Animals As Leaders Announce Four-City India Tour in August

The American tech and prog trio will return to the country for the first time since 2013 with the Parrhesia India Tour starting August 20th in Delhi NCR

Prog band Animals As Leaders will tour India this August. Photo: Press

American instrumental prog rock and metal band Animals As Leaders will make their way to India this August, with a four-city tour that spans shows in Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Kolkata.

The mind-bending trio – comprising guitarist Tosin Abasi, bassist-guitarist Javier Reyes and drummer Matt Garstka – are coming back to the country 11 years after their India debut. They last performed at metal festival Bangalore Open Air in July 2013.

This time around, Animals As Leaders will perform in Delhi NCR on August 20th, in Kolkata on August 22nd, in Mumbai on August 24th and close with a Bengaluru concert on August 25th as part of their Parrhesia India Tour. While venues are yet to be announced, the tour is put together by entertainment company Skillbox in association with X-Ray Touring and Rocnation. All shows are billed as “an exclusive SkillBox Production.”

Animals As Leaders, who last released their fifth album Parrhesia in 2022, first shot to fame with their djent-informed self-titled album in 2009, including their early hits like “Cafo” and “Tempting Time.” In 2011, they released Weightless, their second album that doubled down on the ambient-meets-progressive-metal sound with songs like “An Infinite Regression.” More playfulness was imbued on 2014’s The Joy of Motion, best heard on “Physical Education,” although they still brought djent breakdowns with “Tooth and Claw.”

Abasi, Reyes and Garstka took a different turn with their next album, The Madness of Many, released in 2016. Songs like “Arithmophobia” had a distinct sitar-like influence while “The Brain Dance” found its place in the Animals As Leaders catalog as perhaps their most accessible song, buoyed by acoustic guitar and jazz influences. More baffling prog artistry was on show on Parrhesia, the trio pushing boundaries with songs like “Monomyth.”

Although billed as a tour to support Parrhesia, the band are likely to bring songs from across their discography in India. Abasi told Rolling Stone India in 2013 about the Animals As Leaders live experience, “We’re usually physically performing the way most bands do, but with my pedalboard and other technical demands, we’re not running around stage doing kickflips and stuff. Hopefully, we can procure a screen and a projector from the festival. We like to try for the same production level everywhere we go.”

While they’re playing the acclaimed math-rock, prog and post-rock festival ArcTanGent in Bristol on the way in to India, the trio will embark on a tour celebrating 10 years of The Joy of Motion across the U.S. in October this year. In the U.S., they are supported by Australian instrumental act Plini, who has also toured India in the past.