On October 23, IGNEA will release their new studio album, Monumental, via Napalm Records. With a decade of experience, the Ukrainian band is releasing its fourth studio album. It follows three years after their previous release, Dreams of Lands Unseen, a concept album dedicated to photojournalist and writer Sofia Yablons’ka.
Monumental is no coincidence
Amid an endless series of challenges caused by the ongoing conflict—including prolonged power outages—the band managed, through sheer dedication, to complete this latest album last winter.
The title of the album, Monumental —which is once again structured as a concept album—is no coincidence. It perfectly reflects a landscape marked by a raw and essential constructivism. It also reflects the sense of abandonment found in the imposing ruins scattered around the outskirts of cities ravaged by war. Finally, it evokes a collective memory that has been wounded for many years now.
Exploring nostalgia
This desolation is then tempered by a retrofuturistic vision. This vision seems to embark on an attempt to rebuild hope by preserving the remnants of a past that was never fully lived. This was due to the historical upheavals the country has endured. It is a nostalgia that the band seeks to explore in all its forms.
Musically, all of this translates into an intriguing blend. It fuses melodic and Eastern metal with electronic elements and hints of prog, folk, and industrial.
The distinctive style of Monumental
Another strength of the ensemble is its distinctive style. At times, it is inspired by the approach of major bands such as Amorphis, Aeternam, and Nightwish. However, its musicality is decidedly bold. It has an incisive and modern sound that at times seems to evoke a movie soundtrack.
Helle Bohdanova serves as the band’s lead vocalist and is also the album’s lyricist. The music was composed primarily by Yevhenii Zhytniuk, the band’s keyboardist and synthesizer player. Dmytro Vinnichenko’s powerful guitar riffs and Xander Kamyshin’s bass round out the lineup.
A great deal of eclecticism
There is undoubtedly a great deal of eclecticism in the structure of the album’s nine tracks. They are multifaceted and layered. They are always ready to highlight industrial landscapes, sweeping melodies, and thunderous choruses.
Monumental: Transforming images into sounds
Above all, the band’s ability to transform sounds into an effective means of conveying imagery and memory deserves special mention.
The opening track, Darkness, and the subsequent Dreams of Lands Unseen are perhaps the most striking examples of the band’s musical intuition. The latter echoes the title of the previous album.
Venturing into increasingly diverse musical territories
The former offers an epic melody with a catchy chorus. The latter is a sublimation of successive musical moments. The initial growl evolves into choral passages that pave the way for the synth. The synth is seamlessly integrated into a magnetic finale that tells of an imminent expedition ready to take off into infinite space.
By exploring and venturing into increasingly diverse musical territories, the band boasts outstanding collaborations. One is with Combichrist’s frontman, Andy LaPlegua. He is an icon of the electro-industrial genre that characterizes the track Prefab.
Another collaboration is with Britta Görtz of Hiraes. She is one of the most charismatic figures in underground heavy metal. Helle shares vocal duties with her on “Harmony Manufactured.”
Enriching the core blend with intricate details
The roaring intensity of metal is occasionally broken up by tracks of remarkable technical caliber. These tracks enrich the core blend with intricate details. Examples include Presence of The Past and Between No Longer and Not Yet. Both also offer glimpses of progressive sequences. I Am in Hell is a short track that showcases the vocalist’s talent through a masterful performance.
The album closes with the instrumental track Nadir. It almost seems to soften the electric frenzy of the work with a reflective pause. This brings the journey to a close.
Bringing Monumental to an end
Monumental is an album born out of impossible circumstances. Precisely because of that, it succeeds like few others in conveying the value of this fragment of human ingenuity called music.
The energy of metal channels all the rage of a crushed community. It expresses that rage through a narrative steeped in urban mysticism and a longing to escape.
Kudos to a band that, despite countless difficulties and amid such dramatic circumstances, managed to create a work with such vivid meaning.
Tracklist
- Darkness
- Dreams of Lands Unseen
- Presence of the Past
- Prefab (feat. Andy LaPlegua from COMBICHRIST)
- What Buildings Dream of
- I Am in Hell
- Between No Longer and no Yet
- Harmony Manufactured (feat. Britta Görtz from Hiraes)
- Nadir
Line Up
- Helle Bohdanova – Vocals
- Yevhenii Zhytniuk – Synths
- Dmytro Vinnichenko – Guitars
- Oleksandr Kamyshyn – Bass