Friends from Moon Premieres Genre Hopping EP ‘The End’

With Friends from Moon, it’s not just song to song but note to note in which you don’t know what you’ll get. That’s quite apparent in their brand new EP, The End. A one-man band overseen by the multi-layered talents of Indian artist Ritwik Shivam, The End is an elaborate, diverse listening experience.

It’s heavily entrenched in electronic influences, but as you hear in the EP, it has many different styles. For instance, you’ll hear some hard-driving EDM, and then, out of nowhere, you’ll hear some intense, heavily distorted metal riffs. It’s a combination of all of the music Shivam loves, and it has had an effect on him as a musician.

Discussing the focal point of The End, Shivam states:

“The theme of the EP is associated with a cataclysmic decline in a high-tech but dystopian society and the soundscape serves as a requiem for the lost utopia.”

Shivam envisions this listening experience to be based in a futuristic world which is suggested by its various soundscapes. As you hear, the instrumentation is heavily layered and textured. At its roots, it’s a combination of low-tuned guitars, sawbass guitar, techno rhythms, synths, soaring vocals, and a dark ambience. Shivam has for a long time been highly inspired by rock operas and musicals. He wanted to bring that grandeur to his own recordings.

In essence, he’s using Friends from Moon as an outlet for the full gamut of human emotions and letting them all come out at once. Listening to an ambient electronic record and a death metal record back to back will do that. At the end of the day, it’s all about the quality and craftsmanship of the music. And Shivam is operating at a high level in that regard.

Friends from Moon ‘The End’ [EP] album artwork