Photo by Jonathan Weiner // Words by Maddy Howell

It’s been two decades since vocalist Dave Stephens rounded up a bunch of high school classmates to form the foundations that We Came As Romans was built upon.

Each year since bringing a plethora of new challenges, unexpected road blocks, and fresh trauma, the Michigan outfit have grown, adapted, and evolved at a rate few can match. Starting out in basements and rising through the ranks of modern metalcore, they’ve continually weathered tragedy, reinvented themselves, and somehow emerged swinging each and every time, staking their claim as one of heavy music’s most formidable forces.

Following the death of clean vocalist Kyle Pavone in 2018, the band’s 2022 full-length Darkbloom served not only as a poignant eulogy for their brother, but a defiant rebirth that channelled grief into power. Stephens stepping into the lead vocalist role, its creation doubled up as a healing process that ultimately saved them.

“That record came from a very cathartic place,” the frontman begins.

“After Kyle passed and COVID hit, the future of the band looked really bleak. I wasn’t sure if we were going to make it, and I was imagining a future without the band. I didn’t know how the fans would react to just me doing vocals without Kyle, but we knew we had to respond to his passing with something.”

“Creating that album was so hard, but so beautiful,” he continues.

“We were able to work through things together, and because of the pandemic there couldn’t be anyone else involved. It was just the band in the studio, hanging out, and almost going through therapy together. We made something really special through that, and it brought us to a point where the band is bigger than ever.”

After accepting their demise and preparing to throw in the towel, We Came As Romans suddenly found themselves selling out shows across the globe, some in cities they’d never even visited before. That whiplash-inducing chain of events relit their creative fire, but when the Darkbloom era ended, things ground to a halt. As the pressure to get started on their next chapter increased, Stephens and his bandmates felt increasingly lost.

“Coming off Darkbloom, we were like, ‘Who are we now?’ We didn’t want to just keep writing about trauma. We wanted to move forward,” he explains.

“We had a rule for this record - if we’re going to write a song, everyone in the band has to be able to relate to it. If it didn’t resonate with all five of us, it wasn’t making the cut.”

On All Is Beautiful… Because We’re Doomed, We Came As Romans have reached a new summit. Allowing themselves to shed some of their hard-earned confidence and power, their seventh album is defined not by endurance, but by vulnerability, reflection, and brutal honesty. Darker, heavier, and more haunted, its thirteen songs explore the complex reality of what comes after loss. Identity, disconnection, and questioning the very foundations of who you thought you were.

“The record was inspired by the writings of Homer,” Stephens explains.

“In The Iliad, the gods envy mortals because we understand the finality of life. There’s beauty in knowing things don’t last forever. Sunsets, the ocean… All of it means more because it’s fleeting. That idea really struck a chord and became the root of the record.”

With those musings on mortality as their guiding light, the result is an album that plays out like a weathered journal. Recounting the band’s story, each track focuses on a specific moment in their shared journey, even documenting their eventual end on emotional cut ‘Circling A Dying Sun’. A poignant album concept, the idea came courtesy of bassist Andy Glass.

“We were stuck for seven or eight months. Throwing darts at the wall, and nothing was sticking,” Stephens recalls.

“Andy saved the day when he started drawing on a whiteboard. He mapped out a storyline and tied each song to a real-life moment we’d experienced as a band. From that point, everything clicked. It was pedal to the metal.”

That conceptual backbone is perhaps most vividly felt in ‘Bad Luck’ - a trudging, riff-heavy anthem of frustration and defiance. An ode to pushing through the toughest of situations in pursuit of brighter days, it represents how We Came As Romans have come to embrace their struggles as part of their journey.

“Sometimes, I feel like we’re cursed,” the vocalist shrugs.

“On one of the Darkbloom tours, everything that could go wrong did. We got to Canada, and our gear truck was denied entry. We’ve crossed the border a hundred times, and suddenly, boom - no gear. Stuff like that just kept happening.”

“I don’t think that we’d be able to get to the high points without going through those low points, though,” he continues.

“It’s about the camaraderie we’ve built, and the perseverance that it’s given us. It’s never been easy, and we’ve had to work hard for everything. There are still so many obstacles every day, but we figure it out. That’s what ‘Bad Luck’ is about, and that’s why it opens the album. It’s about what we've been dealing with, where we're at, and how we're going to keep moving forward.”

Forging an unshakeable strength in their unity, All Is Beautiful… was built through persistence and perfectionism. Feeling the pressure of living up to Darkbloom’s hype, over thirty tracks were completed for the record, with production split between previous collaborator Drew Fulk and rising talent Will Carlson.

“Initially, we went in with Drew. We nailed a bunch of songs, but it felt like something was missing,” Stephens recalls.

“We had been grinding on the record for over a year, so decided we needed a fresh perspective. Will is with Drew’s company, and he’s young, hungry, and unafraid to get weird. The combo of him and Drew alongside us made something really special.”

From the self-interrogation of ‘Where Did You Go?’ - written about the disconnect between who you are and who you used to be - to the battle-scarred perseverance of ‘No Rest For The Dreamer’, this is a record steeped in confrontation and clarity. There’s the existential questioning of ‘Culture Wound’ and the simmering closure of ‘Circling A Dying Sun’, but despite its heaviness, All Is Beautiful… Because We’re Doomed isn’t hopeless. Finding beauty in the chaos of their story, it’s a tribute to all the messiness and magic that comes with being in a band.

“When we started this, we were just kids. We were living on $2 a day for food, stopping at shopping malls, and begging people to buy our t-shirts so we could put gas in the tank,” the vocalist smiles.

“It's amazing how far it's come. Sometimes I look out at the crowd and think, ‘Damn, this is insane. All these people still care about us 20 years later.’ That’s an insane accomplishment, and if it were to end tomorrow, the fact that we've come this far is enough. I thought this was going to be something I did for three years before going back to college, but now I've been in the band longer than I haven't.”

Inspired by the innovation of metalcore’s next wave and seeing the likes of Bring Me The Horizon and Parkway Drive take the genre to the biggest stages possible, We Came As Romans know that now is a great time to be making heavy music.

Pouring everything they have into these songs, All Is Beautiful… Because We’re Doomed is not just a reflection on what’s happened, but a promise of even bigger things to come. A heartfelt recollection of the struggles and challenges that have lined their path, and an assertion that they’ll always find a way forward, the five-piece are already thinking about what the future holds.

“Sometimes musicians don't give fans enough credit, but we've learned that fans can see through how genuine you are in your lyrics,” Stephens finishes.

“If it's not real, they pick up on that. We've become more introspective with this album, and we’re able to be open about how we're all feeling. Because of that, the lyrics come from a real place of pain, hope, and sadness.”

“I love this record, but I can't wait for the next chapter. Andy's already sending over new song ideas. In the future, I hope to look back on this album and say, ‘Man, I'm really proud of this, but damn… We got even better.’”

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ALL IS BEAUTIFUL...BECAUSE WE'RE DOOMED arrives August 22nd via SharpTone Records. Order the album - HERE

We Came As Romans are currently on the Bad Luck World Tour with After The Burial, Currents and Johnny Booth. The North American leg closes out with a historical homecoming at The Fillmore in Detroit on August 23rd - the day after the album is released. WCAR then treks to Europe and the UK to begin the Bad Luck European leg with Brand of Sacrifice. In addition, We Came As Romans are set to appear at major festivals including Warped Tour and When We Were Young. See below for a complete list of dates and cities. Get tickets - HERE