European Fanclub: The AVA & Blink-182 Community

Adam ‘Atom’ Willard was born on August 15th, 1973 and has been in several high-profile bands, most famously The Offspring and Angels & Airwaves. He started playing with his first notable band while only in his teens.

Atom joined Rocket From The Crypt in 1990 after the original drummer moved out of the San Diego area. He played with the band for four of their albums and a few EP’s and after ten years of making a name for himself with the band, he left after musical differences with the rest of the band. After leaving Rocket, Atom became a drum tech for Weezer and followed them all over the county and even joined Weezer’s drummer Patrick Wilson in his side-project The Special Goodness.

In 2003 Willard joined The Offspring to replace their original drummer Ron Welty. Willard never officially appeared on any of the albums as session drummer Josh Freese recorded drums shortly after Ron’s departure. However, Willard appeared in the bands video for the single “(Can’t Get My) Head Around You” which was recording in 2003 and aired in early 2004.

In 2005 Atom was contacted by former Blink-182/Box Car Racer front man Tom Delonge and asked to play drums in his new band, Angels & Airwaves, which consisted of Delonge, David Kennedy(Box Car Racer/Hazen Street) and Ryan Sinn (Distillers). The debut album was released in May 2006 entitled “We Don’t Need To Whisper”. The album produced four hit singles and toured all through the year. The time spent with AVA limited his time with The Offspring and with that he officially left the band in 2007 to work with AVA full-time. Also in 2007, AVA released their second album, “I-Empire” which sold over 200,000 copies and released three singles to date, with a fourth on its way.

He currently resides in Los Angeles, California with his wife, Heather.