Almost Sober

The Ian Loveless Story

“It’s a long hard road out of hell. But I’m climbing up the back of that wayward wagon and pulling it back on trail with a rebel yell. I’m almost sober, I put that poison down. And you can come and stay where my black heart used to lay and we will run away. The battle is over now, so get up off the ground, cuz I am so much more than I was before. All of this love. All of this war. I’m almost sober.”

Those words are from Ian Loveless’ title track on his new album being produced. “I’m going to need God’s help, but the whole album takes people on a journey, on the journey I was on, and it’s something they can relate to. It’s a drowning place for the demons that anyone is welcome to,” he says.

Sitting with Ian is a humbling experience because quite honestly his humility is so thick it rubs off. It’s so obvious on my side of the table why people are drawn to him, his story and his music. A lot of people are in the pit of hell, in a prison cell or sitting in utter darkness like he was, being taunted by the devil. His willingness to lay it all on the line, to “go into the gutter” as he says, is totally empowered by God, who literally wept in front of him when Ian finally came back home.

Ian’s story may perhaps be the most compelling testimony of redemption I’ve ever heard in my life on finding hope in the midst of darkness. It’s so abundantly clear that this is why Ian is now a son of God. He’s a walking testimony to the hope of Jesus Christ, and writing this story has me moved to tears like no other.

To see Ian it is obvious he’s walked a long, hard, dark road; his presence on the other hand is full of light and God’s glory. But his journey walking in the Light has been short in comparison to his life of violence, crime and addiction, and he is still on a healing journey, gracefully being held in his Father’s hands.

Ian recently moved back to Rocklin, California from Nashville, but in doing so broke his parole. He says, “I’m going to clean it up and take whatever penalty is required, I might have to do at least 45 days or a couple of months, but whatever it is I’m going to be telling people about Jesus if they put me back in.” This isn’t Ian’s first rodeo show, he’s done time before, and he even admits, “I was such a criminal that I told the Judge ‘Whatever time I get I know I deserve, and even more.’”

Ian says, “I know I’m meant to lead people to God and that was what I was born to do.” Now that he’s clear minded he says, “I can see that God never left me.” When he was locked up it was the first time he felt the real presence of Jesus Christ, and it was then he stopped blocking his ears.

Ian shares, “Basically what I’ve come to learn is that I can’t fix anybody. Period. We can’t fix anybody. If you put your faith in the flesh it’s always gonna let you down. All these years I’ve been trying to find my purpose, asking myself ‘What’s my purpose?’ But I realize now that my purpose is me. I’ve gone through what I’ve gone through to be a living, walking witness to people, to show them how far you can fall and show them the power of God. I don’t want to do anything anymore to try and glorify myself. I want to try and glorify my Father.

“The only way I can be a proper example and help anybody is to help them draw nearer to God. I can tell them about Jesus all day long, but they’re not going to listen, necessarily. However, if I’m the best person I can be and make myself available to people, and if I put the effort in, maybe they will, if I lean on God no matter what.”

At this place in his life now, just over two and a half years clean, Ian finds the most peace in solitude on his knees talking to Jesus. “It’s the only thing that brings me peace anymore. It’s not easy to be sober and off of all of this stuff when for fifteen years I was always on something.

“The drugs were my escape basically from the feelings and from what I thought I was supposed to do. So I know that I am a living testimony. I still give God all the glory, it’s not like I’m great or anything. But I figured it out that all I need to do is just tell people the truth, that I used to (for breakfast, lunch and dinner) put a needle in my neck and shoot crystal meth and heroine, and I used to steal semi-trucks and basically hurt the hearts of everybody I love, and I stopped using God’s gift.”

Ian admits now that for years he let the enemy win. It wasn’t until he had a spiritual encounter with the devil in his cell that he saw him for who he really was. “He had me and he was damn near doing a victory dance,” he says. “But, I do believe it was my mom’s prayers that saved me and pulled me out of it.”

Ian’s mom and her loving words during his young childhood years played a huge part in helping him get back up and continue moving forward and believing that he was born with a purpose. He says, “I firmly believe that my mom’s prayers kept me alive and it’s something I refer back to because I still struggle. I’m far from perfect, but I do want to help people. I do feel like God is speaking to me and I’m just finally listening.”

