To say that 2024 was an explosive year for As I Lay Dying vocalist Tim Lambesis is a bit of an understatement. The controversial frontman made headlines upon the latest dissolution of his aforementioned long-running metalcore outfit, as a drip-feed reveal of four separate lineup departures (Phil Sgrosso, Ryan Neff, Ken Susi & Nick Pierce) left him the sole member of the band.
Nearly all of those exit statements shared cryptic undertones of the exiting members’ moral code and personal limits being tested during their time in the band. Lambesis himself issued a statement on the matter in early November, vowing to once again rebuild the band, but provided little context as to why his bandmates left.
That all changed in late November, when private footage of Tim and his now estranged wife Dany began surfacing online anonymously. That footage featured heated conversations and arguments between the couple, and often found Tim in near manic states, pacing, talking erratically, and hitting himself repeatedly.
In the hours after that footage began to circulate, Tim issued this statement, claiming that leaked footage was in fact ‘public attacks’ on his character. He claimed that the footage emerged a day after he filed for divorce against Dany and was meant as ‘retaliation’ for him choosing to dissolve the marriage.
In his statement, Tim alleged that Dany had both verbally and mentally “abused” him over the course of three years. He further claimed that he had footage to back up his claims of her assaulting and threatening him.
He went on to add that he had filed for a restraining order against Dany and that a domestic violence investigation into their relationship was in the process of being filed. That same statement also found Tim labeling his erratic behavior in the footage as “anxiety filled reactions and defenses.”
Adding to the drama surrounding the situation is Tim‘s own controversial past. Back in 2013, he was sentenced to prison after pleading guilty to solicitation of another to commit murder. At that time Lambesis hired an undercover police officer posing as a hitman to murder his then wife.
He went on serve several years in prison before being paroled, after which he reunited As I Lay Dying until a similar mass exodus of the band’s roster began unfolding around 2020 to 2022. He would go on to rebuild that lineup with new members sans guitarist Phil Sgrosso. However, that incarnation of the band all exited late last year, Sgrosso included.
Now Lambesis has given his first interview since his above-mentioned statement. Speaking with ‘personal branding pro’ and fitness coach Justin Wenzel on the latter’s podcast, Lambesis has now broken his silence.
Speaking of the tumult among the band’s various rosters and his tendency to seek skilled musicians in a business sense rather than establishing brotherhood with his bandmates, Tim stated [transcribed by theprp.com]:
“I chose to make it that way, but that was my own fault. It doesn’t have to be that way… living with a person in a bus and all that, I’m responsible for making sure that there is health in my own life and personal concern between the people I’m working with and I didn’t prioritize that enough.”
Tim also spoke of his growing unhappiness in his relationship with his wife Dany as manifesting as far back as at least a year ago. He went on to say how his issues in his marriage eventually began creeping into his professional life:
“I think it just really comes down to the amount of anxiety I had on a relationship level, that I just carried on a regular basis, of like, not understanding. I just don’t understand how you could be with a person and not be kind to them, and, like, really mess with my head to the point where I just would wake up with anxiety. I’d go to sleep with anxiety.
And to me, being that version of myself, it was inevitable I was going to push everybody else away, right? Because how do you how do you connect with a person that’s drowning in anxiety constantly, but won’t talk to you about it?
I wasn’t going to talk about it, because I didn’t want to let anybody know how deeply unhealthy things were, because then they would tell me, I have to leave the relationship. But I wanted to find a way to fight and stay, right?
So, I just kept it in, kept it in, and they’re like, you know, people are just saying, like, ‘Tim‘s acting less and less like himself’, like, ‘I’m concerned, what is going on?’ I never yelled at anybody or argued with anybody, or we never had fights. It wasn’t like that. It was just like, from afar, they were like, ‘This dude just feels like he’s falling apart, like, what’s going on?’
And the irony is that the relationship ended — my relationship ended — at the same time that those guys sort of gave up, per se. I’m not blaming them, but the solution occurred at the same time that they felt like they no longer were… They didn’t want… They didn’t want to stick around, because they felt like there was no solution, right?”
When asked if his now former bandmates attempted to intervene, he replied, “…That’s not to their discredit. I mean, I I tend to… the more I’m struggling, the more I isolate, right?” He continued:
“I do have to defend them… So part of why I bottled up and isolated more is that I did get this sense of ultimatum that was like, ‘Hey, dude, whatever you’re going through, like, I can’t see that that stuff surface again, because if that, if that comes out again, I’m gone.” …One of the guys had said that. And so there was like, Okay, well now, like, I feel like I gotta hide my struggle, right?”
