Erica Lynn

Erica Lynn has been singing since fifth grade, but her path to the microphone took an unexpected route. She started as a violinist, and at her school, you couldn't play an instrument and be in chorus. Rather than choose, she became the first person in the Millcreek School District to join the Vocal Ensemble as an instrumentalist. Years later, T.W. asked her to play bass in A Bed of Razors. She picked up the instrument, said yes, and never stopped being in bands after that.

The first album that meant something to her was Linkin Park's Hybrid Theory; her favorite of all time is Five Finger Death Punch's The Way of the Fist. Her influences are Queen, Evanescence, and Spiritbox, which is also exactly what's in her ears right now. Queen tops the list of bands she never got to see, and Freddie Mercury tops the list of people she'd share a stage with, alongside Courtney LaPlante, Maria Brink, and Bruce Dickinson. "I love how he was unapologetically him," she says of Freddie. "That is what I aspire to do. I have a different voice that I embrace and hope other people like it as well."

Before taking the mic for Storms Within, Erica paid her dues across the scene: A Bed of Razors, Immoral, Everybody Hates Monday, Scarlet Veil, iScream, Heaven's Lost, and Never to Suffer, to name a few. When A Bed of Razors dissolved, T.W. asked her to front the new project, and Storms Within took off from there. She writes constantly: "I have sheets and sheets of music, on top of like 56 thousand notes in my phone. When we start writing I get in a weird headspace and pull lyrics that mean something to me in that moment."

Off stage, her life is family and firefighting; by day she's an administrative assistant to a Common Pleas judge. She's pretty face value, and she knows it: "I do come off harsh a lot, but that is because I care more than I'd like to admit." Her first concert was Three Days Grace, Halestorm, and Seether; the best show she's ever seen is Ghost. Her pre-show ritual is the shortest in the band: "I give my man a kiss and get on stage."

The best show she's ever played is the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, at the Women in Metal exhibit opening. Her favorite Storms Within song to play live is "Let's Go to War," and her dream festival is Rock on the Range or Inkcarceration. The band means everything to her: "I have put over a decade worth of work into this project." Her message to fans: "I appreciate every listen, stream, and view. That is what success is to me. Getting music to people's ears that I have involvement in. So, thank you."