10 Questions with ... Edie Lundeen

1. What made you want to get into the music business and who were some of your early mentors?

Just before I started my sophomore year in college, I was reading a back-to-school edition of Rolling Stone. There was an article about people that worked in different areas of the music business that started in college radio. All of a sudden, something clicked and I knew that is what I had to do! On my second day on the U of Arizona campus, I walked into the college radio station. At U of A’s KAMP student radio, I became friends with Sirius XM’s Rob Cross, and it’s been fun to see where each of our paths have led us.

Some of my early mentors in records were Bob Clark and Pamela Jouan when I was at Atlantic Records. I started as their assistant. They really taught me so much and were my greatest advocates when the L.A. local radio promotion position was open. I got the job!

2. What was your first job in the music business, and give us a rundown of the labels and positions you’ve held over the years?

Oh boy, here’s the laundry list!

• Metal Blade Records / College & Alternative promotion
• Atlantic Records / LA Local Promotion
• Virgin Records / LA Regional Promotion
• Lava Records / West Coast regional
• Capitol Records / LA Regional
• Sony RED / VP, Alternative
• Cult Records / Head of Promotion
• Black Dog Music Marketing / founder
• Amplify Entertainment Group / Head of Alt & Rock West Coast
• Epitaph Records – Head of Promotion

3. Before we chat about your gig with Epitaph, what are some of your best promotion successes with helping break a band at Rock?

Obviously, the most recent is Architects. I’m extremely proud of the work that my team has done on that one so far. Other bands I was a part of in my career that stand out – Sugar Ray, Matchbox 20, Phoenix, Mumford & Sons and AWOLNATION. I have been fortunate to be a part of so many incredible records.

4. You recently celebrated your first anniversary working at Epitaph. Before we talk about some specific artists, what’s the state of the label in 2021?

The label is healthier than ever! Fortunately, 2020 was one of the strongest years that the label has had and 2021 is going in the same direction.

5. Congrats on the success of Architects. “Animals” was a smash at Rock Radio and the latest single “Dead Butterflies” is still climbing the charts. You must be very excited to see the growth of this band at the format.

It’s wild that on the band’s 9th album, they are finally getting their due here in the states. They delivered an album that was much more mass-appeal rock than some of their past more metal leaning releases and it was time to get the Active Rock format to know this band. It was a huge education process for sure, but we kept at it and broke down the stations that were originally digging in their heels.

We still have close to 400 spins on “Animals” every week, but as stations start to come down on that song, “Dead Butterflies” is going into rotation. Research is starting to kick in on “Dead Butterflies” – Top 10 at Octane (“Animals” is still #1 there!) and #2 Males at RTM! The chart has been such a traffic jam lately. There are songs that will have a 100+ spin increase in a week and yet, still keep the same chart number. “Dead Butterflies” has been stuck in that mess lately but it now feels like that the song is starting to move.

6. There’s also the new single “Scavengers” from Thrice that is getting a great response so far. What’s the latest on the Thrice project?

You are right! The response has been great! I was a bit concerned when I picked this song to be the first single since it was a bit of a departure for what people expect from them. This song just really raised its hand when listening to the full. But the full album is great, and I can’t wait to hear the response from the big Thrice fans out there (I’m looking at you Jave!). Horizons/East will be out on Sept 17th followed by a full tour a week later starting on Sept 24th in Houston.

7. Besides these artists, who are some other new and emerging Rock bands that we should keep an ear out for in the future from Epitaph?

I’m super stoked on our new band The Linda Lindas! It’s made up of young Asian & Latina girls from ages 17 to 11! These girls are the real deal! And, Wes Styles at WIHN just told me he was going to give them a shot!

And we have some new releases coming from some of our established artists like Every Time I Die, Converge and Falling In Reverse – I think you may have heard of this band before.

8. Let’s talk about the Rock format and Active Rock as a whole. What’s your take on the State of Rock Radio today?

I like to see stations are really playing songs for a good period of time to give it a shot to perform. But, with that said, it does create these traffic jams of songs not moving up and down the chart unless it’s a new song from a core band. When a song used to have a life of approx. four months, it’s now more like 6+ months.

Edie the Roller Derby Queen rocking in red in center!

9. Ok, your email signature ends with *sent from my roller skates*. Can you tell us about your Roller Derby adventures?

I played roller derby for over 11 years – 4 years of flat track and then 7 years on banked track. I retired for a few years, but my feet missed my skates. I’m now back training for a local flat track league and I’m also a ref for them! My alter-ego is Vodka Toxic with my jersey number of 100 proof!

I loved playing roller derby competitively but there really is only so much a body can take doing it. I am fortunate that I never broke a bone playing for so long. *knocks on wood*. The cool thing about playing the sport in L.A., we had a number of TV productions that would come film in our facility. Some of the shows I have been a part of - Storage Wars, Bones, Cupcake Wars and a few music videos and commercials.

The music industry comes out to watch Edie skate! Left to Right: Mike Savage/Amazing Radio, Leslie Frank (non-industry friend of theirs), Kat Corbett/Sirius XM, Edie, Tobi Lynn/Amazing Radio, and Chris Muckley/Sirius XM.

10. Finally…on another personal note, besides roller skating, what do you like to do for fun when you are not in “work” mode?

I love to see live music even if it’s not for work. I will pretty much go and see anything. I also recently started kickboxing. I guess I needed to channel the aggression I was missing from roller derby in a different way. It’s been a blast!