Erra

Erra is an American progressive metalcore band from Birmingham, Alabama, formed in 2009 by five high school friends: Jesse Cash, Alex Ballew, Adam Hicks, Garrison Lee, and Alan Rigdon.^[1] The band's name is drawn from the Akkadian god of mayhem and plague. They are widely regarded as one of the leading acts in modern progressive metalcore, blending djent, progressive metal, and melodic metalcore with a distinctive dual-vocal interplay: harsh screaming from their lead vocalist alongside Cash's melodic, near-classical singing.

Through a series of lineup changes over their first decade, only Cash and Ballew remained from the original five members. The current lineup includes vocalist J.T. Cavey (joined 2016), bassist Conor Hesse (joined 2016), and guitarist Clint Tustin (full member from 2023). Tustin first contributed songwriting on the band's seventh album.

In April 2025, Cash publicly broke his silence about a serious battle with depression, a candid admission that offered new context for the emotional depth of the band's work.^[2] His father's passing also cast a long shadow over the creative period leading into the band's 2026 release, with Cash describing the process of writing through grief as central to the record.

Recording Silence Outlives the Earth across two separate sessions allowed the band time to step back and assess the album's direction between takes. Cash has spoken about shifting the band's lyrical approach on the record, moving away from overanalyzing conceptual coherence toward selecting lines for how they resonated emotionally within the music. He described the process as "a good time in metal not to care what people think," reflecting a creative freedom that shaped the album's directness. Cavey called it his favorite record the band had made.^[3]

Erra has released seven studio albums: Impulse (2011), Augment (2013), Drift (2016), Neon (2018), their self-titled record (2021), Cure (2024), and Silence Outlives the Earth (2026). They have recorded for Tragic Hero Records, Sumerian Records, and UNFD.