Tooth & Nail - Artist Blog - I Am Empire

Two Years of Kings

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 14:01:05 -0800

Two years ago today, we released "KINGS" on Tooth and Nail Records. We spent the night celebrating the release of our first album on our new record label. It had been a dream of ours to 1. sign to a record label and 2. put out a record in stores! We have now done both of those things! We have also been lucky enough to travel across the US multiple times, as well as internationally to play the music from that record. We wanted to thank everyone who has supported our band since it's inception, and thank you all for buying/listening to/illegally downloading, and burning our record.

Commemorative of this, we will be streaming would like to offer a free download of the unreleased acoustic versions of the songs "You're a Fake!" and "Foxhole" from this album. The link is below. Thank you.

-I Am Empire

SOUNDCLOUD - DOWNLOAD HERE

I Am a Man of Few Words

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 14:01:41 -0800

Greetings,

June was an incredible month; Baltimore a wonderful city. I'm writing to you from a comfortable chair in San Jose, California listening to some exciting mixes of our new record.

Our producer, Brian McTernan, has pushed us far beyond our own comfort zone and taught us the art of confidence. Regardless of what you expect to hear, you may find yourself pleasantly surprised. I've honestly had to sit back and try to understand this record myself! The mystery of happiness, the pursuit of love. Am I nothing but a blackout? drawing questions of revival and the things we should do to feel new again?

I don't have a clue…but the labor that inspired this record, and the labor that was required to make this record has drawn a smile upon my heavy heart. I'm excited and nervous, but confident about releasing these songs to all of you wonderful people. We hope to rebuild your love for our band and restore the rock in your roll. If you've met me, you know I'm a man of few words, but I sincerely look forward to seeing you all on tour soon.

Cheers,
Austin

I Am Josh & Writing A Blog

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 10:07:36 -0700

What’s up Earth?!

It has definitely been a while since I have been able to sit down and contemplate where I am and all I have accomplished with my best friends in I Am Empire. With a year full of touring in a van without AC, awesome festivals, van breakdowns and awesome hangs, it was always about looking to the future. There is always a show to get to or a cracked exhaust manifold to fix. We have been so busy thinking about our next move, we hardly get to notice all that we are accomplishing right now.

Sitting back now I feel like we are in the midst of defining what I Am Empire is and that is an exciting thing to be a part of. I can honestly say that this album, which we have so diligently been putting together this past several months, is the culmination of all of our hard work, anxieties, hopes and frustrations over this past year. This has been a greatly transitional part of our lives. There are many changes and uncertainties surrounding us and it seems that every decision we make holds a heavy weight in deciding what the future has in store for us. Yet here we are just being dudes, making some sweet jams.

I didn't plan on getting real sentimental when I sat down to write this blog but I think that writing puts a lot of this into perspective and when I get to thinking about it, I realize how grateful I am for all of this. Hearing these songs come together in the studio has been a very surreal experience for me. Every note carries with it a memory of this last year’s struggles and successes and I think you will be able to hear all of them come through on this album. One thing I can say for sure is that we have put 110% of ourselves into this and we regret nothing. I know I have enjoyed every second of it.

To a billion more,

- Joshua

I Am In The Salad Days

Tue, 26 Jun 2012 13:06:50 -0700

It all started in 2003. I met a kid named Austin in my P.E. class on the football field and we got to talking about music, bands and guitar. One thing led to another and we ended up writing a rock song together in his bedroom that June, the first of many that would create the catalog of I Am Empire's current history.

Later that same year, a friend of mine from church asked me if I had heard the new record by a band called Thrice; "The Artist In The Ambulance." I had no idea what he was talking about honestly, but 12 tracks later on the car ride home I was hooked. I knew that was what I wanted to do and that it could be done. Austin was a great singer, we could both play guitar, all we needed was a pair of friends on drums and bass and we would be there!

Thrice sounded like everything we loved, passionate lyrics, gritty vocals and a rockin' and original-sounding band. Without their presence and outspoken faith in the mainstream music world we may have never seen the path that brought us to where we are today. I think we have a lot to thank them for, and also a lot to thank Salad Days Studios; the place responsible for producing that record, for. Which brings us to our current endeavor...

It's a pretty rare occurrence for four friends to get together to play rock 'n' roll in a garage and end up in a state-of-the-art recording studio with one of their favorite all time producers like Brian McTernan. It's an unbelievable feeling still knowing that I am two weeks into that very process here at Salad Days in Baltimore, MD with my best friends in I Am Empire.

