Decoy is back with WASTOIDS Music News, where he drops a heap of music stories on you. As always, we’re brought to you by Hello Merch, where bands offer, you guessed it, merch. Most people think of records, shirts, hoodies, that sort of thing, but the beauty of it all is there’s no rules. You can make whatever—like deathdrinks, a cocktail recipe book companion to Survival Guide’s 2023 album deathdreams. Emily Whitehurst is known for her work in the punk band Tsunami Bomb, but Survival Guide leans into synth-ier territory. Deathdreams was produced by Bob Hoag at Flying Blanket Recording studio in Mesa, Arizona. With deathdrinks, she concocted a distinct beverage for each song on the album, ranging from simple stirred, tiki and dessert drinks, to blended fare and mocktails. It’s up for pre-order now, along with gear and music.
Moving on: Northwest Indiana’s Cloakroom have released a new single, “Unbelonging.” Blending shoegaze, dream pop, and a distinctly pop heart on this song—think The Cure meets My Bloody Valentine—it’s a great example of the trio’s songcraft, and it comes complete with a video edited by bassist and WASTOIDS Hotline animator Bobby Markos, aka Documavision. The song was recorded at the late Steve Albini’s Electrical Audio and The Rec Room, and Cloakroom teases a new full length record coming in 2025 on Closed Casket Activities.
In other news: Stephen Malkmus of Pavement, Matt Sweeney, Jim White, and Emmett Kelly’s indie rock supergroup The Hard Quartet released one of our favorite albums of the year, and now they’ve announced a 2025 North American tour with Sharp Pins and Evicshen. It includes a stop at Mesa’s Nile Theatre on April 29th.
Moving on! On October 4th, A Place to Bury Strangers released their seventh album, Synthesiser. They hit the Valley Bar in Phoenix Saturday, November 2, and they’ve also released a new video for the great song “It’s Too Much.”
You might be saying “it’s too much” distortion when seeing them Saturday night—as bandleader Oliver Ackermann also runs Death By Audio distortion pedals. Here’s our most recent interview with Ackermann:
And to close, we usually talk about musicians who rule on Music News, but here’s a guy who sucks. We’re talking about Tim Lambesis, of metalcore band As I Lay Dying. He’s got one of the craziest rock and roll life stories ever—after coming to prominence in the Christian metal scene with As I Lay Dying in the early 2000s. In 2008, Lambesis and Destroy the Runner vocalist Chad Ackerman formed Austrian Death Machine, a parody based around the movies of Arnold Schwarzenegger. To fans, Lambesis seemed like a guy with an interesting sense of humor and huge muscles—but the story gets much darker and more sinister from there.
In 2013, he was arrested by San Diego police and charged with soliciting “an undercover detective to kill his wife,” Meggan Murphy. In 2014 he pled “guilty” and was sentenced to six years in prison, though he was released in 2016. And it’s been eventful since then. He reactivated As I Lay Dying, releasing a new album, Shaped by Fire, in 2019.
So why am I talking about him now? Well, on November 15th As I Lay Dying is set to release its 7th album, Through Storms Ahead. But here’s the thing—guitarist Phil Sgrosso, drummer nIck Pierce, guitarist Ken Susi, and bassist/vocalist Ryan Neff have all left the band in the last month, as well as the band’s tour manager. Which means it’s JUST TIM these days. It’s truly a strange saga, one I can’t look away from.
Do you have any As I Lay Dying stories? Do you still rep the band? Got the inside scoop or dirt? If so, we’d love to hear from you: just call 1-877-WASTOIDS or hit us with a voice message, you can email that over to hotline@wastoids.com.
