GRAMMY® Award-winning band Mastodon have steadily evolved into one of the most influential, inimitable, and iconic rock bands of the modern era. Since emerging in 2000, the Atlanta quartet have defied both sonic and thematic boundaries with an uncategorizable, undeniable, and uncompromising vision unlike anything else in music. This vision manifested over the course of canonical albums such as Leviathan, which landed on Rolling Stone’s coveted The 100 Greatest Metal Albums of All Time. Following the seminal Crack The Skye [named one of the best albums of 2009 by Time], they earned three consecutive Top 10 debuts on the Billboard Top 200 with The Hunter [2011], Once More ‘Round the Sun [2014], and Emperor of Sand [2017]. Out of six career nominations, they received a GRAMMY® Award in the category of “Best Metal Performance” for “Sultan’s Curse.” They are the rare creative force whose music can be felt everywhere from Game of Thrones, Adult Swim, The History Channel, and DC comics films to Coachella and Bonnaroo. They notably supported the Hirschberg Foundation For Pancreatic Cancer Research with a rendition of “Stairway To Heaven” in honor of late manager Nick John. The group reached another critical high watermark via their ninth full-length, Hushed and Grim. Featuring the GRAMMY® Award-nominated “Pushing The Tides,” it marked the band’s third straight #1 bow on the Billboard Hard Rock Albums Chart. It concluded 2021 on over a dozen year-end lists with Rolling Stone raving, “we get everything from some of the band’s hookiest rockers to date to some of their most awe-inspiring epics.” In 2024 they embarked on a massive arena tour with Lamb of God, celebrating the 20th anniversary of Leviathan, with the two bands subsequently teaming up for the collaborative single “Floods Of Triton” which was met with widespread critical acclaim from Rolling Stone, Forbes, Pitchfork, Revolver, and beyond. Most recently they were honored as guests of New York’s Metropolitan Opera for their acclaimed production of Moby Dick, in acknowledgment of the 20th anniversary of the similarly themed Leviathan. Evolving as they usher rock into new realms, they forever remain the same unpredictable trailblazing beast—Mastodon.

Alcest is a French post-black metal and blackgaze band founded in 1999 in Bagnols-sur-Cèze by Neige. A pioneer of the genre, the project fused the ethereal textures of shoegaze with the intensity of post-rock as early as Souvenirs d’un autre monde (2007), laying the foundations for what would become blackgaze.

Joined by drummer Winterhalter in 2009, Alcest developed a sonic universe that is both melancholic and immersive. Their discography — highlighted by landmark albums such as Écailles de lune (2010) and Kodama (2016) — moves between light and darkness. Shelter (2014) marked a deliberate dive into airy shoegaze territory, while Spiritual Instinct (2019) returned to harsher and more abrasive sounds. Signed to Nuclear Blast since 2019, the band has earned widespread acclaim for its mesmerizing live performances.

With Les Chants de l’Aurore (2024), Alcest continues exploring a dreamlike world inspired by Neige’s inner visions. Now regarded as an essential force in the global rock scene, the band continues expanding the boundaries of its art, suspended somewhere between dream and reality.