Making history as the first female solo artist to top the Hard Rock Albums chart with her five-star acclaimed debut solo album, Life Screams (2016), Lacey Sturm returned this Friday, February 12th, with a new single, “State of Me.”
The track is the second single coming from her highly-anticipated album, set to release this summer. The Platinum-selling, GRAMMY-nominated (former) frontwoman of Flyleaf wrote the new song with Skillet’s John and Korey Cooper. Sturm has taken the opportunity of the shutdowns to write new music and find creative ways to connect with her fans. As an independent artist, she and her husband, Josh Sturm, have been collaborating with rock music power-houses to release music in their own time without the standards or pressure of a label.
During times of loss it’s obvious that what we see is temporary. We have to accept that. But what lingers after loss is what we can’t see. That is eternal,” continues Lacey. “What really matters is love, faith, the spirit. The soul. When I focus there, on the eternal things, I find a tremendous resolve to protect what matters most.
~ Lacey Sturm
One of the projects unveiled was a collaboration with Breaking Benjamin for their 2020 single, “Dear Agony (Aurora Version),” which peaked at No. 13 on the Billboard 200 after 20 weeks on the chart, while racking up well over 10 million views on YouTube alone. Lacey has also performed with Shinedown and others on drive-in theater stages and has hit virtual stages along with Metallica, Three Days Grace, Seether and others during the Recording Academy-sponsored Octane Home Invasion Festival. Tonight at 5pm PST, Sturm will be a guest performer on Love and Death‘s album release streaming event.
Lacey hopes to continue to inspire others to strive for better ways to live and love. Produced, recorded and mixed by her husband, Josh Sturm, “State of Me” follows the release of Lacey’s first single toward her upcoming album, “The Decree,” and remains uncommonly true to the artist’s experience.
Along with the single, “State of Me” has been added to SiriusXM Octane, Loudwire and released a companion music video to match today at noon EST. The visuals in the video are achingly familiar to her track with Flyleaf, “All Around Me,.” while offering a fresh twist and gripping, desperate clawing for reprieve.
Marking a continued return to her hard-rock roots, Lacey’s “State of Me” extends an aggressive, musically violent lifeline to herself, and to those hanging over the precipice; those drowning under a crushing weight. The heavy tempo grips the being with a desperate angst for freedom against the dark and heavy weight of fear, depression, and brokenness; and it claims authority against it. “Step behind me,” Lacey sings.
The track is a vulnerable expression of her journey through healing and finding hope in the middle of a world of chaos and fear.
Choosing life is violent in that we reject every subtle form of suicide, every eternal death choice that would try to disorient, distract and seduce us away,” says Lacey, who lost someone close to her in this season and has herself narrowly escaped suicide twice in her life. “Eternal life starts in our soul. So look at the state of it. And if you see eternal death, be violent against it, cut off every temporary thing that would bring that into your heart and reach out and cling to eternal life, even if it costs you this temporary one.
~ Lacey Sturm
The single is available now at digital and streaming outlets everywhere from FOLLOWSPOT Records / The Fuel Music.
