American progressive metal label Sensory Records is preparing for the eponymous debut album from international progressive metal quintet PHILOSOPHOBIA in June, today unveiling the cover art, track listing, a brief teaser, and more.
In 2007, longtime friends Andreas Ballnus (Perzonal War) and Alex Landenburg (Kamelot, Cyrha, Mekong Delta) had the idea of creating a prog metal concept album. After recording a few demos, Landenburg joined Annihilator as their touring drummer while Ballnus became the guitarist for former Iron Maiden vocalist Paul Dianno. With both touring around the world for years, unfortunately they had to postpone their prog adventure due to lack of time.
In 2018, Ballnus got in touch with Kristoffer Gildenlöw (ex-Pain Of Salvation, Kayak) for a book project he had written; the two soon became friends and when Kristoffer heard the demos Ballnus and Landenburg had recorded, he was blown away by the quality of the songs, and at that moment PHILOSOPHOBIA was born. Completed by keyboard wizard Tobias Weißgerber and vocalist Domenik Papaemmanouil (Wastefall), the recordings for the band’s debut album began in 2020 against all odds.
Landenburg and Ballnus headed to SU2 Studios in Southern Germany and recorded nine songs of which eight made it onto the album. In fact, six of them remained the same songs that were written in 2007. The two still felt that those songs were timeless and deserved to be recorded for the final album version. Together with recording engineer and producer Phil Hillen (Powerwolf, Kamelot, Alyssa White Gluz), PHILOSOPHOBIA recorded an hour-long experience covering a wide range of textures; somber tunes to heavy prog metal tracks to instrumentally artistic roller coaster rides.
Philosophobia was mastered by Alan Douches (Fates Warning, Redemption, Mastodon) at West West Side Music in New York, and completed with cover artwork conceived by Ballnus and created by Björn Gooßes/Killustrations.
PHILOSOPHOBIA is now preparing to issue their eponymous debut album via Sensory Records, the band’s top choice for its release, in conjunction with Kristoffer Gildenlöw‘s return to prog metal on stages worldwide since his departure from Pain Of Salvation.
