#Andy hurley series#

That's certainly true of Matthew Mixon, a video producer and Hurley's roommate. I feel like I've had enough experiences for multiple lives.' A pact with friends 'If we did end tomorrow, I would be so stoked and proud of everything I've done and how I lived my life. 'I would love to keep doing it forever,' Hurley said.

Its most recent work, 'American Beauty/American Psycho,' released in January of this year, sold more than 218,000 equivalent copies in the first week alone. The band has won a host of awards, including a People's Choice for Favorite Alternative Band, although a Grammy is still on Hurley's wish list. Today, Fall Out Boy is riding the success of six albums, three of which have reached the top of the Billboard charts. 'With Andy, I don't think anyone has anything disparaging to say.' 'Pete and Patrick and I, we all love each other, but we've always hated each other at some point for various reasons,' Trohman said. His dedication to the band made everyone want to do the band more in the beginning.'įrom touring in a rundown van to becoming famous, Hurley in many ways has been the band's rock. It helps that he doesn't do drugs, he doesn't drink alcohol. 'He takes everything he does very seriously. He elevated our level of musicianship,' Trohman said. 'He started making the band musically very tight. But after the band had gone through two other drummers, he became part of Fall Out Boy just in time to record the band's debut album, 'Take This To Your Grave,' in 2003 at Smart Studios in Madison. 'It definitely took a lot of coaxing' to get Hurley in the band, Trohman recalled. Then, 'when we were all burned out on doing such serious political bands,' Hurley said, Wentz and Trohman established Fall Out Boy. He played drums in radical bands like Racetraitor and Killtheslavemaster, with Wentz as an occasional bandmate. That was when he was inspired to become straightedge - meaning he wouldn't take drugs or drink alcohol - and a vegan. When he was 15, Hurley immersed himself in the hard-core punk scene in Milwaukee, and when that wasn't enough, he would travel to Chicago to play or hang out with similar bands.

#Andy hurley series#

'Music is the first thing I didn't give up,' Hurley said, in part because of a series of band and percussion teachers 'who pushed me further than I would have on my own.' He kept detailed logs of all the different drumsticks he used. He got into groups like Nirvana and Slayer and Black Sabbath.

In a fake obituary he wrote for school, he hoped he'd be remembered for playing 1,000 drum sets, signing 100 million autographs and for his 100 world tours. In middle school, Andy Hurley started playing percussion. Her son, she said, 'as a child, was angry.He was ending up with the wrong kinds of kids.I feel that music saved his life.' 'First thing I didn't give up' There's a room in her home that includes a shrine to her son, from band posters to an action figure to a platinum record framed on the wall.

Ann today lives in Franklin with her husband of two years Andy was her man of honor at the wedding. And when he was 9, his mother, Ann, was diagnosed with breast cancer. Hurley's father, a physician, died when he was 5. The journey has had its struggles, both professionally and personally. The house, the city - they provided him with much-needed retreat at the end of every grueling tour. While his bandmates moved to California long ago, Hurley's home has been in Milwaukee - a nearly 6,000-square-foot, five-bedroom, million-dollar-plus home on North Lake Drive. But Hurley is arguably the most fascinating member of Fall Out Boy: a softspoken, easygoing, hyper-intelligent, tattoo-covered, cross-fit-obsessed, straightedge vegan who loves his friends so much, he lets them live at his home, rent-free. Actually, he's in one of the most popular rock bands in the world, Fall Out Boy.Īs the drummer, he's less well-known than frontman Patrick Stump, bassist and onetime tabloid magnet Pete Wentz, and lead guitarist Joe Trohman. Hurley, 35, is indeed playing in a band for a living. His first sentence: 'I think I will be in a band 25 years from now.' In 1991, Andy Hurley, then a sixth-grade student at Menomonee Falls North Middle School, had an assignment: Write about your future.