The two occasions we sat down together, Ian was reciting his songs, and it was very clear that his music is not only part of his story but part of him, and God is going to use it to draw people into the Light.

“I have a song that I wrote and the chorus says, ‘Mom if you can hear me, I miss you oh so bad, and I’ll be thinking about your light, your love, and life on my way to rehab. And Mom if you can see me please don’t look away, I know you never got to see a version of me that was finally ok. It used to be that everyday your prayers kept me safe and I’m a little bit afraid cause you’ve gone away. I’m up against the rope but I won’t lose hope and I’m wondering do angels still pray? Would you send one my way?’

“I know that with the album that I’m gonna draw up, called Almost Sober, I want it to be a drowning place for people’s demons, a place that they can come and a place that glorifies the power of God in a person. It’s not aiming toward a Christian audience. I want it to be a secular record because my ministry is in the gutter. It’s where people need help. I can relate to people like that.”

As I was telling Ian that God literally delayed this issue of Megamorphosis for his story to come out, and that this issue theme “Empowered” was about being the light and piercing the darkness, Ian gave me these lyrics that God gave him — “Love will come my way, faith will make it stay, and hope will be the flame to light the way, when I’m dancing in the dark.

“I don’t write any of these songs, God writes them and gives them to me. I’m not like the greatest singer or songwriter, but if he can turn somebody like me around, and make all of my wilderness and pain (that has been my whole life) matter and inspire people and make people draw nearer to Him and regain hope, it’s worth it. I’ll go through it all again,” he says.

To this point you’ve only got a glimpse into the broken life of Ian Loveless, and you may not realize how powerful his statement above actually is. But as you read on you’ll understand that only a son who has incredible love for his Father could say it and mean it, especially since what you’ve read so far barely touches the surface of how far into hell Ian really fell.

“I was literally born into the arms of an angel and that was my mom,” he says. He was born with the umbilical cord around his neck and he suffered brain damage to his frontal lobe, and as a young child he persevered only because of his mom. But at age seven he lost his mom due to a court order and he was taken to live in Maine, and then kidnapped back by his mom. But, because of a broken tail light she was pulled over and arrested, and Ian recalls, “The last time I hugged my mom goodbye I was a little boy and then I didn’t see her again until I was 19 and already had a criminal record. And I was in a rock band, and on my way to being an animal.”

“My mom was the love of my life and I missed her a lot. I grew up in Del Paso Heights and it’s a really rough area. I tried to remain the sweetest little boy but I was made to lie a lot when I was younger. I thought that I was made to steal and cheat so I began to get mean and hardened my heart out of necessity.” Ian points to his neck and says, “That’s why I got this sheep in wolves clothing around my neck.

“I always had God in my heart, but it just seemed like everything around me when I was away from my mother during those years was trying to separate me from my faith; it seemed like signs were everywhere that said ‘Ian why should you try?’ It’s so much easier to give in and be tough and fight back. I would get jumped all of the time, so I started kickboxing to toughen myself up. Now I see I was just being tested, and it was a chance to prevail, but I would give in every time.”

If there was such a thing as bad luck, Ian would get the award. His life was full of tragically hard stuff and the devil seemed to always be there to make sure and sabotage any opportunity of living a normal life and staying clean.

“I came to God in the 7th grade and I arranged a Bible Club at my school, and they tried to ban it, but I wanted to be a rebel so I said ‘Screw that, I’m gonna do it.’ But the kids were caught smoking pot at the club and that put a damper on it. At the same time my cousin hung himself and I found him dead up in Oregon, and it’s a picture I can’t un-see.”

Ian tried to convince himself that he didn’t believe in God anymore after that tragedy. “I just turned really dark. I quit the Bible Club. I started wearing all black, wore black nail polish and stayed in a dark room all the time. I would get off of being grounded, and I would go out and get into a fight. I was just acting out. I was full of so much rage, and I would say that rage has been one of the main key problems for me along with the drugs — rage and sorrow.”

