Lone Wild is an American indie rock band that was formed in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 2012 that later moved to making Nashville, Tennessee it’s home in 2020. With Ashkan Karimi (lead vocals, guitars, synthesizers, producer) as the main songwriter and member, the band’s lineup has changed a number of times over the years it has been together leading Karimi to have a few select live members only.
Formerly known as Aftermidnight and The Fairweather, Lone Wild began as a culmination of Karimi finding his own musical identity and direction.
In 2018, Lone Wild released the debut singles “Danger Cat” and “Stranger Ways” along with a number of other singles, leading to the self-titled debut album release, “Lone Wild” in March 2019.
Following the release of the debut album, Karimi’s first generation Persian-American heritage led the band to partner with Preemptive Love Coalition - a non-profit that helps refugees in Middle-Eastern countries. They did so by spotlighting their work while touring to promote the album at concerts, on social media, and by donating 10% of their concert, merch, and streaming profits.
Gaining momentum, they had music featured on various independent playlists, indie music blogs, national commercials & television. In 2019, they released their debut music video for their biggest song to date, "Stranger Ways". In 2020, “Danger Cat” & “Sequin Dress” landed on national ads for Carvana and tech giant, Amazon, while “Spitfire” was placed on Season 1 Episode 4 of the HBOMax Original Series “Made for Love” that garnered millions of viewers.
As touring slowed in 2020, Lone Wild started to write and record the second album. In 2020/21 amidst the covid-19 pandemic, an election in the U.S. and surmounting racial injustices, the band answered back with the release of their 4 new singles, “Locktup”, “The Dirties”, “Tryna Make Sense of It” and “#ikyk”.
Background[]
2010-2014: Early Years[]
The origins of Lone Wild can be found in the music scene of Tulsa, Oklahoma. Karimi met friend and guitarist, Austin Donoho, and one day decided to get together in a garage with Donoho’s friend Ben Blount (drums). As time progressed, Karimi brought songs to Donoho to record guitars for a recording project that Karimi was doing himself. The solo project morphed into the band Aftermidnight, when friend Pablo Achivare-Vallejos (bass) joined.
Playing their first show on New Years Eve 2011/2012, they began to make their way through venues in the local Oklahoma scene and neighboring states, spanning Missouri, Kansas, Texas, and Arkansas. They went on to release 2 EP’s recorded at Tulsa’s, The Closet Studios with Kendal Osborne as the engineer & co-producer. The “Aftermidnight EP” which featured their crowd favorites “Currents” and “Veneer” earned local radio airplay on 104.5 The Edge's Homegrown slot. Their follow up EP “The Luminous” which featured their singles “Scales”, “Moonlight”, “Luminous” and “The Rope” also did equally as well, with “Scales” and “Moonlight” earning airplay on college radio across the U.S. Amidst all this, Achivare had to step out of the band due to a tough time with immigration and acquiring a student visa, and the band enlisted Patrick O’Meila to fill-in for shows during the time Achivare was away.
In 2013 & 2014, Aftermidnight played Center of the Universe Festival featuring acts like MUTEMATH, OneRepublic, Young the Giant, Cold War Kids, Twenty One Pilots and Neon Trees.
2014-2015: The Fairweather[]
After the release of Aftermidnight’s 2nd EP, things began to take a shift when Blount needed to step out to focus on college. During this time Karimi and Donoho occasionally would get together to work on the various music ideas they had.
After a cold rehearsal in a garage with friends from the local music scene, they enlisted Bobby Ross (bass) and Kristopher Elliott (drums). The Fairweather emerged, and went on to release a self-recorded EP featuring the songs “Untie My Tongue” & “Drifting Home” — both earning extensive airplay on college radio. Playing upwards of 70 shows from 2014-2016 across the mid-west, they took an indefinite hiatus as Donoho needed to step out.
2016-2019: Lone Wild[]
With a number of songs left over The Fairweather days, Karimi began to finish writing what was left, bringing in Bobby Ross and his friend Aaron Seale (drums) to co-produce and record the project. In early 2017, Karimi joined forces with long time friend Jordan McLeod as the projects executive producer, and in Spring of 2017 they went on to record with Kendal Osborne (The Closet Studios).
During the production and recording of what would eventually become the debut record for Lone Wild, they leaned heavily into the influences of 80’s pop, rock, synth wave, and chill wave. What started as writing and recording for a 5 song EP stretched into an 11 song album, which was recorded in two parts. The first 5 tracked during their sessions in 2017 and the remaining 6 were tracked in Spring of 2018.
In 2018, Lone Wild finally emerged with the release of their debut singles “Danger Cat” & “Stranger Ways”. Karimi followed with a handful of single releases from the 2017/18 sessions, which culminated with the release of the debut self-titled record, “Lone Wild” on April 5th of 2019.
Kicking off the album release with a show at their often frequented local venue, The Vanguard, Karimi enlisted friends Donoho, Blount, and Aaron Seale as live members to play the release show and a number of shows in the midwest throughout 2019 to further promote the album.
2020-Present: Tryna Make Sense of It[]
In 2020, Karimi made Nashville, TN his home - in the midst of a pandemic, an election year, surmounting racial injustices, and an overall pessimistic climate, he began to listen to what was going on around him and escape it all to write music for Lone Wild’s sophomore effort.
In Spring of 2021, Karimi teamed up with Sam Westhoff (Producer/Engineer) & Justin Streck (Engineer/Co-Producer) at Lava Sound Studios to finish up his recordings. In 2021, Lone Wild answered back with the release of 4 new singles, “Locktup” (July), “The Dirties” (September), “Tryna Make Sense of It” (October), and “#ikyk” (December). He then followed up in the Summer of 2022 with the additional release of "Icarus" as he began to move towards the release of his 2nd record.
Discography[]
Studio Albums[]
- Lone Wild (2019)
Live EP[]
- Lone Wild Live (2020)
EPs[]
- Tryna Make Sense of It (2021)
Singles[]
- Danger Cat (2018)
- Stranger Ways (2018)
- Wild Child (2018)
- Spitfire (2019)
- Sequin Dress (2019)
- Locktup (2021)
- The Dirties (2021)
- Tryna Make Sense of It (2021)
- #ikyk (2021)
- Icarus (2022)
- Kingdom Come (2022)
- Space Between (2022)