Ukrainian melodic metal band IGNEA takes listeners into cinematic worlds with the five piece’s next masterpiece, the captivating concept album, Dreams of Lands Unseen, out April 28, 2023 via Napalm Records. The 10 tracks reflect the life of Ukrainian photographer and documentarian Sofia Yablonska, known for traveling to very distant corners of the world while documenting the lives of tribes and natives, which was especially dangerous and uncommon for a woman of her time. Ahead of the release of Dreams of Lands Unseen, the band tells us their biggest influences and IGNEA’s essential songs to hear.
INFLUENCES
Amorphis: “Perkele (The God of Fire)”
The entire existence of IGNEA probably boils down to this song. Yevhenii, who didn’t even hear much metal before, spotted his nickname in the track list of an album and bought it just of curiosity. The band, the album, and the song struck him, and he started dreaming of playing this kind of music ever since—heavy, groovy, proggy but simple, and with a nice sprinkle of kebab riffs.
Nightwish: “Planet Hell”
Although IGNEA is nowhere near your usual symphonic metal, with a frontwoman wearing corsets and cheap lace underwear, you can’t deny the influence here. “Once” is the perfect example of doing somewhat cinematic and atmospheric metal without orchestrations everywhere, and having sing-along songs in music with a comparably limited number of listeners.
Symphony X: “Iconoclast”
If you cut out all the oddly timed progressive madness in strange tonalities out of this song and change the vocals, you will probably end up with an IGNEA song. Michael Pinella’s keyboard solos have always been a major inspiration for Yevhenii in the development of his own soloing style, although it’s obviously very different.
ESSENTIALS
“Seytanu Akbar”
Growls and concentrated singing, grooves and pulsating monotone drones—essentially one of the results of IGNEA’s struggle to combine contrasting things into one homogenous song.
“Jinnslammer”
Mom, I accidentally wrote a metal hymn! Honestly, this song is what we all were proud of the most, before the new album was done. Oh, and that keyboard solo.
“Dunes”
Someone once said that festival goers mostly remember the first and the last songs of the set list. This one will make a very strong tune to open a festival appearance, just as it works well in the beginning of the album.
IGNEA:
Helle Bohdanova – vocals
Yevhenii Zhytniuk – keys
Dmytro Vinnichenko – guitars
Oleksandr Kamyshyn – bass guitars
Ivan Kholmohorov – drums
IGNEA online:
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NAPALM RECORDS
