At War With Self is the project conceived by multi-instrumentalist Glenn Snelwar, best known as one of the guitarists on the Gordian Knot debut album which featured members of Cynic, Watchtower, King Crimson and Dream Theater.
For the project's first album Torn Between Dimensions (2005) Glenn collaborated with drummer Mark Zonder and bassist Michael Manring.
The original concept in which Snelwar combined classical guitars into progressive and thrash metal has been re-visited and fully realized with A Familiar Path.
The tracks on A Familiar Path are "the heaviest, most aggressive and accurate version of what I've had in mind for combining metal and progressive influences with classical guitars" says Snelwar.
Instrumental tracks such as a hybrid half-classical, half-metal rendition of a Heitor Villa-Lobos guitar study, the Slayer-meets-King Crimson aggression of Concrete and Poison and Diseased State, a new rendering of Reflections originally featured on the debut Gordian Knot disc and the guitar shred of The Ether Trail, are balanced with the vocally-centered title track and Ourselves.