Everything we have done up to this point has been an adventure; touring, playing overseas, writing and recording, etc. But this experience in a way is the topper on it all. In addition to creating albums like Thrice's "Artist", Salad Days is an amazing place to simply spend time for any musician. The days have been chalk-full of tracking ideas, jamming and talking endless circles around who the best bands of the last 10 years are.

Brian is an incredible producer who we have all looked up to since that fateful year of '03, so learning from him is like interacting with a real life Yoda; a true Jedi Master in the band world. He has pulled a very organic and energetic power from our music that maybe we already had but have never harnessed until now. The album we are making here will without a doubt be the most prolific and complete musical effort of our careers, we are all so excited for you all to hear it!

I know that the guys and I are so thankful to God for bringing us here and to Tooth & Nail for making this happen for a band of four geeky music guys that didn't have anything better to do. And we would not be here without the love and support we always receive from our fans, friends, families and each other. Regardless of public opinion or success, I know we will all remember our experience here in an absolutely fond way. We will always be able to say that we walked the same halls as some of our favorite all time artists (Thrice, Circa Survive, etc.) for four weeks, and made a record that stretched us to the best of our abilities and the furthest reaches of our passion. I hope that you, when you hear the music we're making, feel the same intensity and power that brought it to life!

Thank you for reading as well as supporting I Am Empire and music from all around the world. Without you, our lives would be so much different, and the path from P. E. to L.P. would still be a mystery we would never solve. Here's to making records until we're dead; long live Rock 'n' Roll!

-Andrew

A video blog for those interested in Andrew's gear is up now on YouTube.

I Am Done Tracking Drums

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:23 -0700

Hello internet world,

Eric from I Am Empire here once again. We are on Day 13 here at Salad Days Studio in Baltimore, Maryland and things are going great!
Yesterday I spent some time with Austin at the local Barnes & Noble, which is located right along the harbor. What a view! We got a chance to see a whole bunch of ships come in to the harbor for what was called the "Star-Spangled Sailabration", which had ships from Brazil, Mexico, Indonesia, Colombia, Ecuador, Denmark, United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, Japan, Norway and of course the USA. It was pretty sweet.

As far as music goes, drum tracking is over and I feel it went really well. I can honestly say that this feels like my best drumming yet. Check out YouTube for some sweet footage from the studio. Josh is currently on day two of tracking his bass parts, which are sounding super sweet and punchy so far. Look forward to next weeks blog to hear from Josh about bass tracking and other things.

If you would like more daily updates, keep up with us on all our social networking websites!

Twitter: @IAmEmpire
Instagram: @I_Am_empire
Facebook: Facebook.com/IAmEmpire

Peace!
-Eric

I Am Tracking

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:15 -0700

Hello!

We are done with pre-production and we begin tracking tomorrow. It has been great working with Brian on all of these songs and we can't wait to get started on the actual recording process. We start with drum tones in the morning. But for now, time to make some pasta. If you would like to keep up with more of the daily updates, please follow us on any of the following platforms:

Twitter: @IAmEmpire
Instagram: @I_Am_empire
Facebook: Facebook.com/IAmEmpire

- Eric

I Am Recording A New Album

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:08 -0700

Hello!

We would like to announce that we are currently in Baltimore, Maryland recording our next full-length album for Tooth and Nail Records. We are working with producer Brian McTernan (Thrice, Circa Survive) who owns and operates Salad Days Studio. We will be posting updates every few days on all our social networking sites, and we will also be posting weekly updates here on this blog so stay tuned. Peace.

-E
IAE

Home.

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:05 -0700

This is it folks! We've come to the end of the road on the Fire With Fire tour, and let me tell you, it has been a month none of us will forget. We have had the highest highs and the lowest lows on this tour. From playing the biggest shows of our career to being forced to cancel one of the biggest shows of our career, and even being stranded for weeks at a time in states far from home, while we try to find a way to pull together enough money to buy a new van, or fix a trailer, or even fix that new van we pulled money together to purchase. But where would we be without trials? If we just left home and came back every tour without having gone through something, what would be the use? On this tour, more than ever, we have come back with a new found faith and direction in our band. We firmly believe I Am Empire is a band with a purpose. We are lucky to be a group of 5 guys that band together during hard times, instead of getting mad and making things worse.

