Progressive metal act AGHORA encompasses many elements and bring to their music a diverse taste of many styles. They have been one of the leading pioneers of female fronted progressive metal in the last ten years.
The band was formed in 1995 by guitarist Santiago Dobles in Miami, Florida. In 2000, AGHORA released their self-titled debut album which featured Sean Reinert (CYNIC, DEATH) on drums and Sean Malone (CYNIC, GORDIAN KNOT) on bass, as well as Charlie Ekendahl on guitar, and Danishta Rivero on vocals. The album became a success in the underground progressive communities, thanks to incredibly skilled playing and inspired songwriting.
Despite the seven year gap between the first album and the new one (Formless), the band has survived the test of time that many bands go through. Some members have come and gone but AGHORA has persevered. The band's line up has been very steady in recent times and now consists of Matt Thompson on drums, Alan Goldstein on bass, and Diana Serra on vocals.
Since then AGHORA has performed live with some of the heavy hitters in metal and fusion (AMORPHIS, KAMELOT, ATHEIST, SONATA ARCTICA, ALLAN HOLDSWORTH), and spent most of 2006 writing and recording their sophomore album "Formless", which was co-produced by Santiago and metal producing guru Neil Kernon (QUEENSRYCHE, NEVERMORE, DOKKEN, NILE, CANNIBAL CORPSE).
Formless, which was released independently in December 2006, also received a worldwide release on May 21st (Europe) and June 19th (USA and Canada) of 2007 through Season Of Mist.
The band is now back with an interesting mix of old and new sounds. In terms of music, their influences run the spectrum of classical music, fusion jazz, world music, progressive metal, thrash and death metal. With the release of "Formless", they truly began paving out their own path and their own sound in the industry.
Aghora is presently hard at work on their third (presently untitled) album, which is expected to be unleashed in late Summer/early Fall of 2009.
*
*
*
