Beneath the Encasing of Ashes

In the history Pluto Records publishes, As I Lay Dying began life under the name Life Once Lost. When that group was reorganised, singer Tim Lambesis left for a while to join Society's Finest in Texas, but within about four months he had moved back to San Diego and started As I Lay Dying afresh. Drummer Jordan Mancino, who had just left Edge of Mortality, came in, and bassist Noah Chase joined later. The band's first demo was enough to land a deal with Pluto Records, a metal label based in Dallas, and they went straight into the studio to make this album. Beneath the Encasing of Ashes came out on Pluto in June 2001, twelve songs lasting about thirty minutes in all. The CD credits the production to Lambesis and guitarist Evan White and the playing to Lambesis, White, Chase and Mancino; it was recorded at Doubletime Studios with Jeff Forest as engineer. Looking back in a 2010 interview, Lambesis said that, lyrically, this record and the band's newest one were the two he felt most connected to. He admitted the songs were far from well written, but said the album reminded him of "a condition of my heart" that had mattered to his development, and that on the first record he had simply expressed what God was doing in his life and the sorrows he went through. In June 2002 the band shared a split release on Pluto with fellow San Diego band American Tragedy, and after that they signed to Metal Blade Records. "Behind Me Lies Another Fallen Soldier" appears again on Frail Words Collapse, their first album for Metal Blade, in 2003. Pluto has let this record go out of print, but the original recordings were reissued in 2006 on Metal Blade's compilation A Long March: The First Recordings, which carries all twelve songs in their original order as tracks 6 to 17, preceded by new recordings of "Illusions", "The Beginning", "Reinvention", "The Pain of Separation" and "Forever" and followed by five songs with the same titles.