Hi! Can you give a brief history of Metameria, including the music style and the members?
Metameria began on October 1, 2015, founded by vocalist, guitarist, songwriter and composer Ihor Salivanov, together with his wife Anhelina Salivanova, who initially played keyboards and later became the band’s bass guitarist and manager until the birth of their daughter.
Our music can be described as Industrial Gothic Rock.
During more than ten years of the band’s existence we have released two Russian-language albums (2016 and 2020) and played many concerts in our hometown Kherson, as well as in several other cities in Ukraine. Over the years, the lineup has changed many times, with the exception of the frontman.
After the war began, we lived for some time in Odesa, where bassist Konstantin Kornienko and drummer Margarita Sedenkova joined the band. During that period we performed four concerts in Odesa.
Later, again because of the war, we decided to take a pause. Eventually Ihor managed to migrate to the United Kingdom with his family. It was here that the work on our third full-length album was finally completed. Unlike the previous ones, this album is entirely in Ukrainian.
If it had not been for the war, this album would probably have been released a couple of years earlier.
Could you provide more detailed information about Electro Romantica?
Electro Romantica is our long-awaited third album.
The first album was released in 2016, the second in 2020 — and only now, after many years, the third one has finally come into being.
This record actually began its life back in the days when our debut album Minuty Sochteny was first released. Since that time its sound and atmosphere were slowly taking shape. In Electro Romantica, the darkest and most fragile ideas from our first two albums are gathered, reimagined and developed further.
The lyrics are filled with the sorrow of war, human suffering, and the uncertainty that has become part of our everyday lives. Despite this heaviness, the album remains very diverse: each composition follows its own path, yet together they form a single emotional fabric — dark, delicate and piercing.
For the first time in Metameria’s history, all the lyrics are written in Ukrainian — as the inner voice of our time and as an honest testimony of this era.
This is also the first album that Ihor recorded almost entirely on his own, investing not only sound into it, but also years of personal experience.
Electro Romantica is the result of several years of work across different countries:
the material was accumulated in Ukraine and recorded in an Odesa studio during 2023–2024;
it was mixed and mastered in Spain, in the city of A Coruña, in 2025;
and finally completed in the United Kingdom, in Eastbourne, the city where this story ultimately found its voice.
Metameria has signed with no label. Could you tell us more about that?
When we started, we were young students and simply had no money for publishing or signing with a label.
Today the situation is also complicated. Labels are less willing to take on full financial responsibility, while many musicians — especially in Ukraine, where a lot of people live below the poverty line — simply cannot afford such investments.
At the moment we are interested in eventually releasing the new album on CD, but initially it will be released digitally, just like our previous albums.
What is the difference between Electro Romantica and the band's very first album Minuty Sochteny?
If we compare the upcoming third album with the first one, there are several differences.
The first album is still the longest in duration. The new album sits somewhere in between the very long first album and the much shorter second one.
Another difference is in the sound. On the first album the synthesizers often sounded quite uniform, while the new album contains a much richer variety of synthesizer textures.
Also, unlike the previous albums that were recorded with a full band, this new album was almost entirely recorded by Ihor himself. However, the result turned out not worse — in fact even better — because Ihor recorded the bass and guitars himself and brought the keyboards to life in his own way.
The mixing, mastering and drum production were handled by Artem Matyovka, the same person who worked on the previous two albums.
The new album is deeply filled with the author’s emotional suffering and moral weight — something that was not present to such an extent on the first album.
What inspires Metameria’s music and lyric writing? What do the lyrics talk about?
For me, writing music and lyrics is something like a necessity — even a form of therapy.
In my lyrics there are all my feelings: love, sadness, inner struggles, and stories from life.
How often does the band practice and work on new material?
Before February 2022, our pre-war lineup usually rehearsed twice a week. We also performed live roughly once a month, sometimes more often depending on opportunities.
As for writing new material, I compose everything myself. Everyone who has played in Metameria mainly learned and performed my material, sometimes adding their own instrumental ideas.
Since I migrated to the United Kingdom and now live in Eastbourne, Metameria can currently be considered more of a studio project.
However, I hope that when the war in Ukraine ends, we will be able to revive the band’s live activity again, possibly with my last lineup — bassist Konstantin and drummer Margo. We will see what the future brings. Everything takes its time.
How did the band come up with the name Metameria? What does it mean to you?
The name came to me when I was a young student studying color theory at college. I came across the word - metamerism, which describes the phenomenon of how light interacts with color.
I liked the sound and meaning of the word and decided to use it as the band’s name.
However, we did not start completely from zero in 2015. Before that we had already existed for almost five years as a band called Silhouettes, with several releases. Later, after discovering the word “Metameria” and deciding to change our musical direction and sound, the last lineup of Silhouettes transformed into Metameria.
What are the band’s plans for the near future?
My plans for the near future are:
1. To create another music video.
2. To release the new album on CD, if possible.
3. To continue writing music and promoting Metameria.
4. Eventually to revive the band’s live performances.
Do you have a message for Iron Backstage readers?
Dear friends, always be yourselves no matter what.
Listen only to the music you truly love and do only what your heart tells you.
😜🤘
https://www.facebook.com/metamera.official
