In July of 2023, I found myself in a frustrating position. I had just released a single for my power-metal project, MettleWings, which had been shelved for nearly six months. “Doubter No More” was a straightforward attempt at creating a song that complimented my songwriting formula, but could clock-in at under five minutes. I liked it but I really stalled at the final production process. All that was necessary was to have the tracks mixed and mastered and to release it on streaming platforms, with a lyric video. When it finally came time to complete the song, I sort of just released it into the either with very little fanfare. As I write this on March 16th 2025, it remains as my last release under the MettleWIngs banner.

I’ve done a lot in the past year and a half. I’ve had different jobs and (like most AADD havers) I’ve found new hobbies and obsessions to be enamored with. But I’ve never stopped loving power metal. I’ve never stopped thinking about MettleWings. I have found myself daydreaming, hundreds of times, thinking of what MettleWings means to me and moreso, what it could mean to others, if only it had the chance. I find myself imagining different ways to make MettleWings an actual band, with members and tours. I think up band rigs, and routing solutions. I think of traveling in a van, up, down and across the land, spreading positivity and selling fun merchandise. Things that throughout these years, I’ve discovered aren't so odd or even unachievable. But has remained strangely out of grasp for me. Needless to say. I’ve discovered that (on top of other diagnoses) I suffer from crippling anxiety. Something that has apparently kept me in arrested development for decades now.

Along with other tactics, I’ve found ways to function and move past a lot of barriers I involuntarily put in front of myself. Sometimes the biggest step towards overcoming a disorder is just knowing you have one and how it activates itself. It helped me enough that I realised, MettleWings could still very much be a thing. And maybe it will just take going at it with a new plan. And just a little bit of pushing myself into uncomfortable situations. But of all things, it’s helped me embrace my many, many plans and put them into just a bit of action. In January of 2024, I decided to take a few hundred of my riffs, melodies and lyrics that I had accumulated over the years and dedicate a few hours every other night to piecing them together. Finding what complimented each other and even making new riffs and lyrics along the way. By the time I had reached November, I had accumulated nearly 20 scratch demos. More songs than I had ever made for any project I had ever partaken in. I was proud. I felt productive. I felt like this could happen.

And now I find myself here. Currently in the process of recording official rhythm guitars for the new songs. As I have in the past, I will be commissioning musicians far more talented than me to record leads and drums. I’ll then record bass and official vocals. Have them mixed and mastered and release them one by one, over the course of about a year and a half. I’ve already completed three songs and I’m in the middle of the fourth. I don’t plan to commence the commission phase until I’ve finished the rhythm tracks for all of the songs. All 18 of them.

In the end, the plot is simple. I hope to create music that will encourage and uplift people in the ways that I’ve needed in the past. With themes of overcoming anxieties and injustice, to expressing a love that you never thought possible. I’m proud of these songs. I’m proud of what I went through to make them. And I want to share them with the world. With people who need them. With people who want to perform them with me. I just need to show the world what MettleWings can be. What it is already to me. And if they want to come along for the ride, I’ll be here. Ready to rock.

-No mold can hold what I will be. Not theirs, not yours, just only me. Creating self from ground to sky. Watch me soar. Watch me fly.

-Miah