Black Veil Brides

The video for “Knives And Pens” scored nearly 12 million YouTube views which in turn moved about 20,000 Black Veil Brides T-shirts out of Hot Topic outlets.

“I wanted to make the next Motley Crue or KISS,” frontman Andy Six (Biersack) told Billboard.

“I had a very specific vision of what I wanted to do with an image. We’re doing something more than a lot of people can offer, which is a larger-than-life image, theatrical presentation.”

Knives And Pens

And that was the key. BVBs were highly visual – dressed in black with black hair, black leather jackets, black pants/shirts, piercings, and heavy make-up (they had a promotional deal with Mehron Makeup).

Six started Black Veil Brides in Cincinnati where they gained local notoriety despite near constant line-up changes. But it was when Six wanted to relocate to L.A., largely because nothing much was going to happen for them in Ohio, the band balked. So Six left without them, resurrecting Black Veil Brides on the left coast.

The Brides ’10 debut album “We Stitch These Wounds” sold 11,000 copies in its first week to land at #36 on the Billboard Album chart. While not up to their t-shirt sales it was still a good start.

Unbroken

Soon, Six decided that he wanted to be called by his birth name, Andy Biersack. But that wasn’t the end of it.

For a solo album, “The Shadow Side,” he recorded under the moniker, Andy Black.

Black Veil Brides’ sophomore effort, “Set The World On Fire,” was followed by the song “Unbroken” which was heard on The Avengers soundtrack.

“Wretched And Divine: The Story Of The Wild Ones,” a Rock Opera concept album with accompanying film, was the band’s first Top 10 Billboard entry (#7). In addition, the ’13 album reached #1 on the iTunes Top Albums chart.

The single, “In The End,” reached #3 on the Billboard Rock chart initially selling over 200,000 copies in the U.S. alone and was certified gold by the RIAA, five years after its release, for sales exceeding 500,000 units.

“In The End” also won a Metal Hammer Golden God Award for “Song of the year.”

In The End

The band’s self-titled fourth album arrived in ’14. It was their second consecutive effort to debut in the Billboard Top 10. Keeping up his profile, Biersack hosted the ‘17 Alternative Music Awards in Cleveland.

Months later, Black Veil Brides released their fifth album, “Vale.” Andy Black then returned with his sophomore solo album “The Ghost Of Ohio.” Coming three years after the initial Andy Black effort, the ’19 album was a semi-autobiographical set exploring Biersack’s childhood anxieties and obsessions.

Black/Biersack and the group then presented “The Phantom Tomorrow,” an extension of the narrative first presented in the ’20 video for the lead single “Scarlett Cross,” featuring protagonist ‘The Blackbird’ and the antagonist known simply as ‘9’. But despite the “high” concept, the album barely registered on the Billboard 200 (#176).

Black Veil Brides returned in ’26 with their seventh album, “Vindicate,” “This record is rooted in the feelings of revenge and vindication,” noted Biersack. “These are emotions that can either push us forward or hold us back. There’s a duality to them. They can fuel growth, drive ambition, and help us rise above what’s tried to break us, but they can also become destructive if we let them consume us. Each song explores a different side of that struggle.”

The set contained the title track and “Certainty.”