For the longest time, I've said that Randy Blythe is an Instagram must-follow and now he is definitely a Tumblr must-follow as well.
While Blythe has said he will be taking a break from Lamb of God, he will be busy this year working on his memoir. Blythe just launched a new Tumblr blog for his upcoming memoir Dark Days, where he will be documenting the process of recounting his trials and tribulations in the Czech Republic.
Here's an excerpt from his first entry:
Everything was going just hunky-dory until about a year and a half ago. On June 27, 2012 my band flew from Norway to the Czech Republic to play a show. Upon landing in Prague, we were met at the end of the jetway by five masked and heavily armed large men in body armor, along with four plainclothes detectives. To the immense surprise of my bandmates and myself, I was arrested on suspicion of manslaughter concerning the death of a lamb of god fan. We had played Prague two years previously, and unbeknownst to any of us, a young man had sustained an injury to the head during our show, dying a month later. The police said that I was the cause of that injury. I was promptly incarcerated and spent the next thirty-seven days in a 123 year old crumbling prison on the outskirts of Prague. After a long and complex process during which my band had to borrow almost half a million bucks, I was released on bail and returned to the United States. Instead of hiding like a coward in the U.S., safe from extradition (the U.S. government had refused to cooperate with the Czechs after they requested assistance in investigating me immediately after the young man died. My government also did not deem it necessary to inform me that I was a wanted man in a foreign country. Your tax dollars at work.), I returned to Prague in early 2013 to stand trial. I did this for several reasons, first and foremost being I felt the family of this young man deserved some answers, and I was the only one who could provide them. I felt it unethical to hide from my problems while they grieved the loss of their son. As the father of a dead daughter, I understood their pain in a very visceral way. I had tried to hide from my problems for over twenty years by crawling into a bottle. I do not live that way anymore, so to hide from this would have been intolerable for me. I believe it would have lead me back to the drink, and from there, I would have surely died.
On March 5, 2013, I was found not guilty and acquitted of all charges. I have remained a free man every since.
This book will tell that story, the whole story, for the first time ever. I’m the only one who lived it, so I’m the only one capable of telling it. However, the tale of my arrest, incarceration, release, and trial are merely the vehicle I will be using to convey what I feel is an important message in today’s fast paced, high tech, self-centered world. I have something to say, and life has presented me with a tragic way to illustrate my point without being preachy or pedantic. I will not moralize or shout from some ludicrous ethical pedestal (I didn’t win the Olympics or cure cancer, I went to prison for Pete’s sake)- I just want to relate how I got through a very scary time and came out with my head held high. I think there is a lesson of value in the telling of my story, if only for myself. Therefore I will write it, and I hope some of you will read it.
The whole thing is worth reading. So follow Randy's blog, Dark Days. Oh and if you love to Tumbl, make sure to add Metal Injection's Tumblr feed too!
