Get the latest gossip

The Mars Volta: ‘The world we were in was very sexist and homophobic’


An intimate new documentary takes us behind the highs and lows of a band who were touched by many tragedies

When Omar Rodriguez-Lopez of the Mars Volta moved to the mainland US with his parents from their native Puerto Rico at age 10, he was thrilled when the white kids called him a word he’d never heard before. In fact, one of the primary reasons the friends formed the Mars Volta, which mixes Latin music with punk and prog-rock, was to honor the cultures that shaped them. While playing for an audience far more interested in breaking things and slam-dancing than getting the message of the music, Bixler-Zavala reacted by calling them “robots” and “sheep”, eliciting a hellish waves of boos.

Get the Android app

Or read this on The Guardian

Read more on:

Photo of Mars Volta

Mars Volta