When asked if his bandmates experienced any of this behavior on the road, he replied:
“Yeah. I mean.. verbal arguments and stuff. Or, you know, you’d be like, hey, where did they go? Where did Tim… Me and my ex would go, [leaving his bandmates] [we would] just be gone for the last two hours, like we’re waiting for him…
And it just was, that whole, I’m just scratching my head and being like, how can I resolve conflict? And there was, there was no way to possibly resolve [it.] I’m always looking for a way to resolve conflict. It’s within my nature. Maybe it’s the codependent thing, like you’re talking about. So I just like all I care about is resolving it.”
Lambesis also went on to say that he feels he continued to try and make unhealthy relationships work in an attempt to fill a void left by his past mistakes, including losing access to his adopted children with his first wife as a result of his actions and arrest in 2013. Speaking of how losing those relationships have impacted him, he teared up stating:
“I think for people that are like ‘Ah man, this dude’s had every opportunity.’ I think that that’s a criticism that’s warranted. Because it’s like, man, I’ve had plenty of opportunities to take a step back and heal from that, but I never wanted to talk about it. Because I felt like, to some degree, there was this belief that if I try to say something… When you talk about somebody losing their kids, it’s natural to feel sympathy towards them, right?
And if I’m talking about something where [people will] feel like, ‘Oh, he’s trying to gain sympathy for how he feels’, or what he went through, then I know, for me, because I’m a public figure this, that’s a bad look, right? It’s like, oh, ‘that dude’s a narcissist’, or he’s trying to do whatever. So, I just I didn’t talk about it. I didn’t talk about it.
You know, 12 years ago is when I was arrested and in the last 12 years, I maybe talked, just acknowledged, that loss, like once or twice, very, very briefly. And avoiding that to me was a real problem. So I just can’t do anything but come out and say man, that’s the route that makes sense.
But there’s something freeing in finally acknowledging that thing I didn’t want to talk about, or if I did talk about it once a year for a couple minutes, [there’s] something freeing about it. If it’s 12 years later and I gotta cry about it a 100 more times then that’s what I’ve gotta do.”
When asked how old his children are now, he stated, “I’ve been asked out of respect for them to not talk about them publicly. But I can mention the feelings that I have for them in a broader sense. But their freedom and autonomy to remove themselves from the chaos that I’ve had in my life is something they deserve.”
When asked about the band’s latest album “Through Storms Ahead” he also described the lyrical content as in a way subconsciously being a “cry for help” with his mental unhappiness. The future As I Lay Dying was also brought up, but it would appear it’s not an immediate concern. Tim relayed of that:
“I don’t really want to talk about the details of that… I do feel like my task right now is to be further down this healing path, and when I’m there, I think it’s somewhat inevitable that I will… for people that like As I Lay Dying already, I may not win over new fans or whatever, but for people that are like ‘I wonder if the next As I Lay Dying album is going to be good?’ or if whatever he does next is going to be good, of course it’s going to be good if I just focus on my health and become the person that can create that and have a stable surrounding and good community around me, and that’s what’s gonna give it strength.
But I mean the musical creation has never been the difficult part for me. And that’s like a weird thing right? Like you recall record label people or booking agents and they’re like oh, “Well is Tim good at his job?” and they’re like, ‘Of course he’s good at his job, but he’s potentially a mess in other areas of life.’ So it’s like dude, my job is the least of my worries.”
Circling back to the void he’s struggled with in losing his children and how he’s been inclinded to harbor unhealthy relationships since, he offered:
“There’s clearly been something that’s been unaddressed for the last twelve years of my life, or just scratch the surface of it… If you have something traumatic happen and it creates a void in your heart and you feel like you shouldn’t talk about it, you’re not allowed to talk about it, or nobody wants to give you sympathy, or if you did get sympathy for it… you’d be called a narcissist. I had to put all that aside and just say, ‘I don’t care what people say.’
“I have to just address this, this is a huge void in my life. And if I don’t heal from it… I don’t want pity. I don’t want sympathy. But I want to address it. I want to be able to talk about it and say ‘this is what’s held me back.’ It’s important.
Pity’s kinda gross. I don’t want pity right? When I pity somebody else, I’m like, ‘Oh man, I hope they don’t know that I pity them.’ That would make them feel worse. I don’t want that. I just want to be able to address it, to say ‘this exists’, Like I can’t pretend it doesn’t exist. Like that’s it. It’s pretty simple.”
As for his approach to social media over the past year or two, he commented:
“I post because of the necessity of just existing in this world. But, like, I’ve been very much off of social media because this anxiety that it gives me. I think part of me just has to get past that and just be like, you know whatever the criticism may be, I think there’s conversations that can be had, even if there’s the negative comments, right?
There’s very important conversations around incarceration, around healing, around rehabilitation, like I just need to get out there and start having those conversations.”
