Azusa emerges from the relatively unknown, combining members of Extol, The Dillinger Escape Plan, and Sea + Air into a frenetic, chaotic, powerful, heavy, and at times ethereal sonic blend that is everything you’d expect and more from this talent.
Asuza burst onto the scene in 2018 as a project from Christer Espevoll and David Husvik of Extol handling guitars and drums, Liam Wilson of The Dillinger Escape Plan on bass, and Eleni Zafiriadou of Sea + Air and ex-Jumbo Jet on vocals. The result was an amazing debut filled with elements of thrash, hardcore, and pop presented in a sometimes chaotic blend of very technical metal with Eleni Eleni Zafiriadou’s beautiful and brutal vocals. From a historical view, Christer met David at a Benea Reach show in 2014 and the two started jamming 6 months later. During that time the two, who were The Dillinger Escape Plan fans, learned that Liam (from TDEP) was into their former band Extol and they reached out and the suddenly the band just needed a vocalist. Eventually they remembered Eleni from her time with the hardcore band Jumbo Jet and the result was Heavy Yoke. For Loop of Yesterdays, the band was anxious to pick up where they left off and in the words of bassist Liam Wilison, “Heavy Yoke was the initial impact, Loop of Yesterdays is the aftermath.” Once again the band recorded at David Husvik’s Hawk Studios in Oslo over a series of marathon sessions that started before Heavy Yoke left the pressing plant. Like before, Nick Terry (Turbonegro, Serena Maneesh) handled mixing giving mastering engineer Jens Bogren (Opeth, At the Gates) a lot to work with.
‘Heavy Yoke’ is the title track of Azusa‘s upcoming debut album. The video can be seen below.