About Lit
Lit is an American rock band formed in 1988 in Orange County, California. They have released seven studio albums, but are best known for their 1999 album A Place in the Sun, which featured the hit single "My Own Worst Enemy". "Zip-Lock" and "Miserable" were also successful, leading to a platinum certification for A Place in the Sun.
Guitarist Jeremy Popoff and bassist Kevin Baldes met in 1986, and soon after, began playing music together. In 1987, Popoff , Jerry Neel , Dave Barber and Derek Johnson formed the band Strate Lace and performed three live shows together: The Troubador in Hollywood, The Waters Club in San Pedro, and a back-to-school party in a friend's backyard. Neel quit the band early on to pursue a career in the mortgage industry and Johnson would go on to attend the Trebas Institute of Recording Arts in Hollywood, California, where he learned to produce and engineer. On February 20, 2003, Derek Johnson was among the 100 killed in the nightclub fire while attending a Great White concert at The Station in West Warwick, Rhode Island.
Meanwhile, around 1988, high school friends Baldes and Jeremy Popoff's brother, A. Jay, formed the pop metal band Razzle. The lineup being Kevin Baldes , A. Jay Popoff , and Sean Holland . They performed their first show on June 26, 1988, at The Troubadour. In 1989, A. Jay switched from drums to lead vocals, and the band added guitarist Jeremy Popoff and drummer Allen Shellenberger. Things began to come together in 1990, when the group released a demo tape and an EP entitled New Vibe Revolution in 1993. Razzle dissolved in 1993 and became Stain in 1994, which had a much harder and heavier sound. They released a demo tape in 1995 and eventually signed with Malicious Vinyl in 1995. After finding out the name "Stain" was already owned, the band changed their name to Lit.
On April 1, 1997, the group released Tripping the Light Fantastic on the Malicious Vinyl record label. Lit continued to grow their local and national fan base playing locally and touring with alternative bands such as Radish , Lifter and Reel Big Fish. Malicious Vinyl lost its national distribution shortly afterTripping the Light Fantastic was released, which allowed the band to get out of their recording contract. They spent the next few months writing songs and showcasing for various major record labels. Lit signed with RCA Records in 1998.
Lit gained world wide popularity with their second album A Place in the Sun, released in February 1999. A Place in the Sun yielded the massive hit single "My Own Worst Enemy", topping the Billboard Hot Modern Rock Tracks chart for a total of 11 weeks and receiving a Billboard Music Award for the biggest modern rock song of 1999. It was followed by "Zip-Lock" and "Miserable", which featured Pamela Anderson in the video. Shortly after, the album was certified platinum in the US and gold in Canada, becoming the band's best selling album. The band performed over 286 shows and toured worldwide in support of A Place in the Sun. In addition to the Vans Warped Tour and a slot on Woodstock 1999, the band toured with the Offspring, Garbage, and No Doubt. The band's tracks also appeared in soundtracks of Ready to Rumble and The Replacements, and appeared in the movie Replicate and the TV series V.I.P. starring Pamela Anderson. The band became staples on late night television shows The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Late Night with Conan O'Brien, Later with Craig Kilborn and appeared regularly on MTV TRL, Spring Break and guitarist Jeremy Popoff appeared in an episode of MTV Cribs.
Lit followed up A Place in the Sun with the 2001 release of Atomic. The band's highest charting single was "Lipstick and Bruises" which reached top 10 on the Billboard Hot Modern Rock Tracks. Lit toured to support Atomic, which began with a headlining US tour that scheduled to begin on September 11, 2001 in New Jersey, the same day as the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks. The band continued to tour, appear on television and movies, and also released two albums from Handsome Devil and The Color Red who the band signed to their Dirty Martini label, distributed by RCA.
Map & Directions To Venue
