Who says you need a state of the art recording facility? One Castleton student and his friend drop a bombshell and say you don’t.Relatively new local band, Ambulia, has released their debut album ‘Miles and Complications.’ The band consists of Castleton student Julian Defelice and guitarist Tom Hutner.

Defelice and Hutner first got together in the fall of 2005 when they were members of the band Hot Chokalit. The band’s biggest moment possibly could be when they opened for New Jersey band New Blood Revival at a show sponsored by WIUV.

Differences in the band’s direction led to Hot Chokalit’s demise. A year later Defelice and Hutner re-united to form Ambulia named after a song on Hot Chokalit’s album ‘Hostile Takeover.’

‘Miles and Complications’ was produced using Defelice’s own home recording studio — located in his bedroom.

Like most contemporary bands it is hard to slap Ambulia with a label. Ambulia has elements of electronica, hip-hop, industrial rock and metal.

Listening to Defelice sing is very interesting. He has a voice that resembles Nine Inch Nails’ front man Trent Reznor. Defelice also does some amazing guitar and synthesizer work on the album.

Hutner brings his metal and hardcore influences into his guitar playing, which gives Ambulia its edge. Hutner also makes freestyle rap seem like a cakewalk when he spits his lyrics:

“December 12th 20, 21, thousands of puzzle pieces re-arranged into one, the path least traveled all littered with gravel, was taken with ease expectations of a judge’s gavel, the rollercoaster turned introvert to coaster, couldn’t find my holster, eyes shined like diamonds, distracting me from violence, who knew I would be finding this looking for guidance down the barrel of a .45.”

Chances are you’ve never heard Ambulia, but their sound resembles many bands. The instrumentals at times resemble The Mars Volta, The Prize Fighter and System of a Down. Defelice and Hutner’s vocals sound like Reznor meets the X-ecutioners.

And they structured the album like the rock band Coheed and Cambria with the last song being broken into three separate songs.

The songs I’ve most enjoyed listening to are ‘Homecoming King,’ ‘The Only Solution,’ ‘Delilah Complex,’ and ‘Scaling the Tower III: December, 12, 2021.’

For a copy of the album contact Defelice at Julian.Defelice@castleton.edu