Singer & Guitarist to Depart Top Dead Center

Top Dead Center will unfortunately be undergoing a significant lineup change this summer as our singer, Althea Vacalis, and guitarist Jason Shank will be departing. Please see the following statement from Althea and Jason: “Folks may or may not know that we’re a married couple, and it’s been one of our greatest highlights to enjoy the privilege of playing music together in an awesome band and sharing those performances with everyone.  However, we’re also a military family and we’ve been told we’ll be moving cross-country later this summer.  Unfortunately that means that this Saturday’s show at The Electric Palm will be our last with Top Dead Center.

We share this news with a whole host of mixed emotions - sadness, pride, heartbreak, joy, and so much more. We’re not leaving by choice, and it feels like something we deeply love is being torn way from us.  We were really hoping that we’d get a reprieve this time around and be able to spend a few more years rocking out with Top Dead Center.  While this hasn’t been easy for us to swallow, we’ve mostly processed our grief and we’re settling into acceptance - duty calls, and this is a lifestyle we know all too well. 

So rather than remain sad or angry about it, we just want to come out to the Palm on Saturday night and leave everything we have on the stage for y’all.  We are immensely proud of what we’ve accomplished with Top Dead Center in such a short amount of time.  To Nick, Matt, Dan, and Ivan - thank you for letting us share this journey with you.  To everyone who’s come out to see us over the past year and change - y’all are what make this worth it for us, so thank you from the bottom of our hearts for choosing to spend some of your precious time with us! 

Top Dead Center will announce a new lineup soon.  For our part, we’re looking forward to seeing as many folks as possible on Saturday night for our final turn with TDC.  It’s been one hell of a ride, and we plan to go out the only way we know how - hard and heavy!

- Althea & Jason”

Althea and Jason perform at a recent Top Dead Center show.