VILLAGERS OF IOANNINA CITY

Villagers of Ioannina City are a Greek heavy-rock band formed in Ioannina in 2007. Emerging from a group of musicians who had played together from a young age, they initially worked within conventional rock and metal structures before discovering the musical language that would define them: the fusion of heavy psychedelic rock with the traditional music of Epirus. The band’s sound draws on the pentatonic melodies, circular rhythms and communal character of Epirote folk music, incorporating instruments such as clarinet, kaval, bagpipe and other winds into arrangements built from distorted guitars, bass, drums and extended progressive structures. These elements are not treated as decorative samples placed over rock songs. Traditional melodies, drones and rhythmic patterns frequently provide the foundations from which the heavier arrangements develop. An early self-released recording, Promo 2010, introduced this direction, but the breakthrough came with Riza in 2014. Predominantly sung in Greek, the album connected psychedelic and stoner rock with traditional material and imagery rooted in the landscapes and culture of Epirus. Songs such as “Zvara,” “Krasi,” “Ti Kako” and “Karakolia” became central to the band’s identity, while the companion Zvara / Karakolia EP, also released in 2014, reinforced their dialogue between regional folk music and amplified rock. Villagers of Ioannina City made a substantial creative shift with Age of Aquarius in 2019. Sung in English and organised as a broad progressive journey, the album moved toward cosmic psychedelia, long-form composition, post-rock dynamics and heavier guitar writing. Rather than repeating the formula of Riza, the band used Age of Aquarius to demonstrate that its identity could survive beyond direct adaptations of traditional songs. The record brought them significantly wider international attention and was subsequently supported by extensive European touring and their relationship with Napalm Records. Their live album Through Space and Time (Alive in Athens 2020), released in 2021, documented the scale and intensity the group had reached in concert. It also showed how naturally the quieter folk passages, extended instrumental builds and massive riff-driven sections of their studio work could coexist onstage. The group has long been anchored by vocalist and guitarist Alex Karametis, bassist Akis Zois and drummer Aris Giannopoulos, working across different periods with wind players who bring clarinet, kaval, bagpipe, zourna and related instruments into the music. Karametis has also taken an increasingly central role in production, recording the band’s forthcoming material at Magnanimous-X Studio in Thessaloniki. As of 31 August 2026, the band’s third studio album, Venceremos, has been announced but has not yet been released. It is scheduled for 18 September 2026 through Napalm Records. The already released singles “Ghosts in the Sky” and “Venceremos” indicate a heavier and more direct development, combining progressive metal, ritualistic psychedelia and traditional instrumentation with a concept centred on alienation, resistance, fear and freedom. The album was produced and recorded by Alex Karametis and mixed and mastered by Jacob Hansen. Villagers of Ioannina City have become one of the defining Greek heavy-rock bands of their generation because they did more than place folk instruments inside stoner rock. They built a coherent musical vocabulary in which the atmosphere, melodic traditions and cultural memory of Epirus could operate inside contemporary heavy music without being reduced to novelty or folklore cosplay. Their progression from Riza to Age of Aquarius and now Venceremos shows a band willing to protect that identity while repeatedly rebuilding the form around it.