SURVIVED

After dark country trio Lost Dog Street Band released its 2022 album Glory, bandleader
Benjamin Tod decided it was time to retire the project. Tod, alongside his wife Ashley Mae
(fiddle), had been working together as a band since 2011. 'I came to terms with letting go of
Lost Dog completely, which is how I evaluate a lot of things in general,' explains Tod.
'Oftentimes when I'm trying to make a really hard decision, I go ahead and go through the
process of mourning its death and accepting that I am going to lose it.' But just a month after
recording a solo project in January of 2023, Tod felt an urge to revisit the project one more
time.
'I thought I was done with Lost Dog, but after recording my solo album, I looked over all the
songs that I had ready for a new record. These were songs for my band. I had to admit to
myself that I wasn't done with Lost Dog.'
Though there was heartbreak at the prospect of the project coming to an end, its
resurrection has meant all the more in this new context. 'Benjamin and I, both individually
and together, have been through some professionally grinding and demoralizing personal
times over the past five years,' Ashley Mae explains. 'To take a step back from that over the
past year and realize, 'Wow, we held it down and withstood that, and we survived that,' was
a really good, bright, shining moment. It was the high point during a demoralizing time.' As
such, Survived is a saving grace, a phoenix rising from the ashes. 'This record means
everything,' adds Tod. 'It just feels like salvation.'