On this tour we started doing something a little different and it's been working very well! With every CD purchased from our table, we are donating $1 of that to The Mentoring Project. This is an organization founded by Don Miller that sends out people to act as mentors to fatherless children across the world. Kids that grow up without fathers need a father figure in their lives and this organization works to provide that for them. If you don't know much about our band, Austin (our singer) has gone through the pain of a father leaving his family behind and that is what our record, Kings, is about. The pain of dealing with that and learning that there is still hope even in the worst situations.

If you were one of the kids we played to on this tour, we all thank you for coming out and supporting our band. Without you guys we would be nothing. If you have never been to a show before, we hope to see you soon and we still love you! If it works out and Tooth likes this blog, maybe I will continue the life on the road with I Am Empire blog for you all when we hit the road again! Otherwise, you can at least follow the band on twitter (@iamempire) and tumblr (iamempire.tumblr.com) and even on my personal blog (imdan.tumblr.com) if you'd like to keep up with us!

I AM WEST

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:58 -0700

We made it back to the West coast! After a month of van/trailer/scheduling problems, we are back. On our way we spent a couple days up in Saskatchewan, Canada for a show on the tour. It was our first time up there and it was a blast. Getting into the country proved to be a bit of a hassle, but once we were in, the people were so kind to us and the show was great! Kids definitely love music up in America's hat.

Today, we played Creation Northwest in the cold and the rain (a welcome break from the grimy, muggy, heat of the midwest) and got to hang out with Adam, Casey, and Micah from Tooth! A lot of fun people running this label we all know and love.

On our day off last week after Sonshine (which was AWESOME), Luke, Josh, Eric, and I went to see the new Harry Potter....yes, I'm a huge fan, read all the books, and the final movie was SO rad. Feel free to judge me all you want, you're missin out if you haven't followed the series! In other personal news, I've also been listening to a lot of The Gaslight Anthem and Foster the People this month. If you haven't checked them out before, do that. I feel like I've been focusing a lot on the goings on of tour and leaving out a lot of the fun little facts about me and the band that could be interesting, disturbing, or just plain boring. Maybe I'll start adding a little bit more of that for the last few days on this tour! We will be back home in only 3 days and as much as I love the road, I am stoked to get home and relax for a while!

I made a new video blog this week when we had some time off, so check that out here! (I apologize in advance for the amount of idiocracy involved in this video)

I AM MANWICH

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:51 -0700

The tour has BEGUN! All I can say is, FINALLY. The first two shows have been nothing but awesome. This 5 Tooth & Nail band package fully brings the rock. Josh and I have been throwing around the idea that the tour should be called the "Manwich Tour", due to the man singer, girl singer, man singer, girl singer line up. What do you think? No?

We played in St. Joseph, Missouri this evening under the threat of a tornado, we've had a few too many encounters with those this month. Being from California, I don't handle a tornado warning with great composure. Besides the crazy weather, Missouri was the bees knees. Lots of kids. Lots of lights. Lots of rock.

The best part about this tour has definitely been getting to hang out with the rest of the dudes and ladies in the other bands. We couldn't have gotten a greater group of people to be out here with! Hope you guys are excited for Icon For Hire and Nine Lashes albums to be released.

Yesterday, I Am Empire took the day off to drive back up to Minnesota and hang out at Rock the Barn festival which was super rowdy! I even fell off the front of the stage at one point...It was rad to hang with so many awesome bands/friends again. Including, but not limited to, The Wedding, Children 18:3, and Hyland to name a few. Keep your eyes out for a possible tour in the future...

It's gettin late here in Missouri and we've got a long day ahead of us to get to Iowa tomorrow, but while you're busy waiting for the next blog, check out some of our personal pages!

I Am Empire Tumblr
My personal blog (a good amount of pictures from the road get posted here)

TWITTER:
Josh
Dan
Andrew
Eric
Austin

I AM BACK

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:38 -0700

So, after a full week off in Minneapolis, Minnesota we are BACK on the road! The second van of this tour got out of the shop Wednesday morning with a brand new radiator and we made it without problems to Oshkosh, Wisconsin to Lifest. We FINALLY met up with the rest of the tour package and shared the stage last night with Nine Lashes, Icon For Hire, and Write This Down. It was a quick hour and a half of music but we had a blast. We are so pumped to be back out on the road and playing some fun festivals on the way.

