Biography:

The band was formed around the turn of 1999 and 2000, with the guitarists Peter Erdélyi and Mark Spala, and bassist Csaba Erdélyi. It took a long time to find a singer and proper drummer, and it wasn’t until 2004 when the line-up could solidify. We started playing live actively, and we played in several underground clubs in Budapest and a few other towns inside the country.
In 2005 we recorded a 5-song EP with Hungarian lyrics. This material was released earlier this year in authorial edition.
In 2006 we recorded a few songs in English to promote our music outside the borders of Hungary and hopefully to find a label. This promo is called "No Contact".
In 2007 we recorded our first album titled 'Crust of Ego', which contains all our previous songs in English, some newly written stuff and a U2 cover.
This album was released in February 2008 by Nail/Hammer Records, a Hungary’s major rock/metal label, and it was distributed throughout the whole country, however we couldn’t find any label or distributor for proper promotion abroad.
We kept on playing live and besides regular club gigs, we participated in some major festivals, including one with Brainstorm, Sabaton and Pagan’s Mind in Budapest, and another one called Rockmaraton in Romania, where we played with bands like Moonsorrow.
In 2009 the year started with line-up changes, new guitarist (Balázs Specker) and session-vocalist (Zoltan Pötörke) joined the band. Zoli left the band in summer, so the guitarist, Peter took on the position of main vocalist, and the band started writing songs with this four-member line-up for the second album.
In 2010 we spent the year with playing live, we also appeared at Metalfest Open Air, and we recorded a cover song for Peter Gabriel’s ‘Sledgehammer’.
In 2011, along with doing gigs and having a small tour in Romania with fellow bands such as Dreyelands, Angertea or Stonedirt, we initiated the recording sessions of our second album “Open Wide”, which was finished by the end of the year.
Currently we’re looking for a label, which could release and distribute our music internationally (but at least Europe-wide).
Ad Astra plays complex melodic metal with lots of rhythm and dynamic changes, catchy melodies, melancholy, irony, tension and loads of heaviness, that is sometimes referred to as progressive power/thrash metal, with influences like Nevermore, Opeth, Death/Control Denied, Pain Of Salvation, Meshuggah, Tool, Psychotic Waltz