Elegy of Madness hail from the south of Italy. Formed by guitarist Tony Tomasicchio, after leaving his previous band Ragion Pura. I had the pleasure of watching the band live in 2018, at the Metal Queens Burning Night. Five studio albums and one live album have been released since then. Most recently “XI”. Last year, the band had to cope with the leaving of long-time singer Stefania “Anja” Irullo. Successor Kyrah Aylin (Chiara Di Mare) makes her debut on the latest album. So, it’s time to ask the band about current developments.
Hi, I’m Rainer and I write for Keep on Rocking and Metalheads Forever Magazine. I am happy to be able to do this interview with you. Please introduce the band briefly.
Hi everyone! We are Elegy of Madness, since 2006, we play Symphonic Metal but we try to add something new in this genre in every album we produce.
Last year, singer Stefania Irullo left the band. She had been at the microphone of Elegy of Madness since the founding days. What were the reasons for that?
As she just posted on social, she quit for personal reasons.
Anja has certainly left a big gap. How did the band cope with that?
We are a very determinate band, so we didn’t lose time and quickly we have found an amazing singer, very versatile, technically extraordinary, and a very kind woman that knows how to involve the audience.
You already introduced the new singer Kyrah Aylin shortly afterwards. How did you find her?
Each one of us tried to find soprano singers interested in our music, but Marco Monno (guitarist) was the one who found Kyrah…. after some auditions went well we decided to make Kyrah enter the band. The best decision that we could have made!
A question for Chiara. Why do you use a stage name and what does it mean?
Years ago, I was looking a stage name for me, you know, something that could represent me and my view of things through the music. I was by the sea, it was a period of confusion and I needed to find myself so, suddenly, I had an enlightenment…Kyrah Aylin!!!
It sounds like a Turkish name, I know that can create confusion with my fans about my roots, but I am Sicilian.
Kyrah meaning Lady (from the greek), Aylin comes from Turkish word meaning moonlight!
Kyrah means “black” in irish language and my real name Chiara from Italian means “clear” so this opposite represents me even in my music, life and style…just like when I sing clear or growling…as the dark and the light, you know…
You have released your new album in October. How satisfied are you with the result?
We are having lots of positive results…. more and more than the former album. This means that we did a great job, so we are extremely satisfied about it.
How did the cooperation with Kyrah work out?
We wanted a professional singer, a meticulous and a good person, that are just some of Kyrah’s skills so the cooperation did exactly how it had to be.
What were the reactions of the press and the fans?
At the moment the reactions are very, very positive…it looks like that our new line up, our new refreshed style works in a perfect way. Evidently our fans wanted something more than “Invisible World”, maybe a vocal ranging more versatile, from clear to scream and fry technique, and a bit dark image of the band have contributed to make our fans more happy!
Are there any musical differences between “XI” and its predecessor “Invisible World“?
Yes, there are, and it is evident by listening the album. We mean, the atmosphere goes to dark, the vocal lines, as told before, are more aggressive and clear in a balanced way in many songs. We really focused on the theme about the master number XI, so there is more symbolism in.
Will you go on tour with the songs from the current album? Possibly also outside your home country?
We hope so, because this time is very hard in Italy and Europe because war and economic situation, but we will try our best to go on tour from January on, and of course outside Italy because we know we have many fans that can’t wait to see us on the stage performing the new album…
Elegy of Madness have been around for more than fifteen years. Where do you get the ideas for new songs? Do you have any musical influences?
Each one of us lived the pandemic time, so that dark times made an impact so deep to push ourselves to compose new songs along the last two years and we noticed that many symbols, many atmospheres that came from Tony, Marco and Kyrah, were just some of the eleven-meaning referred to tarots, esoterism and spiritual matters. So, we were inspired by this stuff number and all the tracks were composed as fragments to be united to represent our lives in that pandemic time and in this current time. For sure, in this album you can hear musical influences from our preferred bands, such as Within Temptation, Rammstein, In this Moment, Cradle of Filth, Amorphis…
How did you go about writing the songs for each album?
Each album was inspired by different condition of living, different times, different way to be involved by what’s happened around…
Thank you again for this interview. Do you want to say something to your fans at the end?
We like to thank you for this interview and we wanna thank all the fans for their immense energy and support!
Elegy of Madness are:
Kyrah Aylin – Vocals
Tony Tomasicchio – Guitar
Marco Monno – Guitar
Larry Ozen – Bass
Francesco Caputo – Drums
Discography:
The Bridge of Sighs (2009)
Brave Dreams (2013)
New Era (2017)
Invisible World (2020)
Invisible World Live at Fusco Theater (Live album, 2021)
XI (2023)
Social Media:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/elegyofmadness
Homepage: https://www.elegyofmadness.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/elegy_of_madness/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/elegyofmadness
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/elegyofmadness