We are so happy to have had a great place to stay with good friends all of last week, without them we might have had a pretty rough time. We spent the week working on other things for the band like our upcoming fall tour, some videos (to be posted soon), and more so we definitely did not waste our time off!

As I write this, we are sitting in a Starbucks on a nice Wisconsin morning, just outside of Lifest where we'll be hanging out again today with Children 18:3, Spoken, Icon For Hire, and Emery. We spent the night in the van (6 people, 4 benches...you do the math!) and I think I have a hundred mosquito bites! But it's nice to be relaxing with some AC, coffee, and good tunes to get me movin'.

Hopefully we can find a better place to stay tonight, outside of the mosquito ridden van! The updates will be coming in faster now (hopefully!) so let's have an awesome July together!

I AM VANS

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:32 -0700

We left off last in Topeka, Kansas where we were stuck finding a new van to continue the Fire With Fire tour and play Creation East (today)..since then, much has changed.

After that day we drove to Minnesota, bought a new (to us) van, took off toward Pennsylvania, and overheated on the side of I-94 Minnesota 3 hours later....we were able to let it cool down a little bit and drive it 10 minutes to a friend's house who happened to live right near where we broke down. Very skeptical at the van's ability to make it the next 20 hours across the country, we decided to stay the night and get it checked first thing in the morning (this left us with about 28 hours to make a 20 hour drive). We got it back from the shop at 11 am, they said that it checked out fine and we just overheated. Back on the road, the thermostat began to read high temperatures (once again) only 25 minutes down the road. We had to pull off the freeway to the nearest Ford shop who wasn't able to even check the van until 5 days later. At this point, we only had about 23 hours before our set time at Creation, leaving us a 3 hour grace period. Trying to push on, we hit the road one last time...our hearts broke a little bit as the van was obviously being pushed to it's limit within another 25 minutes and we knew there was no way it would be able to drive for the next 20 straight hours. This left us no choice but to cancel our appearance at Creation East. Definitely the absolute LAST thing I wanted to happen on this tour, and it did. We have never been to Creation before and personally, I was so pumped to play it. It seems there is something trying to hold us back from getting out there this summer. The only good thing in the situation is that we only had to cancel Creation and one show in New York due to this because the first two shows of the tour had already been canceled by the promoter, allowing us to actually be on every date of the FWF tour still.

Thankfully, we have a place to stay here in Minneapolis and will be able to hang out for 4th of July. Also, the van will be getting a new radiator system and will be good to go by next Wednesday when we go to Wisconsin to jam at LifeFest! So anxious to get back on the road, but for now, we will be patient and enjoy our time off in a nice state with good friends. In the meantime, check out another tour video blog here!

I AM IN KANSAS ANYMORE

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:25 -0700

I have never disliked a river more than I disliked the Missouri River yesterday. After an overnight drive from Denver, Colorado, through Nebraska, to West Missouri, we were stuck. The Missouri had overflowed and flooded 125 miles of freeway along the state line, leaving us unable to cross over into the state without adding another 5-6 hours to our trip. Unfortunately this left us only one choice, to cancel the show.

The good thing of this is that our van started having troubles at this point and we made it to a place that we know well before it finally gave out. Now, I know we are from San Jose, but Topeka, Kansas may as well be our second home. Back in October, our transmission blew out here and we got stuck here for a week. Now, we are stuck here again and searching for another new van. The fortunate part is that we know so many great people here now who help us and give us a places to stay! The van we just recently purchased miraculously from California to Kansas, rolling in just as a ball joint cracked. We spent the last two days relentlessly searching the country for a new van and actually found one at a good price that we will be getting and being able to make it to the first show of the tour at Creation Fest East! We are beyond stoked to finally be moving on the Fire With Fire tour and playing some rad shows across the country.

Throughout all this we got a chance to do a little rehearsing and ended up writing a pretty heavy song and are super pumped.

One of our favorite things to do on the road is finding awesome restaurants, especially cheap ones. After the show in St. George, the promoter took us out to this Mexican place called Alvaro's and I've gotta say...they make one mean burrito....AND it was only THREE DOLLARS! Such a good deal for being on the road. So, if you're ever going through Southwest Utah, hit up some Alvaro's!

