During an interview with Alternative Press, Ashley Purdy was asked about his current relationship with his former band Black Veil Brides. Interestingly, the bassist responded by saying that he still owns half of the band.
Purdy said the following:
“I’m still, like, ‘Well, what can I say?’ What can I say without lawyers still contacting me and saying, ‘Hey, we don’t like that you said that’? I mean, I still don’t know, to be honest.
I guess I can say this because it is the truth. On February 26th [at] 1 p.m., I still currently own half of Black Veil Brides right now. The realization is like it’s a corporate buyout. It’s like me and [singer] Andy [Biersack own the] corporation 50% each. And they still have to compensate me for them wanting me to depart. But that hasn’t happened yet. And we’re still in negotiations about what that is. I don’t know how to approach it, because it’s not finalized yet.”
This news comes after he previously said that he exited the band shortly after spending time in a psychiatric hospital for grief counseling. He addressed that further during the interview as well:
“I think going through therapy allowed me to be more honest. And that’s all I want to be anymore. When you go through stuff and you live through stuff and you survived it, you have a different perspective on the world and life itself.
I don’t know if a lot of fans know. Part of why I moved to Nashville was [because I was] raised by my grandparents. My grandmother died while we were in the middle of a Black Veil Brides tour. When I got home [from tour] I needed some change. Other family members had passed and stuff. Every single male in my family has committed suicide. My father, my uncle, my grandfather, it’s like I fall in that lineage, as well as alcoholism.
Then after my grandmother passed, my grandfather was still alive in Missouri, which is close to Nashville. So I thought, “OK, I want to move closer to Missouri, but Nashville is still Music City, so I can still make music.” But when I moved here, it was in December, like a week before Christmas. And I thought, “This is the first Christmas we’re going to spend without my grandmother, who is the woman who raised me.” I traveled to Missouri to spend it with my grandfather.
While I was driving up there on Christmas Eve, I was 30 minutes out of my grandfather’s house. He shot himself. I arrived to the house, and he was dead. And that was the reason I moved to Nashville: to be with him and because we just missed her. That was our first Christmas without her, and they were married for 60 years…
After that all happened, I was like, ‘All my family members are gone. They’re all dead. I’m in Nashville by myself. Why did I do it? Why am I here?’ So I went down that hole of just drinking. And then trying to figure it out and then I just thought I needed some therapy. I tried to go to therapy. It wasn’t working. I tried to kill myself a couple of times. Instead of killing myself, I decided to get intensive therapy…”
