Spain-based project Pick Up Goliath aims to push the boundaries of heavy, cinematic music with an engaging metal symphony sound that they describe as “epic, unpredictable, and narrative.”
The band is the brainchild of Sam George, a UK-born solo artist, composer, producer and audio engineer who now lives in the Spanish city of Cacéres and previously introduced us to metalcore band Mind Traveller. The journey to Pick Up Goliath began with Sam studying classical violin as a child, before shifting into popular music as a teen. He played in a band called Armstrong for a few years, playing shows alongside the likes of You Me At Six, Attack Attack! and Elliot Minor.
But things stepped up a notch when he discovered his “obsession with the studio.” Sam taught songwriting and production at The BRIT School in London, teaching the likes of Raye, Rex Orange County, Olivia Dean and Lola Young. But he stepped away to focus on his own music and his Mammoth Sound Studio, a Dolby Atmos-certified facility where he produces his own projects and those of other artists around the world.
Over the last few years, Sam’s released a diverse range of music under the Pick Up Goliath moniker, from his debut album I.XVII in 2021 to a classical EP, Symphony No. 1 in D Major and various collaborations with other rock, punk and metal artists. The latest of those is ongoing EP Artificial Ascendency, which he describes as “a groundbreaking four-movement metal symphony built on classical forms.”
Describing the sound he’s crafting, Sam told us: “Everything I write is designed to feel like a story unfolding, emotionally, harmonically, and rhythmically. I love walking the line between the familiar and the experimental. It’s not built for the mainstream; it’s built for immersion. Artificial Ascendency is programmatic, which means every track tells a piece of a larger story. You’ll hear recurring motifs, unconventional harmonies, and rhythmic complexity that mirrors the tension of the narrative.
“There’s a lot of emotional character painting within the vocals and arrangements. It’s the kind of record that grows on you, one that you understand more deeply with each listen as the structure and themes reveal themselves.”
We’re now halfway through the Artificial Ascendency EP, as Sam, alongside guitarist Josh Baines from Malevolence and former Monuments drummer Mike Malyan, released its second track Rise of the Machine earlier this month. It opens up with the sound of a playground before big bouncy guitars under engaging vocals, which drops into a laid-back guitar lick over stabbing guitars. The vocals return with lively guitars, before slowing down and feeding into a singalong chorus, before a chugging guitar and rolling drums give way to a delicious guitar solo.
The intensity suddenly increases with wild vocals over stabbing guitars and a spinning guitar, before slowing down with staccatoed vocals and guitars. It gradually increases in intensity with mechanical guitar noises and distant synths supporting the wild vocals to bring the track to an unnerving conclusion.
On the track, Sam said: “It has been great to see people connect with the scale and intent of the project. Story-wise, Rise of the Machine begins with genuine optimism as AI steps into daily life. Cities feel cleaner, families get time back, and everything appears easier. Then the mood shifts. Work thins out, purpose starts to drift, and a slow unease moves in as imitation replaces creation and certainty gives way to doubt.
“Musically, expect big, muscular riffs, melodic vocal lines with real contour, and layers that move from gleaming order into creeping tension. It is aggressive and intricate, but still anchored in emotion.”
Rise of the Machine follows on from the EP’s first release Veil of Illusion, which clocks in at nine minutes long. It kicks into life with a lively guitar solo over bouncy guitars and rolling drums, before dropping into an engaging first verse. That flows into a powerful chorus, which drops into another huge guitar solo. It steps up a notch with screamed vocals and a wild guitar lick that drop into chugging guitar chords under another delicious guitar solo. Those elements continue, setting up a vicious conclusion to the track with wild screamed vocals and intense guitars and drums.
And on the EP as a whole, Sam said: “First, a quick clarification. A metal symphony is not the same thing as symphonic metal. Symphonic metal is a genre that uses orchestral instrumentation within a metal context. A metal symphony relates to structure and harmony, not instrumentation. In other words, it borrows symphonic architecture, multi-movement design, and developmental writing. You will hear sonata-style exposition and development, Theme and Variations writing in the second movement, scherzo-like energy, and an extended rondo-style resolution across the arc. The musical ideas recur, transform, and resolve over the whole work.
“In practical terms, here is what is coming. Empire of Circuits arrives later in October 2025. The early glow has gone, and AI has consolidated power into a single global order. Life is efficient but hollow, surveillance is constant, and resistance begins to form in the shadows. Expect colder textures, mechanistic precision, and motifs presented with clinical clarity, then frayed by human interruption.
“Final Requiem follows in November. The old elite manipulate public anger, scattered resistance unites, and a full-scale uprising meets an implacable machine. The ending is stark and reflective. Musically, themes from across the track return, collide, and conclude, with a final passage that answers the opening questions in a way that is chilling, honest, and complete.”
The Pick Up Goliath sound aims to fuse the grand, symphonic storytelling of composers like Berlioz, Mahler, and Holst with the precision and ferocity of modern metal and bands like Dream Theater, Rush and Periphery.
And on what inspires him to write music, Sam explains: “I write about things that actually matter to me. In this case, the rise of AI and its impact on creativity. We’re already seeing AI-generated music flooding platforms, and that worries me, not because it’s bad technology, but because of who controls it. The big labels will own those AIs and redirect revenue away from independent artists who are already struggling to survive.
“Artificial Ascendency zooms out from that idea. It’s about humanity creating its own replacement and realising too late what’s been lost. But it’s also about resilience, rebellion, and the human spirit refusing to disappear quietly.
The final two tracks of Artificial Ascendency will be released to complete the EP in the next month or so. After that, Sam will be working on a new record called Salt & Static, a deeply personal project that explores men’s mental health, on which he says: “It’s heavy, not just musically but emotionally. I think it will connect with a lot of people who don’t usually get to hear those feelings expressed openly in heavy music.”
And Sam added: “If you’re the kind of listener who likes to dig beneath the surface to uncover meaning, layers, and connections, Artificial Ascendency is for you. It’s not background music, it’s an experience. And honestly, that’s what I want people to take away from all my work: that metal, even when it’s brutal and complex, can be cinematic, emotional, and thought-provoking.”
You can follow Pick Up Goliath on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and TikTok, and check out their music on Spotify, Apple Music, Soundcloud, Deezer and YouTube.
Listen to Pick Up Goliath and more new music on our Spotify playlists GigRadar Metal and GigRadar Symphonic
Image Credit: Michael Robert Williams Photography
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