User:Alicia Way
| Alicia Marie Simmons |
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Alicia Simmons was born on November 8th 1985.Alicia was born and raised to Steve and Kathy Simmons outside of Kansas City, MO in a little town called Grain Valley. It was there in the sparsly populated countryside with no friends to play with (other than her younger brother of 9 years, Dakota), that Alicia spent most of her days teaching herself to play as many instruments as she could get her hands on. Many summers were spent down at the Lake of the Ozarks where Steve's classic rock band would play for impressively large crowds, while Alicia sat on the stage and looked on in awe. While she was already hooked on music, it was the concert that her older brother Peter took her to at the age of 12-- a Metallica show that changed everything. One night is all it took for Alicia to immediately become obsessed with anything and everything heavy metal and the thought of being in, or working for a band. She started spending every possible moment plastering her walls, and spreading the gospel of heavy metal and rock music to anyone who would, and wouldn't, listen.
Annoying every single family member, teacher, and even friends to death with useless talk of how two different Metallica song's guitar riffs were just barely one note different, and what Nikki Sixx of Motley Crue was REALLY thinking when he was playing the 32nd note of the 5th song on the 2nd record. And as soon as she could, Alicia spent every possible weekend traveling as far as four hours from home (alone) to go to as many shows as she could, much to her father and step mother Paula's dismay.
One night "backstage" at a Primer 55 show in the dingy basement of the Blue Note club in Columbia, Missouri, Alicia met another friend of the band's-- Miss Sarah Dope. The two were immediately inseperable and spent the next few years traveling to literally hundreds of shows together, either driving themselves separately, or riding along and working merch with a few bands they had both known for some time. The girls also worked for various labels, helping to push their bands and get the word out. It seemed every band that rolled through the Midwest knew about the twosome and praised them for their work. It was obvious these girls had found their niche in the music industry.
During a brief falling out, the girls pursued their own careers. Sarah was finishing up a graphic design and photography major at the University of MIssouri, and eventually moved to L.A. Alicia started guitar teching and selling merch full time on tours. When the girls reconveigned for lunch one day, they both decided that was the best thing that could have ever happened to them, and realize that they had both made leaps and bounds in moving towards making their careers for themselves. They still remain as close as ever to this day.
For the next few years, Alicia spent time on various tours working for bands such as Avenged Sevenfold, Cold, Evanescence, Fall Out Boy, Straylight Run, Tim Armstrong, and more; before deciding to slow down a bit and go visit some friends from the two previous Warped Tours: From First To Last.
One September night in 2005, the band asked Alicia if she would come up to Weed, CA (where they were going to be recording for the next few months) with them and producer extraordinaire Ross Robinson of Slipknot/Korn fame. Thinking that the break would be a much needed extended vacation with her friends, Alicia agreed. It was there where the band asked Alicia if she would be intersted in helping them out by filling in on bass guitar on their next tour. Alicia jumped at the chance and in late November, started touring with the group until the end of the year when she also became engaged.