A Perfect Circle

A Perfect Circle's debut album Mer Des Noms is deeply rooted in mythology. "Mer Des Noms" is French for "Sea of Names." In an interview with online magazine New York Rock, APC singer Maynard James Keenan explained that "a lot of the names of the songs are actually people I do know in real life" and that "some elements of their lives seem to be the same as elements in the lives or stories of mythological figures."

Before joining A Perfect Circle, guitarist Billy Howerdel was the guitar technician for Nine Inch Nails. At the end of NIN's Downward Spiral tour in 1995, frontman Trent Reznor gave Howerdel several classic guitars as a "thank-you" gift. One of those, a '60s Gibson Les Paul manufactured in 1991, is still one of Howerdel's main instruments.

Although he's officially listed a founding member of A Perfect Circle, drummer Josh Freese (Weezer, The Vadals) was not the first drummer the band jammed with. In the beginning, Tim Alexander from Primus played with APC and the band even performed a handful of shows with him in Southern California. When APC scored a record deal in 1999, Freese was introduced to the fold and he soon became an official member of the band.