When Ian became an adult, he reunited with his mom and found out she had stage four ovarian cancer. However, by the grace of God she beat it and she lived with it for another ten years, until she passed last year. But, Ian admits her faith is totally what kept her going. “Always with God it’s like grace standing next to the enemy’s wrath,” he says.

It just seemed like he couldn’t get a break, and he started to get angry at God again and said, “I’ve missed her my whole life and now you’re just gonna take her from me?” So he started to feel the rage again, but he says now, “I didn’t realize that God was getting me back then to be the person that I am today, to lead people back to Him and give them hope. That’s why He gave me my music, to glorify Him. I was a little sh** and I totally squandered it.”

The enemy convinced Ian that he was heroic and invincible, so he became a fighter and that’s how he started to harness his rage. “I didn’t recognize the tools and gifts that God put in me because I was so messed up on drugs and alcohol. I would get up on stage and get the crowd all riled up, sometimes thousands of people when I was on tour, but I was poisoning my message, and that’s something that I will have to live with and I can’t take back.

“Women would fall for me and I would give into temptation, and sometimes I would misguide them, and I would use them up as much as I was using myself up. And I wouldn’t throw them to the wolves, but I’d leave them with this empty space inside them. Basically, I was hurt, and I was doing more damage than good, to myself and other people,” he says.

Fast forward, Ian found out that his ex-girlfriend was pregnant while he was on the Vans Warped Tour. His career was beginning to take off, and he was fairly successful, but his band had broken up and he still struggled with pills and cocaine and alcohol at some level. But when he found out he was going to have a child he became hopeful he could be better and get clean. “It was like all of a sudden God popped up again. It was always like here’s something great again and here’s a reason to fix yourself. But then the devil would come and sideswipe me, ya know, look out for a train and you get hit by a bus. I would give in and fall every time.”

Ian’s ex-girlfriend proved she was pregnant on video chat, and he quit the tour. He wanted to try and do the right thing and get his life together, so they moved into a place in Baltimore, Maryland. He got totally clean and sober for the first time ever at the end of 2010, and his daughter was born on Feb 15, 2011.

Three and a half months later tragedy knocked at Ian’s door again, and his daughter passed away in his arms from sudden infant death syndrome. He says, “I couldn’t save her, and I had 911 on the phone and they told me I’d probably break her ribs, and I felt her ribs break. She just turned completely blue and let go, and that was the moment I completely broke.

“I felt the most intense rage I had ever felt, and it felt powerful, for a moment. A power that was uncontainable, like my body couldn’t even hold the rage. I had been clean since I found out about her, then the first thing I did was I got a bottle and I immediately hit up a friend in Baltimore that worked at a strip club because I knew she could get me drugs; I slept with her and she got me heroine and crystal meth.

“I had never even tried those drugs, but I wanted the two strongest drugs you could get and I wanted to put them in my veins.” Ian was so desperate and out of control he looked up on YouTube how to shoot up drugs, and he did it. He says, “Before that I was ready to put a bullet in my head.” Like any other musician parent, he envisioned what his daughter’s voice would sound like and how they’d sing together one day. But that wasn’t God’s plan at that time, he says.

Each tragedy led Ian to a deeper hole and darker place where the enemy would make Ian his puppet and his life his playground. After the death of his daughter, he says, “I found heroine and I found an escape and I felt invincible again. I went back to the gym and started shooting steroids.”

Ian always thought someone else could save him from himself and the life that he was consumed with. Another reason to get clean presented itself when Ian met his (now) ex-wife and married her, but it didn’t take long to figure out they were far too broken, and together they embarked on a descent like no other. He said, “I wanted to step away from the chaos and fix myself so bad, but the devil had a hold on me and we just ended up hurting each other.”

Ultimately he ended up moving back to his childhood home, Sacramento, and fell into a full life of crime. He connected with a few gangs, but was never initiated, but together they did organized crime. “I would steal semi-trucks and would turn ‘em and strip ‘em and flip ‘em. I would steal whole loads of huggies and pampers and sell them for half price or give them away to people who needed them.”

