2009–2011: Formation and Ready Set Rock R5 is made up of siblings Riker, Rocky, Ross and Rydel Lynch, and their family friend Ellington Ratliff, whom they met at a California dance studio called the Rage. About a year after meeting, they asked Ratliff to join the band. While living in Colorado, the Lynch siblings went to a performing arts school. They used to put on shows for their family and charged them at least a dollar to watch them perform in their basement. In 2009, R5 officially started the band and debuted their
YouTube web series,
R5 TV, documenting the band's day-to-day life and career beginning. On September 5, they released their first music video, "Without You", directed by Riker. The band self-released a five-track EP titled
Ready Set Rock on March 9, 2010, consisting of songs written primarily by Riker, Rocky, Rydel, vocal coach Mauli B, and band coach E-Vega, who produced the EP. No official single was released from EP. On September 4 they released a music video for "Can't Get Enough of You" and, in the next month, for "Never". On July 26, 2011, the band released their debut promotional single, "Say You'll Stay". The music video was released on August 3. During these early years they played sets throughout Southern California at venues, including the
Orange County Fair, the
San Diego County Fair, the San Diego IndieFest, the
Knitting Factory, and
Six Flags Magic Mountain.
2012–2014: Loud and Louder In April 2012, the band members announced via their website that they had signed a record deal with
Hollywood Records, and that they were planning for their first mini-tour in May. They collaborated on charity single "Make Some Noise" for Family Channel's Stand Up philanthropic campaign. Their debut tour,
West Coast Tour, started on May 3, 2012, and traveled only to west coast. The second tour,
East Coast Tour started on December 15, in
Jamestown, New York, and traveled only to east coast serving to promote the band with the younger crowd. They also held three special concerts, titled
3M Tour, in
Madison, Wisconsin on November 18, 2012,
Milwaukee on November 19 and
Minneapolis on November 20. On February 19, 2013, they released the four-song EP
Loud, which charted in the top 3 of the iTunes chart within 24 hours of its release. One of the songs on the EP, "Here Comes Forever", was written by Riker, Rocky and Ross. The R5's debut single, "
Loud", was released on February 13 and also serves as the first single from the debut album. The song peaked at number 72 in Japan and 199 in United Kingdom. On August 16, 2013, "
Pass Me By", the second single from their debut album,
Louder, was released.
Louder was released on September 24, 2013, and climbed its way to number 2 on the
iTunes charts, being classified as a "chart-topper" on the iTunes End of the Year Album list. On December 25, 2013, the third single from
Louder was released, titled "
(I Can't) Forget About You" and, shortly after, the official video was released on the band's website. The band had songwriting credits on 6 of the 11 songs on
Louder. The album includes all four songs from the
Loud EP. On February 5, 2014, the band embarked on the first leg of its first world tour starting in
Warsaw, Poland. They toured numerous countries in Europe including:
Norway,
Sweden,
Denmark,
Germany,
Netherlands,
Belgium,
Italy,
Spain,
France, the
United Kingdom, the
Republic of Ireland and
Israel. The band also performed at the annual
White House Easter Egg Roll and at the
Radio Disney Music Awards. On April 24, 2014, the band appeared on
Ryan Seacrest's popular
KIIS-FM radio show,
On Air with Ryan Seacrest, where it was announced that they would be the opening act at the
Wango Tango Music Festival. The band released "
One Last Dance" as fourth and final single from
Louder on May 30, 2014. On June 9, 2014, they released the music video for "Rock That Rock", a song written for Candymania's
Ring Pop, featuring fan content.
2014–2016: Heart Made Up on You and Sometime Last Night Their third EP,
Heart Made Up on You, was released on July 22, 2014, and consists of the songs "Heart Made Up On You," "Things Are Looking Up," "Easy Love," and "Stay With Me." The music video for "Heart Made Up on You" was released on August 1, 2014. R5's second full-length album,
Sometime Last Night, was released on July 10, 2015. Riker shared in interviews that their second album was "more mature," and that Ross was one of the key writers on the record. Ross stated that, earlier in the year, the band had an entire record finished and mastered, but they had second thoughts and scrapped it, feeling it was too similar to
Louder and didn't accurately reflect the direction they wanted to go in. On March 4, 2015, the group hosted an intimate "Hollywood Hang" at the
Roxy in Los Angeles. On April 16, 2015, the band's concert movie,
R5: All Day, All Night, was screened in select Regal cinemas for one night only. In the documentary, Rydel and Ellington confirmed that they are in a relationship. "
All Night" was released as the third single on June 2, along with the album's iTunes pre-order. On June 11, R5 made their late night debut, performing "All Night" on
Jimmy Kimmel Live!. On April 6, 2015, R5 announced the first leg of their Sometime Last Night Tour. Following the conclusion of their summer tour, R5 released
R5 Live: Sometime Last Night At the Greek Theatre, a two-disc DVD set featuring 80-minutes of live music and exclusive behind-the-scenes content. They toured around Europe, Australia, Asia, North America and South America, and wrapped up the last show of the tour on March 17, 2016, in
Sioux City, Iowa. Jacob Whitesides joined the band as opener for first leg of the US tour,
Jack and Jack opened for them in Australia, Max Schneider opened for the second leg of the American tour and DJ Ryland joined the band for the whole tour. On June 30, 2015, "F.E.E.L. G.O.O.D." was released on iTunes as an instant grat track for pre-orders. On July 8, 2015, the music video for "All Night" was released. On October 17, 2015, R5 released a music video for "I Know You Got Away". The video was shot during the European leg of the Sometime Last Night Tour and was directed by Ross and edited by Rydel. On December 18, 2015, R5 premiered a music video for "Wild Hearts" on Live Nation TV. The video was directed by the band during their trip to Las Vegas for Rocky's 21st birthday. The band performed at
Summer Sonic Festival in Tokyo, Japan on August 20, 2016, and in Osaka on August 21, 2016. It was their third time to visit Japan. After the festival, the members except for Rocky went back to Los Angeles, but Rocky stayed in Japan for about a few weeks to be with his girlfriend, who stayed in Japan at that time. Other artists on the lineup include
Underworld,
Fergie and
Weezer.
2017–2018: New Addictions and hiatus On March 16, 2017, Riker announced that the band was recording new songs. On April 5, they announced their fourth EP,
New Addictions, which was released on May 12, 2017. The five-song EP includes the single "If", the original songs "Red Velvet", "Lay Your Head Down" and "Trading Time", and "
Need You Tonight", a cover of the
INXS single from their 1987 album
Kick. Shortly after the release of
New Addictions, the new single "Hurts Good" was released The band also announced their
New Addictions Tour, a US tour which begins on June 17, 2017, and toured to Mexico, Europe, South America, and other countries. After the single and music video called "Hurts Good" in 2017, R5 didn't release any more songs or music videos. On February 1, 2018, R5 posted on their YouTube a video called The Last Show. Then on March 1, 2018, R5's Instagram and Twitter handles were changed to
The Driver Era and all of R5's previous posts were deleted. On March 2, 2018, they announced that the band was going on a temporary hiatus and that
The Driver Era would be a band with only Ross and Rocky. On June 11, 2023, R5 reunited on stage at the
Greek Theatre during
The Driver Era's headlining show, to perform their song "All Night". == Musical influences ==