The world of ASAVA is getting darker and even more cinematic. Today (May 29th), the crime drama-inspired alt-metal outfit delivered “Leigh,” which precedes an upcoming LP called Mahjong and arrives in a gritty, action-packed music video.
A press release describes the song and its video as the second chapter of the band’s How Long is Forever? series, following last year’s “Rue.” Sonically, hushed-yet-ominous vibrato vocals (“I can’t see the road ahead”) and ambient shimmers enter the scene ahead of a slow-gaze burst of kinetic sound, the song ebbing and flowing between these extremes a handful of times before coming to a close.
Visually, we enter on a passed-out woman waking up in a cabin amid a pile of pills and blood. She showers off, and is confronted by a masked figure with a tire iron, leading to a confrontation before the woman escapes and takes off on “the road ahead.”
“‘Leigh’ was written to be the spearhead of part 2 (Mahjong),” vocalist Liam Brocious explains in a statement. “With how large of a story it tells, I feel like it’s the ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ of contemporary rock and metal. The video is proof of our ability to tell such a story on film. And the song and video combined are undoubtedly our best work yet.
“People may disagree, but fuck ‘em. I don’t see anyone else doing this kind of shit. Let’s keep raising the bar.”
In our recent interview with the band, Brocious, a fan of True Detective and Se7en, pondered, “How do I make my own version of fucked-up detective stuff?” You can see if he achieved the dream by watching the visceral, at times disturbing video above.