Italian band Reel will hook you in with a compelling, heavily story-led hard rock meets heavy metal sound that they describe as “cinematic, immersive and intense.”
The Varese band started out in 2021 as a project of vocalist and bassist Axel Reel, aiming to blend music and storytelling while exploring new sounds and discovering his artistic identity. The next year, guitarist Matthew Reel came on board to work on the band’s first record, In Each Of Us, before being joined by bassist Christian Federico, drummer Nicolas Piero and, most recently, Beatrice Rampanelli coming in on vocals and guitars last February. The band is midway through a musical and literary trilogy, with the debut EP soon to be followed by Beyond What You Can See and The Last Horizon.
On the sound they’ve crafted, Axel told us: “We’re a heavy band with cinematic atmospheres, built over the years through songs, concepts, and a vision that expands into our videos and into the book connected to our upcoming albums. We came together from a simple need: giving shape to the images, emotions, and stories that music was showing us. Every track is a piece of something bigger – a language where music, visuals, and narrative intertwine.
“Our sound comes from a very instinctive approach: everything starts from the sound itself. A riff, a chord, or a melody immediately brings an image to mind, and that image guides the entire construction of the track. From there, the musical language follows. An emotion might pull us toward darker, doom-like atmospheres, or something more direct, psychedelic, or open.
“The genre shifts depending on the story we want to tell, but the identity always stays the same. It’s almost like a soundtrack in reverse: first the atmosphere, then the scene, and only then the lyrics. That’s why our songs don’t always follow the same structure. Some dive straight in, others need wider spaces, others shift perspective or intensity. The heavy aspect coexists with the cinematic one, because for us music is a place—a space where that initial emotion can breathe. Every track has its own identity, its own world, its own image. More than a genre, it’s a way of composing: letting the sound lead until it can truly express what we meant to say.”
Our latest taste of this is Stolen Dreams, which was released at the end of last month. It starts out with a menacing little guitar riff that develops over light rolling drums into a stabbing riff and a laid-back lick. That feeds into a dramatic opening verse led by Axel’s engaging vocals, which increases in intensity before dropping into a funky little guitar lick. Another powerful chorus follows and gives way to lively guitars and drums, before a cool little flurry of guitar riffs and a big piercing guitar solo. That gives way to a stabbing guitar riff under spoken vocals, bringing the track to a dramatic ending.
Speaking ahead of the release, Axel said: “We’re very excited about the release of Stolen Dreams, because it marks an important step in our journey. The song grows like a wave: it starts restrained, opens up, changes shape, and then explodes into an intense finale. It doesn’t follow a traditional structure—it’s a journey. At its core lies the theme of freedom: the feeling of having your identity taken away, and the need to reclaim it by diving within yourself to recover what you thought was lost.
“The music video mirrors this inner path through three symbolic trials, each with its own colour and atmosphere. Music and images evolve together, step by step, from darkness to awareness. Listeners should expect an experience rather than just a single – a world to step into, a journey through the story and through themselves, a glimpse into our artistic path.” Check it out in the superb video, which includes a sorcerer, three trials, and a final rebirth on a lake, below:
That’s the first release since the debut EP In Each Of Us, which includes the building opening track The Call to Ammit, which you can check out in the video below, the more laid back Even Flow and the epic 10-minute track Mr. Hyde.
And on the ongoing trilogy, Axel explains: “Our trilogy was born from the desire to build a single narrative universe that unfolds through three works. In Each of Us is the starting point: an album made of symbols, emotions, and fragments of the human experience. It doesn’t tell a linear story, but it contains the roots of the themes that later appear in a more concrete form—identity, inner conflict, the search for self. Beyond What You Can See is the narrative core. Each track corresponds to a chapter of the novel with the same name, and music and story progress together.
Each track corresponds to a chapter of the novel with the same name, and music and story progress together. Here, the symbols of the first album become an actual plot. The Last Horizon continues that story, expanding the evolution of the characters and the consequences of the world introduced in Beyond, blending narrative with the introspective and symbolic aspects of the journey. The trilogy is meant to be experienced on different levels: you can listen to each track on its own, or dive into the full journey and discover a coherent universe where music and story mirror and complete each other. Our goal is to take music beyond sound and turn it into an experience that leads listeners toward the hidden parts of themselves.”
The Reel sound has been influenced by Queen and Freddie Mercury’s compositional vision to the likes of Black Sabbath, the narrative approach of Ritchie Blackmore and his bands Pink Floyd and Rainbow.
And on what inspires them to write music, Axel explains: “Our influences always come from what we’re living. The sound is the initial spark, but it’s never random: it immediately finds its place in the narrative world we’re building, and every time it opens a new door into that world.
“We never start from a fixed theme. We let what we feel guide us, and along the way themes like identity, change, freedom, memory, and fragility naturally emerge. They’re part of our lives and of our narrative universe, and each song shows a different side of them. Songwriting, for us, is the meeting point between two things: the spontaneity of an emotion born from sound, and the vision of a larger world that gives that emotion direction. Every track becomes a piece of the story, but also a piece of us.”
2026 looks like being a busy year for Reel, who have releases scheduled throughout the year, with the video for Worms being released shortly and followed by Mad Hatter. The band is already working on the pre-production for the second album, Beyond What You Can See, with plans to go into the studio this year. Axel is also completing the editing of the Beyond What You Can See novel, which will be released alongside the album to complete the narrative arc of the trilogy.
And Axel added: “Every song we write is meant to be a bridge – between what we feel and what someone on the other side might feel. Music, for us, is exactly that: a way of expressing things we often can’t fully put into words. If even one person feels understood, touched, or awakened by what we do, then our music has achieved its purpose. The rest is a journey we’ll build together with anyone who wants to be part of it.”
You can follow Reel on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, and check out their music on Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube.
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