Ivan Sekyra Dead: Drakar Vocalist Dies at 59 After Long Illness

Ivan Sekyra, the vocalist, guitarist and founding member of underground Czech metal band Drakar, died on Saturday (June 30). He had been battling a long, but undisclosed illness. Sekyra was 59-years-old at the time of his passing.

Drakar were a bit of a cult act but they returned to the metal consciousness somewhat last year with a double-disc reissue, which was released via I Hate Records. The set was titled Let Draka/Flight of the Dragon. The first disc is the Czech version; the second is the English version.

Website Teeth of the Divine conducted an interview with Sekyra back in 2011. If you're not familiar with the band, this interview certainly sheds plenty of light on the cult of Drakar.

Sekyra spoke about his musical philosophy, saying, "The music of Drakar is deliberately riddled with practices that are banned in classical music. There is important work with rhythms. None of the drummers wanted to play like that because they used to play different from it."

He also admitted to taking up the vocalist role because "we could not find right singer, so I started to sing of necessity alone. A few people told me that I have an interesting timbre of voice, and so I tried to take advantage of it. The vocal should sound like when Big Brother speaks to you, a hundred times intensified."

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