~ The German Hard RocK and Heavy Metal Guide ~
History forged in Steel 1978-1993
Yeah I hear what you're saying - Even attempting such a vast project as a "complete" German HR/HM Encyclopedia seem about as futile as ...making a US one? Bah! Long-time Metal collector and Corroseum forum member Prowler spits in the face of Impossible and hereby delivers unto the Metal world the first encyclopedia of the Largest-Yet-Least-Collected Metal-country in the world!
The main idea for this database was born a couple of years ago, when I had found out that in most of the cases, the style descriptions of many German underground bands was completely wrong or there wasn't any info available at all, because the items/bands were too obscure, or that noone had ever heard about them before. The first impulse was to print a book, but that idea was quickly abandoned as while adding known bands to this database, even more, completely unknown releases of even more obscure acts were found.
We also wanted to focus on any kind of heavy music/band that had ever been around from 1978-1993, so that's why we stopped adding releases to the discographys that was released after 1993 in case you might wonder. This database tries to cover every kind of Heavy Kraut Rock/AOR/Melodic Rock/Hard Rock/Crossover and Metal bands of all genres, that were active during that mentioned time range, no matter if these bands ever recorded anything. We are also aware that the list isn't nearly complete, meaning we are open for any kind of suggestions, corrections and help by adding more obscure bands. Especially the local acts are of huge interest, so we might have a short survey of that city/area's underground scene. We know that especially in the Kraut Rock scene there are tons of bands/albums that would most probably meet our requirements, but unfortunately most of these albums are so insanely expensive and rare, that it's impossible to buy all of them just to check out if they might include any possible Hard Rock riffs. We are open for your suggestions, don't worry, your name will be mentioned in the article. To get the site started, we first added the bands with vinyl/CD appearances, while the Demo bands will be added piece by piece in the future as well.
Last but surely not least, a BIG THANK YOU to Dan Edman who made all this possible, by granting me space and technical help. Without his heads up I'd most probably still be dreaming of something like this project.
Browse bands by letter:
2nd Hand Band
Lineup:
Andreas Bärtels (vocals, guitar)
Axel Breitung (vocals, guitar)
Jürgen Behrens (drums)
Manfred Hammerschmidt (bass, vocals)
Band-info:
Their sole Single was recorded in January 1981 in Northeim (near Göttingen) so I guess they came from somewhere in that area. The lads played solid Kraut/Hard Rock with strong 70's touch and I guess AC/DC was their major influence. Especially the guitar solos sound much alike Angus'. The songs either are as minimalist as AC/DC's tunes and got a powerful sound so the 70's Hard Rock faction should risk an ear here.Discography:
"Second Hand Band/Lonesome little Lover" 7" 1981 (selfreleased)
48 Crash
Lineup:
Klaus Reinelt (guitar)
Thomas Imbacher (drums)
Thomas Sabisch (bass)
Berti Majdan (vocals)
Jürgen Metko (guitar)
Band-info:
Basically 48 Crash is just the mid 80's Metal legend Gravestone under a new name. After dedicing to leave Gama Records 1988 due to financial inconsistencies, Gravestone, although having received offers by different labels, decided to handle the promotion and production of the further albums by themselves and founded their own label Fortune Records. In combination with that, 1990 the band name got changed to 48 Crash. I guess the stupid artwork and band name wasn't much helpful to sell a hell of records and either the change of musical direction that fans was known from from their last album "Creating a monster" wasn't. "Some like it hot" is dominated by a kinda R'n'R driven Hard Rock/Metal mix while only songs like "Madelaine" remind us of their old exploits and can be considered true Heavy Metal. The album is something that nobody seriously really needs at all, despite the musical skills of the single musicians in the band. I guess the lads came to the same conclusion and quit in 1992.Discography:
"Some like it hot" LP/CD 1990 (Fortune)
Ab$ent
Lineup:
Matthias Kral (vocals)
Oliver Kral (guitar)
Hugo Eiler (guitar)
Helmut Nigst (bass)
Bernd Schele (drums)
Band-info:
Another one of these local unknowns hailing from anywhere and nowhere, who produced any unkown single during the early 80’s and disappeared into nowhere again afterwards. They rather might not look like Hardrockers at all, but that's what their 2 numbers "Breakdown" and "Shadow of the devil” indeed are, reflecting the growing german Hardrock sound of the early 80’s with good heavy riffing on the title track. "Shadow of the devil" walks a slower path though, still the only point that opens a discussion here are the weak vocals of Matthias Kral. No clue where to and when they disappeared…Discography:
“Breakdown" 7" EP 198? (MAT)
Abgator
Lineup:
Jens Burow (vocals)
Carsten Jahns (guitar)
Frank Schwaneberg (bass)
Stefan Schäfer (drums)
Helge Justin (guitar)
Band-info:
Abgator hailed from Lübeck in northern Germany and only managed to release a single Demo tape in 1991 entitled "House of cards". For their type of melodic Thrash Metal the times have been quite miserable, maybe that's why they didn't carry on releasing music, while they still exits up till today, but being a (Metal) Cover band nowadays. On the Demo there are plenty of good approaches of playing slightly technical Thrash and the musicians skills truly was solid. The main band their material strongly reminds me of is Atrophy, with partly a few later Toranaga hints either. But most likely Atrophy's "Violent by nature" should show you the right direction. You can't do much wrong with this tape if you like Thrash.Visit the Abgator home page.
