Angelo Bria has been doing this for a long time. The vocalist, best known for his work with the 1980s metal band Aaronsrod, spent decades in the kind of hard rock trenches where you either get sharper or you get comfortable. Bria got sharper. BRIA, the project he built with guitarist and keyboard player Lowell-George Granath and drummer Bryce Milam, arrives with the confidence of musicians who know exactly what they are doing and have no interest in apologizing for it.
Optimus Masochist, released June 19, 2026, is five tracks in under nineteen minutes. Produced by Dead End Bowie and mastered by Jimmy Caterine, the EP sits in the overlap between classic 1980s hard rock swagger and something more contemporary in its self-awareness. The band’s own description of themselves as channelling the spirit of David Lee Roth after three energy drinks and a midlife crisis is funnier and more accurate than most band bios manage to be.
The Title Track
Optimus Masochist opens the EP and announces everything you need to know about what BRIA are doing here. Bria has described the song as the theme for every self-absorbed musician where the mirror always lies and the prize is just over the hill, unaware or indignant to reality. It is a song about chasing something that keeps moving, about the gap between the version of yourself you see in the mirror and the version everyone else sees, and about the specific kind of person who keeps going anyway.
The production hits you immediately. Crashing drums, a bold bass, and guitars that sweep and scorch and swerve with the kind of rambunctious energy that hairspray-era hard rock understood instinctively and most modern rock has forgotten how to deploy without embarrassment. BRIA deploy it with zero embarrassment and considerable skill. The song dips into what-if territory lyrically before landing somewhere between it’s-gonna-happen optimism and well-now reality, and that arc is what makes it more than just a nostalgia exercise. There is genuine wit in the writing.
Misery Map
Misery Map does not ease up after the opener. If anything it tightens the screws. The track is high-octane from the jump, with Bria’s vocals pushed back into the mix in a way that lets the instrumentation carry its own weight rather than leaning on the performance up front. It is a production choice that suits the song, giving the hard rock energy room to breathe while the vocal sits inside the track rather than on top of it. The result is one of the more physically driving moments on the EP.
Dirty Glass
Dirty Glass keeps the tempo high and the energy higher. It is the EP’s most straightforwardly hard rock moment, fast and unrelenting with the kind of punch that makes it clear this band is not interested in the slow build. Granath’s guitar work is at its most aggressive here and the track’s compact runtime means nothing gets wasted. It hits and it keeps moving.
Prison Stay
Prison Stay is where the EP makes its smartest structural decision. The track opens as a full instrumental, giving Milam’s drumming and Granath’s guitar work room to establish the song’s identity before Bria’s vocals arrive around the one-minute mark. Mid-tempo by BRIA’s standards, it carries a slower groove in the verses before the chorus kicks in and the hard rock engine reasserts itself. It is the EP’s most dynamic track and the one that rewards the most attention.
The Camera
The Camera closes the EP differently from everything that came before it. The tempo drops, the production opens up, and there is an almost acoustic quality to the arrangement that makes it feel like a different side of the band entirely. Bria leans into the storytelling here in a way the earlier tracks do not ask of him, and the result is a closer that earns its place precisely because it does not try to out-muscle the four songs that preceded it. It is the right ending: quieter, more considered, and more lasting.
The Verdict
Optimus Masochist is a debut EP that knows what it is and commits to it completely. BRIA are not trying to reinvent hard rock or comment on it from a safe ironic distance. They are making it, with the swagger and the guitar work and the self-aware humor intact. Angelo Bria brings decades of experience to a project that sounds genuinely alive rather than archival, and the title track alone is worth your time.
Can you dig it? Yes.
Optimus Masochist is out now. Released June 19, 2026. Produced by Dead End Bowie. Mastered by Jimmy Caterine. Follow BRIA on Spotify, Instagram, and Bandcamp.