Ian admits, “My moral compass was misguided, and it was hanging on for dear life.” He would try to convince himself that his intentions were pure even though he was just such a mess. He still felt a feeling of reproach but was too deeply embedded into a vicious cycle of crime and addiction, and continued to lose more and more of himself.

He was known in all these heavily gang-affiliated areas as the one white guy that would walk in and get hugs from everybody. He says, “People were always drawn to me.” At this point in his criminal career he had turned away from his music completely. He either sold all of his instruments or they were stolen by rival gangs.

The hard life was starting to show — “I hadn’t yet busted my teeth out, but I was skinny, I was pale, I looked sick, and everybody that knew me told me that my eyes were completely black all the time. It looked like someone else was looking through my face. The enemy was wearing me like a suit, but I would still try and fight through it,” he says.

Ian lived in a constant battle, and there was a tug of war happening over his soul. “I would gravitate toward these broken people, and even then I realized that God was still using me when I was on drugs, but I still felt like a failure because at the end of the day I was still in bed with the enemy.

“I did security for a while for these prostitutes, and one time I carved ‘trick’ into the forehead of one of these guys for what he tried to do to one of the girls. I was really doing some wicked stuff, and it’s hard for me to swallow.” Ian planned heists and admits that he hurt everyone, and did a lot of damage to people. He says, “In the back of my mind I would hold myself accountable, but I was so spun out and so angry that I wanted to watch the world burn.”

There was a three and a half year period of time where he didn’t pay for anything. He stole everything — food, clothes, gifts, and cars. He says, “I wanted to appear like I had my sh** together so I would bring my family gifts. I would switch VIN numbers on cars — I did time for that. I ended up pleading out when my head cleared. I just ended up doing some monstrous stuff. I’ve now learned through my sobriety to apply that determination, that tenacity, to positive things.

“I ended up getting shot in the leg; I went to rescue a girl from a party. They had given her GHB and she was only 16. I showed up there, and I was met with opposition because they had plans for her. This opposing gang to the people that I ran with, they were into sex trafficking in the area, and I knew that. So before I went over to rescue her I gave myself a shot of heroine and crystal meth in my neck, and I put a shot of steroids in my butt cheek, and I went blazing in there ready for battle. I was really brutal, and I did some real physical damage to people, but I got her out of there, and in turn I got shot in the leg.

“When I went in I was held for questioning because they wanted to know who shot me. I was so into these hood rules and hood mentality, and I thought, ‘I’m not gonna snitch.’ So I ended up being detained, and my femur was shattered in four places, and I had a bullet fragment in my back, so they put me on fentanyl patches because they didn’t realize I was a drug addict. Between that and the IV, I was just high out of my mind.

“It took me about eight and a half months to heal from that, and I was in a cast up to my hip, and I was still going and stealing. I would walk into a place and use the fact that I had an injury as a diversion so that I could get them for all kinds of stuff. I was a thief and a professional liar at that time. It’s hard for me now because lying is something that I hate the most,” he says.

“I beat someone up and I stole their motorcycle, and I ended up in a police chase down by Watt and Elverta Avenue because I was as high as could be. I had about a 5-minute head start from the police, and I wrecked, and broke my body. My whole face was rearranged, and I suffered tremendous injuries, and I had just healed after 8 months from my gunshot wound.

“I busted my teeth out, which really gave the devil a lot of power over me because my mom always encouraged me and called me ‘her beautiful boy,’ and now I had destroyed my face and my smile. I thought for sure that ‘That’s it, I’m done. I’ll never be able to sing on stage again, I’ll never be able to look my mother in the eyes. She’s dying, everything’s a mess.’ So I got insanely reckless, and I upped the ante in my crime, and I started pulling high-risk heists, and ultimately it landed me in Sac County.”

Ian got arrested probably about nineteen or twenty times over the course of three years — booked, released, booked, released. He says, “I would never be in long enough to get clean. And so they finally got me because I had a warrant, and I was out on bail for grand theft auto.” Ian’s charge had been reduced, but they were keeping him in longer, and he wondered why. He asked, but they wouldn’t tell him why. Ian says, “It was like God didn’t want me to know, He wanted me in the dark.”

