Octahedron (album) - Development

Development

Omar Rodríguez-López was working on Octahedron at the same time as The Bedlam in Goliath, as is typical for Rodriguez to be working on two or three projects simultaneously. Yet as Bedlam turned into a "nightmare of a record to make" Rodriguez was unable to sustain both projects and devoted his attention on Bedlam.

Rodriguez had discussed the band's next album (then untitled) as early as January 2008, the month that The Bedlam in Goliath was released, claiming "I consider it to be our acoustic album." Cedric Bixler-Zavala has also spoken of the album as "acoustic" and "mellow," yet stated: "We know how people can be so linear in their way of thinking, so when they hear the new album, they're going to say, 'This is not an acoustic album! There's electricity throughout it!' But it's our version. That's what our band does -- celebrate mutations. It's our version of what we consider an acoustic album."

The album was recorded in three weeks during the month of August 2008, in Brooklyn, New York. Prior to recording, Omar Rodriguez-Lopez asked both saxophonist Adrián Terrazas-González and rhythm-guitarist/sound manipulator Paul Hinojos to leave the band. The Mars Volta's official website states that both "did so amicably." Regarding their departure, percussionist Marcel Rodriguez-Lopez noted that: "it's like we got a whole new band. It's two less members — we got to play differently."

Shortly after the album's release, Rodriguez-Lopez had hinted at Octahedron being the final album he records in his typical "gun-in-your-face mentality" where he would give musicians their parts without giving them any knowledge of how they fit into the greater song. However, he chose to continue with this technique for the band's subsequent album, Noctourniquet, stating it would be the last album he records that way.