Live Acre 7/2/13
One-a-day, for-a-week: Artist Edition Bonus: Dead Sara
Live Acre 7/2/13
One-a-day, for-a-week: Artist Edition Bonus: Dead Sara
7 days & 7 Los Angeles based artists that have our hearts.
We shot artists that we love wearing Catalyst around LA. Each of them tell us what their catalyst for making art was in the first place.
::WHO::
Dead Sara
::THEY ARE::
Emily Armstrong: Vocals + rhythm guitar
Siouxsie Medley: Lead guitar
Chris Null: Bass
Sean Friday: Drums
::THEIR CATALYST::
“What inspires me the most is what is around me. You know what are my friends doing? What are they inspired by? What are they doing that’s inspiring? It’s like this feeding off of each other type of vibe. It’s a lot more inspirational that way.”
– Emily Armstrong
“Music was just my favorite form of communication. It really brought me to life and I wanted to able to do that for others.”
– Siouxsie Medley
“My catalyst was helping me heal myself and better myself when I stopped using drugs. My catalyst now is inspiring others and changing the world.”
- Chris Null
“I like to feel something and make others feel what i’m feeling. I run across artists that inspire the shit out of me and I’d like to return the favor.”
- Sean Friday
Music history is rich with bands that have changed the game, but few are quite as interesting as Dead Sara. This electrifying four-piece rock band comprised of Emily Armstrong, Siouxsie Medley, Chris Null and Sean Friday, has created a revolution of supercharged rock music.
Watching Dead Sara perform is not an experience easily conveyed through print. Hailed and praised by reporters from Rolling Stone, Grammy.com, Fuse, AP, Billboard, Buzzbands, Revolver and LA Times, with headlines such as “Dead Sara soars”, “Marilyn Manson slurs; Dead Sara kills”, “L.A.’s new favorite rock frontwoman”, “The love child of Patti Smith and Layne Stayley”.
Extraordinary has become normal for the members of Dead Sara. And for Emily, being asking to sing on tracks by the likes The Doors, Courtney Love and The Offspring, has become standard.
They’ve won the hearts some of rock’s biggest legends. Dave Grohl told FUSE News: “Dead Sara should be the next biggest Rock Band in the world”. Legendary Jefferson Airplane singer Grace Slick was asked by the Wall Street Journal which female rock singers she admired and she said one name: “Emily Armstrong.”
In the last 2 years, they’ve toured with Bush, The Used, The Offspring and were a featured artist of Vans Warped Tour. But they just got home from their biggest road trip yet. A stadium tour opening for Muse.
Lyrically, many of Dead Sara’s songs are survival anthems informed by their struggle to stay true to their vision of being a powerful, uncompromising rock band. Emily said, “Weatherman was one of the first lyrics that I sang when we started writing the song – it was something I had to build the lyrics around. It comes down to predicting your own future by what it is you do today. Creating your own weather per se in standing up for what you believe in.”
They’ve attracted major buzz for the ferocious spectacle of their high-octane live performances. Of a January show at The Troubadour, L.A.’s indie-rock tastemaker website Picksysticks.com raved: “You almost forgot you were watching a rock show in the 450-capacity Troubadour and not in a venue like Staples Center that holds thousands when Dead Sara launched into their soon-to-be mega hit ‘Weatherman.’”
“We love classic rock, blues, folk, metal, punk, gospel, all of it, so we didn’t want to put restrictions on ourselves genre-wise. We just knew we wanted the music to sound really raw and primal, even a bit unsettling,” Siouxsie says.
‘Weatherman’ became a radio sensation, and they’ve performed it everywhere from Jimmy Kimmel Live! to their recent headline over-sold show at the El Rey Theatre in LA (video shown below). Their manager, Issac Heymann, credits the band’s initial success to Mike Karolyi, program director for Connecticut radio station WCCC.
“We did ‘The Sunset Sessions’ and all we said was we wanted to come out with one program director that wants to add the record,” he said. “Mike Karolyi ran up to me, freaking out. He saw them soundchecking and said, ‘What the hell is that? I’ve never heard anyone sing like that before.’ He was flying out and I said, ‘Change your flight, they’re playing at 8:00.’ I thought I’d never see him again. He changed his flight, stayed; I gave him an advance copy of the CD. He went back, started playing ‘Weatherman’ on his radio station and said 100% of the feedback was positive. And it took off from there.”
The band is currently back in the studio working on material for their upcoming second album due late 2013 / early 2014.
We can’t wait.
photography by Jessie Willner
July 2, 2013 by the kids of liveacre. Posted in 1 a day
Copyright © Liveacre 2012