak Through The White Noise' The release date of this album has been confirmed as April 1st, 2011. Prior to this, Ilan released a free single titled 'Remission Of Guilt' through his website. It has been confirmed that this track will not be on the new album.
Nine Inch Nails
On November 15, 2008, Trent Reznor announced via www.nin.com that Ilan would be joining industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails as their drummer after the departure of Josh Freese in late 2008. Upon learning of his skills as a multi-instrumentalist, Reznor decided to scale the latest live incarnation of Nine Inch Nails down to a four-piece, where Ilan contributed keyboards and percussion. The new lineup played the final Nine Inch Nails tour dubbed the "Wave Goodbye" tour, starting in North America, continuing to Europe and Asia before returning to the U.S. for a final set of dates in smaller venues. During the last show at the Wiltern theatre, Reznor discussed the band's future, including new recordings featuring the current live band.
Angels & Airwaves
On 20th October, 2011 it was announced that Ilan will replace recently departed drummer Atom Willard of the alternative rock band Angels & Airwaves.
Equipment
- Orange County Drums AKA OCDP (matte black finish/gloss black hardware)
- 26" X 16" Bass Drum
- 14" X 6.5 "black beauty" Snare Drum
- 14" X 10" Tom/13" X 9" tom
- 16" X 16" Floor Tom
- 18" X 16" Floor Tom
- 20" X 18 Floortom(Only With Nine Inch Nails
- Zildjian Cymbals
- 16" K Light Hi-Hat
- 21" A Sweet Ride
- 24" K Light Ride
- 21" K Custom Crash/Ride
During his time in Lostprophets his Cymbal setup was
15 Newbeat Hihat
22 K Custom dark ride
20 A Custom Crash
20 Z Custom Medium Crash
20 Oriental china Classic
- DW pedals and hardware
- Vater 1A Ilan Rubin Signature sticks
- Remo Coated Emperors/powerstrokes clear
- Self Made Pedals
- Boss Pedals
- Electro Harmonix
- Z.VEX Effects
- Dunlop Picks
- Gibson Les Pauls
- Fender Guitars
- Marshall Amps
- Vox Amps
- Mesa Engineering
- KRK Systems
- Get Off My Case
Yamaha Keyboards
- Korg Keyboards
- Korg MicroSynth
- Fender Mustang and Jazz Basses
- Ampeg Bass Amps
Influences
- Led Zeppelin
- Cream
- Jeff Buckley
- The Beatles
- Queen
- Nine Inch Nails
- Muse
- Ludwig Van Beethoven
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
- Johannes Sebastian Bach
- Oasis
- Depeche Mode
- Radiohead
The New Regime Live lineup
- Ilan Rubin: vocals, piano, guitar
- Chris Lewis: guitar, vocals.
- Danny Rubin (...students): bass, vocals
- Hayden Scott: drums/Trevor Faris a local drummer is filling in for him)
Discography
- Denver Harbor
- Extended Play (2003)
- Scenic (2004)
- Lostprophets
- Liberation Transmission (only drummed on "For All These Times Son, For All These Times" and "Everybody's Screaming!!!") (2006)
- The Betrayed (2010)
- The New Regime
- Eleanor Rigby (Beatles cover, free download)
- Coup (2008)
- Remission Of Guilt (free download)
- Speak Through The White Noise (2011)
External links
- Lostprophets official website
- Lostprophets Myspace
- Denver Harbour Myspace
- Zildjian official website
- The New Regime official website
- The New Regime Forum
- Coup release announcement
- Nine Inch Nails announcement
- Nine Inch Nails forum post about the announcement (with the original announcement)
- Interview with Ilan Rubin by Drum Channel, Part 1 of 3
- Interview with Ilan Rubin by Drum Channel, Part 2 of 3
- Interview with Ilan Rubin by Drum Channel, Part 3 of 3
Discussion
Please log in / register, to leave a comment