The Arcade Fire is an indie rock band from Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Its members are Win Butler, Régine Chassagne, Richard Reed Parry, William Butler, Tim Kingsbury, Sarah Neufeld, and Jeremy Gara. Howard Bilerman, who played drums on the album Funeral, has since moved on to other projects. As of May 2005, the touring band includes horn player Pietro Amato and violinist Owen Pallett. Pallett has also opened for their shows, appearing as the one-man band Final Fantasy.
The band’s trademark fashion is the waistcoat, giving them an air of "frumpiness". When asked about the rumour that the band's name refers to a fire in an arcade, Win Butler replied: "It's not a rumour, it's based on a story that someone told me. It's not an actual event, but one that I took to be real. I would say that it's probably something that the kid made up, but at the time I believed him."
The Arcade Fire formed around the husband and wife duo of Butler and Chassagne. Joining together as recently as mid- 2003, the current lineup solidified in late 2003/early 2004, when their first full-length album Funeral was recorded. The Arcade Fire is known for its enthralling live performances, as well as its use of a large number of musical instruments. In addition to mainstays guitar, drums, and bass guitar, members play piano, violin, viola, cello, xylophone, keyboard, French horn, accordion, and harp. With several able musicians, The Arcade Fire takes most of its instrumental diversity on tour and band members switch instrumental duties throughout their shows. The number of instruments, along with a wide set of musical influences has provided a substantial number of resources on which to draw from during the recording process. The promise showed by the band in its live shows allowed it to land a record contract with Chapel Hill-based independent record label Merge Records.
