Premiere: ShredxXx Introduce Concept Universe with ‘The Prodigal Sons’ Animated Video
The Mumbai-based rock band talk about undertaking a visual storyline for their two-part concept album ‘Celestial Prophecies’
ShredxXx in a concept artwork made by Dattatreya Chowdhury
While Kolkata/Mumbai rock band ShredxXx’s self-titled debut EP in 2016 played up a sitar-infused classic rock/heavy metal sound, they’ve taken a completely different turn with their upcoming concept record Celestial Prophecies. The first single off the two-part album, “The Prodigal Sons,” brings together polished prog rock influences and a slick animated video for storytelling.
While the band was on a hiatus between 2016 and 2019, vocalist Sankalan Samaddar, sitarist and guitarist Swarnabha Gupta, keyboardist Prashant Kumar, guitarist Nabhoneil Samajdar and bassist Swarnava Sengupta and drummer Akoi now operate out of Mumbai. ShredxXx’s previous drummer Akshat Shinde, has played on “The Prodigal Sons.” Guitarist and sitar player Gupta says they all eventually got into prog just as they began writing the new record, citing everything from Opeth to Rush to Orphaned Land as influences.
In the three years between releases, Gupta notes that they were working on an epic story to suit Celestial Prophecies. This in turn spawned the idea of presenting it as a 3D animated series with Mumbai-based artist Akash P. at Quantimo Studios. As recording began in 2018, an incendiary song like “The Prodigal Sons” introduces the storyline of the Gemini twins, sons of King Leo to take on a rebellion in the fantasy realm of Aeternum.
The accompanying video unveils vast territories, characters and fight sequences that’s set to aggressive yet well-paced music. There’s a total of 13 songs across two volumes and understandably, it’s going to take a while for it all to unravel. Gupta tells us there’s six tracks in Vol. 1, which will release by early next year and seven tracks in Vol. 2, which is scheduled for late 2020. The guitarist-sitarist adds, “One is more towards our prog rock side while disc two explores the prog metal territory.” Along the way, they dip into everything from Western and Indian classical, jazz fusion, blues and more. Gupta says, “All songs shall be released with their corresponding music videos from our channel, so that we can keep the animated series running for approximately a year, with two whole seasons of episodes, while we release both the audio discs.”
Watch the video for “The Prodigal Sons” below.