He was in TSEP (total separation) because he beat up his cell mate for robbing someone’s house that he knew. “I was in a dark room on the 8th floor all alone, and I was only allowed out once a week to shower and make a phone call. When I was up there I had this moment, and had been up for maybe eleven or twelve days because when you’re detoxing from uppers and downers and steroids, it’s insanity. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t see straight, and I was vomiting and couldn’t take water or food so I lost something like 40 lbs. He says, ‘I was in the hole, and it’s where I needed to be.’”

After a while Ian started thinking about his entire life, and he was plagued by all these voices. “The enemy was trying to hold onto me because he could feel that he was losing his power over me,” he says. It had been a while since he felt that sense of hope, but the day finally came when God did something that turned the course of things, and he was sober enough to hear it and allow God to move on his heart again.

There was a man that came into the cell next to Ian, and this man began to tell him a story about a Shepherd that broke his lamb’s leg because the lamb was straying from the flock. The Shepherd carried the lamb on his shoulder until the leg started to heal, and then when the lamb healed he had learned to stay with the flock.

Ian says, “The story hit home for me, and I started to cry, and I said to the guy, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t ever cry,’ and he said, ‘It’s ok, I feel it too.’”

For the next twenty-four hours, neither of them could sleep, so the invisible companion in the other cell began to tell him stories that he could relate to. Ian says, “I never even saw his face. I don’t even know who he was. I shook his hand through the slot in the door, but there was no window to see each other. He could have been just one of God’s angels, to be honest, but something started to move in me, and all of a sudden I just felt like I could see home again. I didn’t realize that it was God that I had been missing all this time, and that I had turned my back on Him.

“Then everything went dark on me again, right when I started feeling that hope, that guy got moved, and I didn’t have anybody on any side of me. Satan was trying to get me alone again, and I literally met the presence of the devil.” Ian describes this spirit that harassed him over the next few days, and he says, “I was getting maybe 15 minutes of sleep after the eleven or twelve days of detox, just small increments, so I wasn’t totally back to normal. But there was this presence of an angry, upset child, and he told me his name was Morning Star, and suddenly I realized what was going on. I was clear-headed, even though I hadn’t slept much, I realized who he was, and so I rebuked him, and I said, ‘Look man, hey, I’m sorry that you got kicked out of heaven and that you are doomed and you’ve been cast out of heaven.’”

The enemy didn’t stop there. The devil then said, “No, I’m just like you, I’m a musician too. I love music. I made music, and I’m the one that invented music.” Ian says, “I was totally blown away by it. I realized he was trying to reel me in, and he was trying to show me that he and I were so much alike — it was a trip.”

This experience woke Ian up to the scheme of the devil. “This is why I use my music to glorify God now. Because when I was younger, I was doing the devil’s work. I was promoting [unbiblical] sex, violence, aggression, drug use, just being lost. I was creating a monument to being lost instead of a monument to helping people wake up to the fact that they’re lost. But I identified with the devil, admittedly, and it shook me up, and I think God allowed that because God wanted to show me, ‘I had to cast Lucifer out of heaven because I made him in charge of the music and he ruined it.’”

Ian believes that God used this moment to show him that his gift of music is important, and that if he wanted it back, he can’t waste it. He said, “God saved me.” So he told the enemy, “I’m saying goodbye to you. You’ve been with me for too long, and I’m just over it. I can’t do this anymore. I can’t help you, and I’ve gotta move on.

“I realized this is why the devil was drawn to me and working on my heart, because (A) he didn’t want me to fulfill what God had planned for me, and (B) he was drawn to me because I almost felt sorry for him, which is crazy.”

Fast forward a few days later, the night before Ian got put back in general population, he was sitting on the bottom bunk with his back against the wall, and he was reading a Scripture in Corinthians that he says, “said something like — although the man outside you is passing away, rejoice, because the man inside you is being renewed — and it hit him like a ton of bricks.”

“All of a sudden I saw this figure, and it was Christ. He was right there. He didn’t have long hair or anything like that, but it was Jesus.” He says, “Jesus just started weeping, and I asked Him why He was weeping, and Jesus said, ‘Because you’re finally coming home.’”

