14 Facts About Billy Howerdel

Billy Howerdel attended high school at West Milford High School, where he played sports, took an interest in a television production class, and was active in an extracurricular audio program.

Billy Howerdel spent several years sound engineering for New Jersey artists and further worked as a guitar technician for numerous others, which, before forming A Perfect Circle, included Faith No More, Fishbone, David Bowie, The Smashing Pumpkins, Nine Inch Nails, Guns N' Roses, and Tool.

In 1999, Billy Howerdel founded A Perfect Circle and invited Keenan to join.

The record, released in September 2003, was still a success, going platinum as well, though the two decided to take a break from the band, so that Keenan could return to Tool, and Billy Howerdel could pursue solo work.

Billy Howerdel first began working on solo material during the writing sessions for Thirteenth Step, in 2003.

Keenan pushed Billy Howerdel to sing lead vocals on a few of the songs, to "get people used to [his] voice", and to help Billy Howerdel transition to the role of primary singer in his solo work.

Once Emotive was completed, APC went on hiatus, while Billy Howerdel continued to write new material.

Billy Howerdel handled nearly all instruments in the studio, except drums, for which he recruited then-A Perfect Circle bandmate Josh Freese as a session musician.

Billy Howerdel formed a band to promote the record, touring throughout 2008.

Toward the end of 2008, Maynard James Keenan announced that he and Billy Howerdel were working on music for APC, and rumors arose that Ashes Divide was splitting up.

Notably, they debuted a new song that Billy Howerdel originally called "Untitled" but which has since been dubbed "Trafficking" by fans who attended Ashes Divide shows in late 2009 and early 2010.

In early 2022, Billy Howerdel announced the name of his second studio album, What Normal Was, to be released on June 10,2022, under his own name rather than the Ashes Divide moniker.

Billy Howerdel has occasionally played live with the band Abandoned Pools.

Billy Howerdel worked on the Guns N' Roses album Chinese Democracy, specifically the song "There Was a Time".