Is Jared Leto’s Thirty Seconds to Mars the most absurd vanity project in Hollywood history?

Sign up to Roisin O’Connor’s free weekly newsletter Now Hear This for the inside track on all things music Get our Now Hear This email for free Get our Now Hear This email for free SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Enjoy unlimited access to 100 million ad-free songs and podcasts with Amazon Music Sign up now for a 4 month free trial Sign up Enjoy unlimited access to 100 million ad-free songs and podcasts with Amazon Music Sign up now for a 4 month free trial Sign up “The album is undone by Leto’s baffling, pretentious poetry and the sanitised quality of the heavy guitars,” tutted Rolling Stone. From early on in the love affair, Thirty Seconds to Mars would cheerfully describe their following – who refer to themselves as “the Echelon” – as “a cult”. But it was a success and Leto did it all over again in 2021, with members of the Echelon paying from $1,500 to $6,500 for their “exclusive” Thirty Seconds to Mars experience. “I find them excruciatingly generic, and their albums simply do not move me at any level,” wrote one Reddit user when a Leto fan wondered why Thirty Seconds to Mars provoked such hate.