From Puerto Rico, Avandra is a progressive rock/metal act who will be releasing their second LP, Descender, on April 26th via Blood Music. The group recorded the album with Astronoid‘s Daniel Schwartz and was mastered by Magnus Lindberg. There will also be guest appearances included from the likes of Haken, Dream Theater, and Astronoid.
On recently released single, “Even//You,” frontman Christian Ayala stated, “‘Even//You’ started out as a shorter version a few years back. That whole middle section didn’t exist, as the main purpose for its creation was to show off a cool MIDI controller I had just bought. The idea behind it was to have an phrase playing (the first melody you hear) and then just build on top of that, so in my mind I was following a very post-rock/post-metal methodology of writing (think ISIS the band or Russian Circles, for example). A lot of the filtered effects were also heavily influenced by Chroma Key and Nine Inch Nails, which is why the main focus of the track are the synths, with the rest of the instruments supporting them. The name of the song was inspired by a Game of Thrones episode where Osha, the Wildling, says to Hodor, ‘Even you, sweet giant.’ Lyrically, it is seen from the perspective of Rob after his death at the Red Wedding. It is one of the very few songs on the album that doesn’t really have a philosophical backdrop to it, though I believe it remains profound in its message.
You can check out the lyric video for the single below, which features a solo by guest guitarist Israel Romero Perez. Personally, I hear a lot of similarities to late Katatonia in regards to the dark, progressive vibes, but overall, Avandra prove to be unique in their building, synth-driven identity.