The Rapture is a goth/glam/dance band founded in San Diego by guitarist/vocalist Luke Jenner and drummer Vito Roccoforte. They were only based locally from 1996 to 2000 before moving to New York. While in San Diego, they released their debut album Mirror and several EPs.
It wasn’t until moving to New York, adding bassist-vocalist Mattie Safer, and releasing House of Jealous Lovers in 2002 that they achieved national acclaim. That album and 2003’s Echoes were produced by DFA label mainstays James Murphy and Tim Goldsworthy, of LCD Soundsystem.
After leaving DFA, the Rapture released Pieces of the People We Love in 2005, produced by British DJ-turned-remixer Ewan Pearson, Dangermouse, and Paul Epworth (of Arctic Monkeys).
The Rapture’s original San Diego label GSL Records -- which put out over 100 albums by groups like the Locust and GoGoGo Airheart -- announced it was getting out of the record business in late 2007. The band itself essentially went on hiatus in 2008, when Jenner, depressed over his mother’s suicide, departed the group.
Jenner spent the time off in the Brooklyn NY neighborhood of Park Slope playing softball, DJing, volunteering at a food co-op, and going to church, where he sang in a choir. He returned to the Rapture in 2011 and the band began recording in NYC.
After around a three year hiatus, the band released a new album, In the Grace of Your Love before becoming mostly dormant once again.
In early May 2019, the dance-punk trio staged a reunion performance for the Just Like Heaven festival in Long Beach.