Liliac began in California and has appeared on “America’s Got Talent” before the family moved to Atlanta.
There is a scene in the film Blade Runner in which the artificial human Roy Battey learns that his laboratory engineered lifespan is almost at an end and cannot be extended. His creator, the eccentric Eldon Tyrell, offers a simple consolation: “The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long. And you have burned so very brightly.”
It’s a somber sentiment, but one that resonates around the current chapter of Liliac, the Atlanta-based metal band consisting of the Cristea siblings (vocalist Melody, guitarist Samuel, bassist Ethan and keyboardist Justin) along with drummer Paul Barnes Jr. The family band troubadours have just released Delusion, the follow-up to 2023’s Madness. It’s a dark, ominous album that comes coupled with a sobering update: The band will be going on an open-ended hiatus after their upcoming promotional tour.
“There’s a lot of ambiguity right now,” says Samuel. “Essentially, we’re doing a year off — that is for certain. But whether or not we come back is questionable.”
It’s an abrupt change of pace for a band whose young members have been performing professionally since their early teens. Now in their early to mid-20s, the musicians who enjoyed a meteoric rise to fame following a showstopping appearance on America’s Got Talent are eyeing other creative avenues and life directions.
That change of direction — which the members acknowledge was largely born of burnout from years of relentless touring — has been a long time coming. When I last spoke to Liliac, they were preparing to open for Christian metal pioneers Stryper at the Masquerade. At the time, plans were in the works for what would become 2023’s Madness, an album that would bridge the gap between the band’s classic heavy metal roots and the modern rock tastes of the younger generation.
The stylistic shift was initially promising: The band’s hard-edged cover of The White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army” garnered hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube, and new singles of original material were similarly well received. Still, Madness and the band’s new direction proved polarizing to the listening public.
“Our dedicated fans really liked it,” says Samuel. “But there were some people who were really on the fence about it.”
The divide proved difficult to straddle. “I feel like we were doing a lot of radio edits,” says Melody of the album’s pop leanings. “The songs weren’t as long as people wanted, compared to our Queen of Hearts album.” She emphasizes that Madness was a joy to create, but fans were still left clamoring for a return to the band’s roots.
Delusion is a sinister and epic counterbalance to the radio-ready pop leanings of Madness. A blend of the symphonic and progressive metal, it emphasizes instrumental virtuosity and intricate song structures with a darker tone both sonically and thematically.
“We have a seven-string [guitar] now,” chuckles Samuel in regards to the album’s low-end-centric sound. “I added more lower, heavier riffs in the songs.”
From a conceptual standpoint, those heavier riffs underscore deeper, socially conscious concerns in the album’s lyrics, which are meant to reflect the harsh realities of the world that most people struggle not to acknowledge. “People don’t want to believe that it’s real,” explains Melody. “They make it a delusion.”
Heavy as it is, Delusion reflects another seismic shift in the Liliac brand: Following promotional efforts for Madness, original drummer Abigail Cristea left the band to pursue matrimony and motherhood. The vacant drum throne was temporarily filled by Alexa Rae, a popular Instagram drummer, before the band finally settled on Paul Barnes.
“I was working the front desk at a School of Rock location,” explains Barnes. He arrived at work one day to a voicemail message from Liliac’s management asking for a drummer. “I put the phone down and immediately called my dad. I asked, “What should I do?’ and he said ‘Call them back!’”
Barnes, who had studied extensively with drummer Brian Stephens and amassed a considerable professional resume at just 16 years of age, auditioned on a mixture of covers and originals. His chemistry with the band was immediate: “We just clicked,” he recalls.
It’s an ambitious album and one that will be supported by a series of headlining concerts, but the band members want to rest and re-examine their priorities. “We want to leave it open, to see if we miss doing music,” explains Sam. “The tour life isn’t easy. There’s a lot of hauling equipment, setting up, soundchecks. We started as children. And when we grow up, people’s dreams start to shift.”
The Cristeas plan to spend the year exploring other career avenues and finding out if new directions in life might prove equally fulfilling. It seems like an abrupt potential ending to a young band still on an uphill trajectory, but they are, after all, a light that has burned twice as bright. Perhaps they will ignite again someday.
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Jordan Owen began writing about music professionally at the age of 16 in Oxford, Mississippi. A 2006 graduate of the Berklee College of Music, he is a professional guitarist, bandleader and composer. He is currently the lead guitarist for the jazz group Other Strangers, the power metal band Axis of Empires and the melodic death/thrash metal band Century Spawn.
