Five summers ago, a quintet of Detroit area friends formed a brutal Metalcore outfit called This Emergency and began making a name for themselves with a steady stream of live dates in and around the Motor City. Within a year, personnel changes led the band to reconfigure, inspiring a name change to We Came As Romans. The changes continued for a couple of years until founding members Joshua Moore (on guitar) and David Stephens (on vocals/screams) were joined by vocalist Kyle Pavone, guitarist Lou Cotton, bassist Andy Glass and drummer Eric Choi, expanding WCAR to a sextet.
In 2008, WCAR released a pair of well-received EPs, Demonstrations and Dreams, the former early in the year, the latter just before the end of the year. The EPs generated a buzz for the Post Hardcore band that eventually earned them a contract with Equal Vision Records.
WCAR’s acclaimed debut full-length, To Plant a Seed, hit the streets last November, which led to great notices within and beyond the Metal community and a number of high-profile tours. In addition, To Plant a Seed scored some pretty impressive numbers in Billboard upon release; the album hit the Heatseekers Top 10, made it to No. 25 on the Independent chart and even cracked the lower reaches of the overall Top 200.
Over the years, WCAR has fielded many questions about the positivity of its lyrical message (couched as it is in the standard Metal demon shriek, with a melodic Indie soundtrack that recalls Fall Out Boy) and the possibility of being a Christian band, a tag they respectfully deny while admitting that the band’s membership is comprised of Christians and non-Christians. Either way, WCAR crafts a pummeling wall of sound on which to pin their positive message and the band’s current tour just might offer up a handful of new songs. The band announced via Facebook and Twitter a couple of weeks ago that they would be returning to the studio with famed producer Joey Sturgis (who helmed the Dreams EP and To Plant a Seed) to track some new material.
Old songs or new, We Came As Romans are hitting the tour trail with a vengeance and the same goal as their ancient namesakes: to take over the world, one friend and countryman at a time.
They play a crowded bill at The Mad Hatter with Sky Eats Airplane, Pilot Around the Stars, Lights Down Low and Back to the Sky.
