Since being released from prison in December 2016, on charges of solicitation of murder, Tim Lambesis has teased new activity with As I Lay Dying. Last month, it was reported that the remarried Lambesis was working on new music for As I Lay Dying with an entire new cast of musicians, as the other members of the band had since moved on to form a new project, Wovenwar.
But maybe an eventual reunion of the As I Lay Dying line up as it was before Lambesis' arrest might not be so far off. ThePRP notes that guitarist Nick Hipa made a surprise appearance on a Warped Tour edition of Jamey Jasta's podcast, The Jasta Show, and when Jasta put him on the spot asking if he would ever consider reuniting As I Lay Dying, Hipa's response was perhaps surprising:
“It’s just something that not really… Man, I’m on the spot… People ask us about it a lot. But what it comes down to, is just like, what makes sense with what we have going on in our lives. And we’ve got a lot of important things going on that don’t relate to that and we’ve made commitments to, and that’s what we are honoring at this moment.”
Hipa added it's not something he finds himself thinking about:
“Honestly it’s just not something we try and consume our thoughts with. Because it’s like we have families, businesses, professions, and a band—and all these things we’re super invested into. It’s like all of our attention is there with that at the moment.”
This is quite a change of tone for Hipa from previous interviews. For example, in 2014, he was interviewed by the MetalSucks podcast, and spoke in a very different tone about Lambesis:
"[W]e started to see the degradation of [Lambesis'] character to [the point where it was] like, ‘There’s nothing really redeeming here. This guy is losing touch. What do we do? This is somebody that we’re involved with on multiple levels.’ And so we just tried to keep things together as well as we could, and not let any of those things ruin the band and what we had built. But when [Lambesis was arrested], I think we were surprised, [but] we weren’t shocked like everyone else. This came out of the blue for everyone else… we did not expect things to go as far as they did, but [what Lambesis did] wasn’t completely out of character.”
A year later, after Lambesis had filed a $35 million dollar lawsuit against two Southern California detention facilities for denying him prescriptions and gross negligence, saying the drugs they denied him were to offset the side effects of steroid withdrawl and that he developed man-boobs, Hipa spoke to Billboard, and again didn't have kind words for Lambesis:
“He could have made such a great impact on this world, but he just gave in to the worst parts of himself. Even more discouraging for me is the fact that he’s trying to file a lawsuit for that amount. It says to me he’s still the same sort of personality at his core; nothing has changed. He thinks of himself a certain way, and he thinks of himself in a situation he created as a victim."
This interview was conducted a year ago. Does time heal all wounds? Could the two of them, and possibly other members of the band reconnected since Lambesis was released and mended old wounds? Drummer Jordan Mancino has said in the past that he holds no ill will towards Lambesis.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXTkDW7m2N4[/youtube]
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d19L39rNRsw[/youtube]
