Oathbound

Hailing from Seattle, Oathbound bears the honest emotion that lay fundamental to the human experience. Heartbreak, loss, addiction, trauma, and more are given center stage amidst a backdrop of progressive metalcore riffs and anthemic synths showing that even through hardship there is always a silver lining and a life out there worth living.

Oathbound was born out of guitarist Taylor Harper’s yearning to reconnect with a creative energy that had long since gone dormant. He had set aside his guitar to join the masses in their attempts to climb the corporate ladder. Having reached some level of success as a civil engineer in the Seattle area, he realized that a life devoid of music was soulless and grossly unfulfilling. So with the fire inside rekindled, Harper connected with family friend Viktor Schultz to begin jamming on some of the early demos Harper had recorded.

Schultz emigrated from Moscow in 2022 with his family after tensions with Ukraine began to escalate. Born in California, Schultz spent the vast majority of his life in Russia up to that point performing in bands and developing his prowess on the guitar. He briefly considered studying music in school before ultimately settling on computer science.

With Schultz on board, Harper started to put out feelers for a vocalist on several Seattle musician Facebook groups. Enter Kalyan Lopez. Lopez responded to Harper’s post and agreed to listen to some of the rough demos that had been recorded up to that point. The two agreed to meet at Lopez’s recording studio north of Seattle to work on some ideas. These ideas ended up being much of what can be heard on the song “All for You”.

Much in the same way as Lopez, Rishab Thadani was found through a Facebook group from a post he made looking for like-minded musicians to jam with. Thadani had recently relocated from the Dallas area after taking a job as an engineer for Boeing. After five minutes of playing together in Harper’s garage, everyone knew it was a special connection. Thadani’s style and precision paired perfectly with the progressive metalcore riffs and general vibe of the early demos.

The last piece of the band was put into place when Lopez enlisted his friend, John Padgett, to join the group as a session bass player. Padgett quickly fell in love with the demos and the vision of the band and decided to join as a permanent member soon after the first few rehearsals.

From Thanksgiving 2023 until February 2024, Oathbound focused all their time and energy into producing and recording their debut EP. The drums were tracked in Harper’s basement with Lopez engineering the recordings. The drums were tracked in two days during the weekend after Thanksgiving and were followed soon thereafter by the guitars and bass. By the spring of 2024, Lopez had completed mixing the EP and plans were made to start releasing singles.

Oathbound’s debut EP, “Until it’s Gone”, truly announces their arrival to the Pacific Northwest music scene and has earned them consistent spots on coveted Spotify algorithmic playlists due to its reception. Currently working on preproduction for their upcoming LP and branding content, as well as a busy calendar of shows around the western states, Oathbound prides themselves on maintaining high quality work which expands into their social media presence and fan engagement.

Oathbound has their sites set on continued growth of their brand and fanbase and have a goal to tour in the summer of 2025 following the release of their first full-length album, which is currently in pre-production.