silent collision

Austyn Moffat found his sound by literally banging his head against the wall — or, rather, his Moog Muse. After getting diagnosed with autism, Moffat made a startling realization about his past projects. “I had been masking even through my music, trying on different genres,” he recalls. “I wanted to have a project where I could find my sound and my identity.” Enter, silent collision. Initially, finding Moffat’s real sound meant moving away from making music on a computer and finding more tangible outlets, like his Moog Muse. “At first, I just wasn't getting anything and I was like, ‘Fuck! Maybe music isn't for me,’” he says. “Then, I was hitting my head on my synth and when I rested my head I was holding two notes and I got a feeling through my whole body that was electrifying. I didn’t know what the fuck it was, but I loved it.” From those notes, his first song as silent collision was born: "Storms Within Stillness,” an apt description of what it feels like to struggle on the inside while masking to the world — and an ode to his home state of Oklahoma, where storm-chasing is a local sport. Moffat’s new moniker, then, is an encapsulation of how he makes music now — not chasing trends or other people’s sounds, but, rather, surrendering. ‘I'm walking up the cliff. I'm at the edge of the cliff, and I'm gonna jump off of it. I'm just gonna hope that I land on a soft pillow or in a nice lake and I'm just gonna glide into the water and not feel anything.’” ~ Brenna Ehrlich