Review Fix Exclusive: Q & A With Varna Lead Singer Tiana Woods

Review Fix chats with Varna lead singer, Tiana Woods, who discusses her influences and the band’s new EP, “This Time, It’s Personal.” With a voice that’s been compared to Kelly Clarkson and Amy Lee, Varna is in a unique position to get more radio play than the average up and coming rock group.

Review Fix: How did the band come together?

Tianna Woods: The band originally came together as Living Eulogy in Jan. 2010. Ross (Pinkas)is an electrician by day and we met while he was installing a fan in my apartment. He heard me singing on my piano and asked if I was in a band. Rob (Shin) came into the group after he answered an ad at Musician’s Institute in Hollywood, where I graduated from in 2004.

Review Fix: Who are your vocal influences?

Woods: I grew up singing pop and blues so my influences are Mariah Carey, Susan Tedeschi and any other female singer who has a great range coupled with pure emotion.

Review Fix: How is ‘This Time, It’s Personal” different from the plethora of other female-fronted rock bands out there?

Woods: We are a three-piece band and we can blend into both the pop and rock markets, which we haven’t witnessed a lot of female fronted bands do. We have always had the goal to bring our music to the masses to blend that commercial vocal with hard rock guitars.

Review Fix: How do you want this EP to resonate with the listener?

Woods: This EP is about personal issues in life not working out for you, fighting to make things better for yourself and the comfort in knowing that other people feel the way you do.

Review Fix: The musicianship on the EP is rock solid. The bass lines are smoothly hidden with the drum work and the guitars hum and hiss at all the right times. How do you guys put your songs together.

Woods: Thank you so much. I write the lyrics and Ross writes the music. We come together with what we have and work on it until it is finished or we end up messing around in our rehearsal studio figuring out music and lyrics on the spot.

Review Fix: “Down” is a catchy track that shows off the band, especially your vocal prowess. How was it written?

Woods: Lyrically, ‘Down’ was written during a time when I was homeless for a couple of months, this band was going through band member changes and not getting anywhere and I was dealing with different issues of love-people who you thought loved you and then come to find out was a different case. The music was written while we were jamming during practice.

Review Fix: What’s your favorite song on the EP and why?

Woods: My favorite song on the EP is ‘My Heart’ because I really fought for it. I believed in the song when no one else did. It is one of the most personal songs I have written.

You can listen to “Down” below:

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14262 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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