FROM ASHES TO NEW - The End is Their Beginning - Screamer Magazine (2025)

Interview with Danny Case

The end of civilization might signify the end to some, but for Nu Metal band From Ashes to New, it was the inspiration for their latest album. “What do we want to call this, this record? Like, we need something, you know, it’s going to stand out. Then Matt [Brandyberry] came up with the idea. He was like, well, the first thing that would happen if the world were to fall apart, it would probably be the grid would go down and there would be a blackout,” explains vocalist Danny Case. “So that’s the idea that kind of sparked all that. So like songs like Armageddon, Broken by Zion and other songs, kind of touch on the end of the world vibe. So the personal struggle, the personal growth, stuff like that, that’s all kind of intertwined with the end of the world theme.” Following the success of the 2023 album Blackout, the band took it one step further and expanded on the theme with a deluxe version. “There are a bunch of features that weren’t on the album before and obviously the artwork has been updated. So for anyone who’s like a collector, there’s a different artwork for that. I think there’s like seven features or something crazy like that. We got a bunch of people to feature our different songs and that was all really, really cool.”

Blackout Deluxe was released June 7 and includes six bonus tracks including collaborations with artists like Of Mice and Men’s Aaron Pauley for the song One Foot in the Grave. “So that song was not on Blackout. The feature with Aaron Pauley is what is on the deluxe album. The song originally didn’t have him in it, but we wanted to do a collab and we were like, hey, we have this song, if you think it would be cool to be on it and he was like, yeah, sure. He put his own spin on it and threw out his vocals and it sounds great. So that’s now how the song exists in reality.” But recording the video for the song, Case explains, didn’t come together as easily. “Nowadays technology has advanced that almost everything could be pretty much remote. So he got all of his video and audio, filmed and recorded, on his own time so that he wouldn’t have to travel and do all that stuff. And so we would basically just send versions back and forth and we would, you know, get it to a place where it was and that was it. Props to our directors and videographers to make sure that we had the same set up. So that it all could be filmed and it could all be edited together because for our parts, us as individuals, none of us were performing at the same time.”

The band decided early on that this album needed to stand out. So, they drew inspiration from the album’s title and stage looks (black paint) from fellow bandmates. “We initially didn’t have a plan to do that, but our drummer [Mat Madiro] has been doing it for a while, like a neck paint and face paint a little bit. Our guitarist [Lance Dowdle] has been doing it a little bit too, but it became a full band thing when we went to shoot the video for Monster [In Me] and the initial idea that I had in my head, was like, oh, you know, be it’d be kind of cool if we did like the black paint, maybe we should just do this. And it looked really cool on the videos or like, let’s just roll it and see what happens. There’s the part of us that’s attesting our success recently to be the black paint because, like, we started doing that and then everything was like going up from there. So the secret sauce of mojo is absolutely the black paint,” Case chuckles.

From Ashes to New has come a long way since its inception back in 2013 and have grown into paving the way for rap infused with metal. With influences such as Hollywood Undead, Avenged Sevenfold, and Memphis May Fire, the band’s sound grew and evolved in rap metal, nu metal, rap rock genres. With the evolution of their unique sound, Case says that they wanted this album to be a nod to its beginning. “The focus on this album was really getting back to what put this band on the map and getting back to its roots. It’s kind of just updating and evolving the sound to fit the times now. So, you know, we looked back at the day one record was very heavy, you know, I had breakdowns, like all sorts of stuff like that. We are putting ourselves where we are now as artists and making music with the spirit of that record in mind. It was heavier, it was angrier. There’s still talks of struggle and growth and all that stuff. And then on top of it, just having the idea for Blackout and, kind of like a post-apocalyptic vibe to some of the songs, you know, we wanted the album to be about kind of the end of the world or like the end of your old self, things like that.”

Danny Case joined From Ashes to New in 2017 after the departure of Chris Musser. Bringing with him not only his voice, but ideas to keep the band moving forward and continuing to evolve their sound. “The album Panic was the first record that I really kind of was able to more actively contribute to. I contributed to the future, but Panic was where I was able to actually bring ideas to the table. So, the song Panic was a song that I worked really, really heavily on and then brought to the table and so that was a really good feeling to be able to contribute. Then with Blackout, Matt and I are always talking about the trajectory of the band, [where] we want to go next and I like to think of myself as kind of like an advisor to Matt, ‘this is what I’m seeing or I feel like we have to do this thing.’ And then, you know, I try to just contribute whatever ideas I can to the process. That was especially true on Blackout.” With the addition of Case the band has been able to develop a dynamic that works for them. “It’s been great. I mean, obviously we kind of had to get our bearings and that happened a lot in 2018. But it’s pretty much been smooth sailing since, and I think that’s why we’ve kept it, you know, just the four of us, because we all just matched really well. There have been bands in the past where I think, like, you have just one too many people and then that causes the chemistry to just fall apart. So people are like, why don’t you have a second guitarist? Why don’t you have a bass player? Why don’t you, you know, have someone doing keyboards? Well, it’s like, sure, we could bring out an 11 person band to play all the parts and whatnot, but we would rather keep it the four of us and play everything that we play live because we do not break anything. There are bands that do that. We are not one of those bands. We play everything that we play true and live. And anything that we can’t do, we throw on the backtracking. Nothing that’s on that backtrack is something that we couldn’t do for the most part.”

For this tour the band made an exception and brought on a second guitarist. “We kind of knew that at some point we wanted to have someone as, like, an auxiliary player, someone on stage who could fill out the sound.” Case explained. “And we just didn’t have quite the space for or the money to do it throughout the years, until more recently. It was, the Shinedown Tour 2023 that we did where we are like, this stage is gigantic. We are going to look silly.” They didn’t have to look far, however, and soon added guitarist, Jimmy Bennett, who had already been part of the band’s tour crew. “The great thing was we had already had Jimmy as a crew guy. He was doing merch for us before and he just did such a great job. And he was always very dutiful and he just crushed it. So we were like, hey, we know you play guitar, you look the part, too. we need somebody to fill in on guitar. So let’s try this out. And he rolled right into that role pretty seamlessly.”

Like any band, however, there have been challenges, especially with touring. Case recounts a rare instance where the band hit a rough patch. “We had just gone through a week of pure hell where we blew out a tire, it got repaired, we were four hours late to a show, barely able to get through it, got it done. The next day, a show was all over the place and the sound system was messed up and a bunch of things went wrong and we barely got through that show with our bearings. Then 45 minutes on our way to the next show, another tire blew out, blew out the underside of our bus. The bus was dead in the water at that point. We had to get a box truck and an SUV and load all of our stuff in the box truck, got down to the show in Bethlehem, barely made it to our VIP [meet and greet]. Our merch wasn’t up until like 8 p.m., the show started two minutes after we finished staging everything, and then more disaster hit when our bus that was on the way to replace our broken down bus, broke down.” Even with everything going on, the band held it together and prevailed and forged ahead, continuing their tour plan and working through frustrations. “Being a part of it all, it’s been really awesome. It’s a great close knit brotherhood. We make decisions together and we do our best to work together to not get resentful towards each other. There are a lot of bands who would have just quit the shows or canceled them or whatever, or would have freaked out on each other. And, you know, caused irreparable damage to their band or had [said] things that they didn’t mean and then it all comes unraveling. We just continue to stay strong through whatever comes at us. It’s been a really, really good experience and a good ride.”

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