The Rise of As I Lay Dying

After the longest recording process in As I Lay Dying’s 10-year history, the California metal band is about to release its fifth album. The Powerless Rise is an intense disc that is sure to excite and inspire metal fans. Youthink caught up with singer Tim Lambesis by phone to find out more about his band’s latest release.

YT: How does The Powerless Rise differ from your previous work?
TL: You know, we’ve always kind of progressed from every album to the next. We’ve never really tried to shock our fans by completely changing [our sound] or anything, but just try to take the elements that make up our band and push them a little bit further every time.

YT: Which song on this album are you most connected to?
TL: That’s tough to say because we haven’t started playing a lot of these songs live yet. I think I get connected to the songs the more often we’ve played them in the show and kind of feed off their live energy as well as their studio sound. But if I had to make my best guess I’d say that just the overall intensity of the opening track, "Beyond Our Suffering," is one of my favourites because it’s definitely the heaviest, most intense songs we’ve ever written.

YT: Where does your inspiration for song-writing come from?
TL: I think it can come from a lot of different sources, not necessarily all musical sources. For me, as a lyricist, I have to be inspired by what I’m currently experiencing in my life, and the lessons that I’m learning. But as a musician, I think that there’s this overall sound in my head and I don’t know where it comes from. It’s probably subconscious in a lot of ways from some of the trash bands I grew up listening to, but I think there’s just this type of sound that I always strive for and I can’t pinpoint where it comes from.

YT: What is one piece of advice you would give to aspiring musicians?
TL: I think keep writing, and if you can afford it, keep recording new stuff. I think that if the music itself is good enough, nobody will deny you the opportunity to take your band to the next level.