Introducing: Vessel

Israeli band Vessel have crafted a thrilling heavy metal sound that harks back to the good old days of rock’n’roll. The Vessel sound offers a more than worthy modern tribute to idols like Black Sabbath, Dio, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, and they describe it as “honesty, attitude and passion.”

Vessel was established with the aim of being a group of friends who share a passion for music, with the friendship being the most important element. Although they currently live in Tel Aviv, lead vocalist Bruno Passy is from Brazil and guitarist Ariel Maman is from Spain. The band first started when Bruno was playing at an event that Ariel’s friend was organising and needed a guitarist.

In the band’s words: “They met at Ariel’s place to practice before the show. Ariel met for the first time a very strange dude called Bruno who had a Judas Priest t-shirt, the connection was made, and the rest is history!”

On the sound they’ve crafted, the band told us: “The Vessel sound is a deja vu of what made us start listening to rock and heavy metal. The classic bands, but with modern production. We also like to speak about the ‘Vessel Touch’, which is our secret recipe when writing songs: one drop of happiness, and two drops of sadness!”

Our latest taste of this is new single Another Life, which was released last week. It opens up with rolling drums dropping into chunky guitars that continue Bruno’s delicious vocals. That flows into the laud-back chorus “Another life, Reborn to live forever, I know the signs, There is no backdoor for heaven, Abandon all hope.” A light lick loops us back into a second verse with Bruno’s soaring vocals supported by chugging guitars and flowing into another chorus.

The pace drops with light guitars and rolling drums, and a couple of big drum rolls and intensifying guitars setup a brief solo that feed into a final blast of massive chorus vocals.

On the track, the band told us: “Another Life‘s reception has been very good, we think people expected something different, and we believe we managed to surprise them all! As it is not the usual upbeat kind of song we usually do, it takes longer to connect. But those are the songs people end up remembering the most. For someone who hasn’t listened to it yet: this song is a traditional heavy metal piece with 2024’s production style. It gathers elements from 80s melodic singers, heavy riffs and crazy drumbeats, it even has a psychedelic touch in the middle of the song.” Check it out in the video here:

Another Life is the latest in a seriously impressive catalogue of huge heavy metal tracks. Previous release Living On The Edge is an absolute banger, diving straight into Bruno’s powerful vocals cutting through and setting up big cries of “Living on the edge.” The song chills out after the second chorus, then drops into a laid-back guitar solo that gradually builds in intensity. Bruno joins in with the solo to deliver more huge cries of “Living on the edge” and, just as you think it’s finished, delivers a few massive cries of “Deceivers.” This guy’s vocals are just magnificent, I love it.

Those tracks are the latest in a really impressive back catalogue of tracks, including the huge Keep Running and First Rain. But Vessel show off their flexibility on Shape Of The Devil, from their 2021 EP Behind The Walls, which starts out slowly with mellow guitars being joined by Bruno’s engaging high-pitched vocals. Big guitar chords kick in as the vocals intensify into a huge chorus. The pace drops again with meandering guitars, before a chorus gives way to a blistering guitar solo. Check it out in the audio stream here:

These tracks set us up for Vessel’s debut album, also called Another Life, which will be released on 17 January 17. On the album, they told us: “We are so nervous and excited, because this is our debut album, which is the result of all these years since we started back in 2018. With this eight-track album, people should expect a well-balanced classic heavy metal album. It has short and rocking songs, power ballads, and dramatic/powerful traditional metal tunes. Another Life gathers songs we wrote from 2019 until 2024, we made a picky selection of what fits best and we also wanted to keep it short and to the point. Like a short but powerful movie or book!” And we’re pretty certain this album is going to be absolutely banging.

The Vessel sound is influenced by the heavy metal classics and more. As they explain: “We have influences from all over the place, and being from different countries makes the number of influences bigger. But I think we can all agree on mutual influences in the band like Dio, Maiden, Priest, Sabbath or Metallica. The classics from the 70s and 80s are always there. Then each member of Vessel has their secret pleasures, like Ariel’s obsession with country music.”

And on what inspires them to write music, they add: “Writing music is a way of expressing ourselves, combined with our love and passion for music. We can listen to music and talk about music for hours, new and old bands/artists. And what inspires us to write is basically wanting to hear something we are currently missing in today’s scene.

We feel that the evolution of technology strongly influenced musicians in their way of writing, maybe the pure essence of writing music got lost a bit on the way. We like to keep it simple, like the old times, when musicians had to rely solely on their talent to sound good instead of relying on technology to help them sound good. And about the lyrics, Bruno gets inspired a lot from his dreams, stories about good and evil in people, and also a lot from horror stories.”

Vessel have quickly become one of our favourite new bands at GigRadar Towers. And there’s plenty more to come from the band in addition to their debut album being released on 17 January. They’ll also be playing live in Israel, as well as a tour across Spain in April and France in September. They’re still confirming dates and working on new songs to perform, but these should be great gigs. And when that’s done, they’ll be back in the studio again, in their words, “to waste all our money (again!).”

And the band added: “We would like to thank everyone who is supporting us, the old and new followers, those who listen to our songs and those who attend our shows too! It’s beautiful to see people enjoying music you write, it becomes magical. When you release songs, it feels like they are not yours anymore. It is something you share with the world and now it belongs to everyone who wants to enjoy it.

“And sharing our creations and seeing people enjoying them only feeds our love for writing the best rock’n’roll we can deliver! And of course, we are and will be forever grateful for anyone who shares our music and spreads the word about Vessel!”

You can follow Vessel on Facebook and Instagram, and check out their music on Spotify, Apple Music, Deezer and YouTube.