The Offworld story begins when bass player Peter “Traxuillizer” Baart and keyboard wizard Stijn “Stan” Van Den Bossche decide to take the psychedelic prowess of their previous bands to new and even greater extremes. Taking into account Stijn’s background in Jazz and Classical music, and Peter’s experience with psychedelic bands and Funk music, the idea quickly arises to put together a project wherein wildly varying styles and genres, feral instrumental tangents, and an overall experimental mentality would be the norm.
With this mindset, the search was on for other open-minded instrumentalists that would bring in their own influences and ideas and would widen the project’s musical palette even further. On guitar, they enlisted Tom Tas, an axeman with a background in Rock and Metal and a member of bands such as Neo Prophet, 23 Acez, Quantum Fantay and Ostrogoth. With the line-up complete, the group did a number of jams and started fleshing out ideas for a full album.
Some time on and a plethora of jams, writing sessions and recording dates later, the band found themselves with several hours’ worth of solid material. Rob Martin (Bliksem) stepped in to fill in the part of drummer, and the band was finally on its way to the studio. The latter was found in Pieter “Pete Mush” Van den Broeck’s Mushroomland Studios in Lokeren, which saw the band eagerly tracking drums, keyboards, samples and other mayhem, and which even saw them actively working together with producer Pete Mush himself (Quantum Fantay, Neo Prophet,…) who enriched the record by adding even more soundscapes, melodies and synth parts.
So 2016 sees the release of Offworld’s debut concept album ‘Some Circles Are Square’; a roaring, soaring, never-boring, infuriating, wild and often whacky smorgasbord of a record – equal parts Prog, Psychedelic, Rock, Metal, Funk, Lounge, Shred, and a number of other styles that have yet to be coined with a term. Sometimes weird, often crazy, yet always compelling and dosed with fiery passion and high levels of musicianship, Offworld takes the listener on a trip through Space Opera’s most bizarre and dangerous reaches.
Website: http://www.musicinmotion.be/offthisworld/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Offworldprog/?fref=ts