AStRONOID

Ambitious post-metal with big, riffy bollocks

aMbitious, Challenging, insPiRational

– there are a lot of tags attributed to post-metal, but ‘anthemic’ is seldom among them. Boston experimentalists Astronoid look to be challenging that with their self-titled second album, taking the lessons from their debut, Air, to create a more rounded, epic follow-up.

“Air is like getting hit by a truck for 50 minutes,” says vocalist Brett Boland. “We wanted more ups and downs, more dynamics, not just for this new record, but for the live shows, too. I want a journey where you can step back, get lost in it all and then get hit in the face.”

Astronoid is an enormous step-up for the band, moving from a largely studiobased songwriting approach into something more befitting a band who’ve shared a stage with some of our world’s biggest musical mavericks including Devin, Tesseract and Zeal & Ardor. The result is a synthesis of shoegaze, prog and instrumental post-metal, not beholden to any single subgenre.

“We are the living proof of the death of genres!” exclaims Brett. “We listen to everything – I was listening to the Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack, followed by Fleshkiller. There’s no curating CD collections anymore, so now you can love everything: death metal, Fall Out Boy… whatever.”

Despite their genre-hopping tendencies, the band still retain a sense of emotional resonance that turns each song into a sonic odyssey.

“I do this to share art; to share what people have shared with me,” Brett admits. “To know it affects people is so important, because to me that’s what music is – a release, an escape.”

Astronoid’s huge transcendental vibes will be conquering a planet near you.

ASTRONOID IS OUT NOW VIA BLOOD MUSIC