Meet Michael Campbell, Johnny Mission, and Brian Zimmerman of Mission G

Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael Campbell, Johnny Mission, and Brian Zimmerman.

Mission G is a melodic metal trio from Gilbert, AZ. Founded by lead singer Johnny Mission in 1998. They went through several lineup changes in the early years but found their stride with their current members. After a brief hiatus in 2012, the band came back better than ever in 2016 and is now doing better than ever. The band places heavy emphasis on melodic instrumentation, metalcore-stylized breakdowns, screams, and clean singing.

Their style has received commercial success for employing a “more accessible style” than typical metal. Their debut album “Shadow of Greed” is out now all on all Streaming Platforms. Mission G has toured and played with bands such as Deftones, Alice in Chains, Slipknot, Papa Roach, AFI, All that Remains, Snot, Drowning Pool, Sevendust, Powerman 5000, HED P.E. Disturbed, Adelitas Way, POD, and The Veer Union to name a few.

Mission G has also appeared on The Vans Warped Tour, UFest, Summer Scorcher, AudioFeed Festival and many more. The video for their song “I Put the Man in RoMANce” recently won “Video of the Year” at the 2017 AZ Metal Awards.

We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc. – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
Early on the major struggles were just finding the right members for the project. After Brian and Mike joined the band, we really discovered our sound and haven’t looked back. In 2012 we took a break because Mike moved to Seattle, WA for work.

When he moved back in 2016, we picked up right where we left off. We immediately started playing shows again and did two nationwide tours that very same year. Honestly, I think it was hard on all of us to get back to the grind so quickly, but we survived.

Its definitely harder these days to pursue our passion in music than when we were younger. With age has come more responsibility. On top of having full time jobs, we are all fathers. While being able to travel around and play music is great, at the end of the day it will always come second to family.

So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Mission G story. Tell us more about the business.
We are a three-piece melodic metal band that do our best to make music that we consider heavy while still maintaining an “accessible quality” that fans of all genres of music can identify with. One of the biggest compliments that we receive is that we have such a full sound for a three-piece band. In a landscape where most metal bands have five+ members, we feel that we stand out from the crowd in that way.

We have a brand new album called “The Shadow of Greed” which we released in September of 2018. We also released three singles on top of that before the end of the year. We spent countless hours practicing, performing, recording this music and it is honestly a culmination of years of hard work. You can check out the album on all streaming platforms (iTunes, Spotify, Amazon, Google, etc.) now!

We are getting ready to hit the road and have a couple shows planned in Southern California before we hit a full West Coast tour this summer. Our next hometown show is with Hed PE at Club Red on March 31st.

Is there something we can do as a city to improve the outlook for businesses like yours?
We have a unique perspective as we have been in the Arizona Music Community for 20+ years. Most of the bands we grew up playing with have come and gone, but there are still a few of us old schoolers still keeping the dream alive.

We have seen the music community change drastically over the years, but all in all, our experience in the valley has been overwhelmingly positive. From bands to promoters, from club owners to fans, it seems most everyone is very supportive of each other, and that is something that Phoenix should be proud of.

Contact Info:

• Email: mikedrums22@me.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/missiong_band
• Facebook: facebook.com/mission.g22

Image Credit:
Julius Aguilar, Ashley Null, Adam Mueller

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