Things will be picking up here shortly and we will have another video blog to show you guys soon, so keep checking back!

I AM THE DESERT

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:18 -0700

If I had to pick one word to describe this tour so far, it would be: SWEAT.

We have been in the desert between Las Vegas and St. George, Utah for the last two days and our air conditioning is officially out of order. Apparently the everything underneath our van has been rotted out to the point of being eaten away, the most important of those things being the AC hose. We ended up driving in 105 degree weather all afternoon. I don't think my body has ever been that hot!

We made some fun out of our day when the 3 of us who have iPhones downloaded a game called High Noon and started playing against each other. Things got pretty entertaining!

To top off all the heat, Austin, Eric, Josh, and I decided it would be a great idea to do a P90X workout an hour before we played the show...how we made it through our set without passing out is truly a miracle!

We're set up in a church auditorium getting ready to sleep for the night and I can definitely feel a good sleep coming on...at least until we have to wake up at 5 am to drive out to Colorado! Hopefully the van will stay together on the way there.

I AM SWEATING

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:09 -0700

Day 1, complete. (mostly)

Today was definitely the first day of tour. Woke up in a hot, smelly van in the middle of I-5 in California, drove from sunup til 3 pm when we finally arrived in Las Vegas, and met up with the guy who was putting us up for the night. Now, so far, this sounds like a good day. What I left out, is when we got to Vegas, our air conditioning hose sprung a leak and began spewing steam from the back of our van. This led us to over an hour of driving around Las Vegas searching for the In-N-Out burger in 107 degree weather with no ac...we were quite a sweaty bunch as we walked in the doors of In-N-Out but were beyond grateful to the awesome people who bought is burgers!

While we were relaxing at the apartment we decided to make a little video blog for all of you, sort of an "I Am Empire: Cribs" type deal. Check it out HERE!

Overall, it was a successful day, playing a rad show in a record store with some cool bands (including great friends From Indian Lakes) and then exploring the old Las Vegas strip with a friend from home.

Tomorrow has another trip to the mechanic and a drive to the next show in St. George, Utah. More good times to come!

I AM FIRE WITH FIRE

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:03:01 -0700

Hello world!

It is t-minus 2 hours until we are officially on the road again (get it?), headed out to begin the Fire With Fire tour with a lot of Tooth & Nail family members. Personally, I have been itching to get back out on the road as I Am Empire has been holed up at home in San Jose, California for the last 3 months. Tonight, we drive down the California coast on our way to Las Vegas for our first show (Zia Records) tomorrow.

While we were home we sold our last van and picked up a new one with INCREDIBLE help and support from fans across the world, so I guess this will be its 'maiden voyage', if you will. If you were one of the fantastic people who donated to our cause, we want to thank you from the bottom of our hearts! This tour is for all of you.

I know I Am Empire has been a part of Tooth & Nail for about a year now and the album has been floating around the world for 6 months, but I'm willing to bet a lot of you reading this haven't been officially introduced to us yet. We are: Austin Lyons (vocals), Andrew Stanton (shredder), Joshua Case (bass man), Eric Martin (I don't have a clever name for drummer), and I, Dan Otis (rhythm get-ar). We've been a band for the better part of 3 years now and absolutely love what we do and feel so lucky to be a part of a label like Tooth & Nail with bands that we have admired since we were wee lads. If you've NEVER heard us before, check our Facebook and Twitter!

Packing for this tour was a bit of an adventure on my end. Lots of searching for clothes, visiting and revisiting Kinkos to print necessary paperwork for the road, finding a new sleeping bag, and (after the old one's zipper was demolished) buying a new suitcase. But now it is all sitting quietly in my house's entryway, waiting to be crammed under seats of the van.

Our last tour was back in February and March when we went out with Children 18:3 (incredible guys/girl) and had one of the greatest few weeks on the road in our history. It was quite a change from the tepid winters of California...the generally sunny, 50-60 degrees with a bit of wind creeping down from the north days we were used to became a thing of dreams. We met Children in Minnesota two days after one of the biggest storms in 45 years had passed and opened our doors to a chilling -34 degrees! Needless to say, it was a trip that left our bones numb.

Welp, the van is calling to be loaded up so we can hit the road. I hope this blog was the start of something amazing! It will be pretty active for the next 6 weeks while we travel the country (and even Canada!) so lock it in your browsers and keep up with the craziness of I Am Empire!