In tears, Ian shared with me that in that moment he realized how bad he had hurt his Father. “That’s what finally woke me up,” he says. “I just realized how hard I hurt Jesus, and I made a promise that I am not going to hurt Him anymore.

“I got transferred to the Tracy facility. But I realized that God was preparing me to do His work, and I would cry on a daily basis. I would have a conversation with an inmate that was doing life, and somehow I would help him find hope even when I felt so broken inside. It just started to empower me, and I still had the doubt, but as I pushed on, my confidence started to come back. I was fighting my case, and I thought for sure I could win this. The night before court, I wanted to get some sleep, dammit, but God woke me up at 3:30 in the morning. He gave me a song called ‘Violent Parade.’”

God told Ian that night, “I have something for you, but you have to go plead out and take what they give you.” But Ian still woke up thinking he could fight it, but Jesus convicted him through his little brother. “As soon as I stepped into court, I saw my little brother, and I caused a lot of problems for him. He got handcuffed because of it, all kinds of grief I brought him, because I used his name. His eyes got so sad because I was all buffed and in orange, and I just knew I had to plead out.”

Ian asked the public defender if he could get permission from the judge to speak, and the judge allowed it. He looked at his little brother and the Judge, and he said, “I haven’t absolutely done everything that I’m charged of, but I can tell you this much, I’ve done worse. I did it all. I want to plead out. I’ll sign the papers, I’ll take whatever you guys give me, I just want to be better.

“So I pled out, and God just started giving me my music back.” All of Ian’s instruments were gone to drugs or stolen, and he had given up on singing completely. “When I was in there I was almost afraid of it because of the reality of what I learned from talking to the devil. But God started giving me these melodies, and I could hear. Suddenly I could arrange an entire symphony in my head. And that’s a skill that I have now. I can literally see the notes on a piano, on a guitar, and hear the drums, and I wrote five of the songs that are going to be on this album, Almost Sober.” The album has a double meaning because Ian is almost sober (but it’s been a struggle), but now he has the purpose to remain sober. God has fulfilled everything He promised to me, and it was time to hold up my end of the bargain,” he says.

When Ian got out of jail, he realized he needed to focus on his own recovery, but he still struggled with alcohol for a little while and believes it was a reminder from those demons that would ultimately strengthen him.

He went to Nashville and got back in touch with his guitar player, Matthew. God sent another angel his way — Matthew’s dad, Paul. He was a pastor, and he mentored and challenged Ian for 2 years to have self control.

About the time Ian started to feel strong again his mom died, he ruptured a disc in his back, and was crippled again — for a short time — spiritually, mentally and physically. “I fell into a bottle really hard for about two months at the beginning of last year, and then I pulled up out of that nose dive, and I was completely renewed by God again.” After that is when Ian wrote the rest of the material for Almost Sober, and that’s when he started to perform in Nashville.

But, Ian’s journey to stop relying on anything other than God took time, and Ian would still drink alcohol because he was nervous to connect and to be honest and vulnerable with people. His commitment to being honest with his music is why he considers his music to be folk. “Because I just bare-bones go out there and tell my story because I want to be honest now, I don’t want to lie anymore. That’s the only way you can get anything done — the truth really does set you free.”

He still has days where he struggles with self doubt, and reminds himself, “No matter what I accomplish I need to glorify God.” He is empowered again, and says, “It doesn’t matter how broken I am because that’s the reason I can help people. That’s my testimony — my witness, is me. I’m the living, walking testimony.”

Jesus told Ian years ago that He had something great planned for him, but that it wouldn’t be easy, and Ian says, “I had no idea what that meant. No matter how much I put myself down or listened to the enemy, or told myself I wasn’t worth anything, people flocked to me. I’m just finally getting to the point that I can believe it.”

Through this journey of sobriety and making his way out of darkness into the Light, Ian recalls as a child his mom telling him, “God told me that you would bring a nation to God. You were going to use your music, your glorious voice, to bring people closer to God.” Never doubt the prayers of a mother.