Discography:
”House of cards” Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
Absurter Cryst
Lineup:
Michael Teutenberg (guitar)
Alex Schulze (vocals)
Jörg (drums)
Andreas (bass)
Band-info:
A grinding Death Metal band from Reinheim founded in 1989 and featuring future members of later well known bands such as Naked Whipper, Blood and Nyctophobic. Michael Teutenberg was also playing guitars right at the same time he was active with Absurter Cryst for the Death Metal bands Malaphar and Abyz.Absurter Cryst's style was similar to Blood's ("Christbait" era) in the early 90's, grinding passages getting paired with doomy ones. On certain tracks of the Demo Morgoth/Death might have been an influence and single attempts to ape Celtic Frost show up either. In 1991 they also recorded songs for an EP (probably a 7") that should be named "Blasphemic forgiverence" but it remained unreleased. The 2 songs plus Intro continued the same style of the Demo but the sound was just more professional and it's a shame that 7" was never released. Andreas got replaced by Isa on bass and the band split up in 1993.
Alex Schulze alias Dominus A.S. sung on Blood's famous "Christbait" album and formed Naked Whipper afterwards.
Discography:
"Six feet under" Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
"Blasphemic forgiverence" EP 1991 (unreleased)
Access
Lineup:
Thorsten Tritschler (vocals)
Jürgen Grötzinger (guitar)
Klaus Weisser (guitar)
Chris Albrecht (bass)
Otto Schneider (drums)
Band-info:
An obscure band from Emmingen on the border to Switzerland that released an even more obscure 7" with 2 tracks. "The Turner" is an (slow) attempt to sound epic and up to a certain grade they even managed it. "Eagles in the Air" on the flipside is more of a classic (quick) Metal track and both songs do smell somewhat of the NWOBHM that I personally would throw in Triarchy here. It's just a middle class single all in all. I have no clue what happened to them. They was mentioned in old Mags to have played gigs still in 1985 but then the red line cuts off so I guess they broke sometime in the mid 80's.
Acer Fury
Lineup:
Arne Böhler (vocals)
Uwe Böhler (guitar)
Chris Kinzel (guitar)
Ö-li (bass)
Gerhard Guggomos (drums)
Band-info:
Five Metalheads from Füssen/Kempten (Bavaria) who are mainly known for their "Crazy king" 7", that was produced privately in April '89. Acer Fury was founded by brothers Arne and Uwe Böhler during the mid 80's and the band recorded at least 5 Demos till 1992, as far as I'm confirmed. The "Crazy king" single is the release that can be found a bit easier and features good, typically late 80's german sounding melodic Power Metal. Previously a 2 song Demo appeared around 1988. After the single the band recorded another Demo 1991 that was also featured on their "Promotape '92" including the 3 new songs "Acer Fury", "Unicorns die lonely" and "Storm in my mind", which are all of the same style like the both trax of the single. With "Spider shaped letterbox thoughts" Acer Fury tried to enter new terrain and went into a more modern direction with either Alternative Rock/Funk influences. They band most probably split up during the mid 90's. A CD compilation with the title "Crazy king" was published on Battle Cry Records in 2016, featuring their single and Demo recordings done between 1989-92. If you got more info concearning the missing Demos, please get in touch.Discography:
"Acer Fury" Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
"Crazy king" 7" EP 1989 (selfreleased)
"Promotape '92" (selfreleased)
"Spider shaped letterbox thoughts" Demo 1993 (selfreleased)
Acid
Lineup:
Michael Sommerhoff (guitar, vocals)
Andreas Duwe (guitar)
Andreas Schulz (bass)
Thomas Gojrzenski (drums)
Band-info:
Acid was an old band from Dortmund, whose roots are originating back to 1979 already. Their first release was a private Hard Rock inspired single, recorded in July '83, featuring the cheesy ballad "Livin' in a dream" and the better, NWOBHM influenced rocker "Drifter". During the mid 80's Acid entered the stage again with a 3 song Demo, that also contained "Drifter" again, before they, after several years of silence, recorded the album "Acidify" during September '88, which in the end was released under the title of "Don't lose your dreams" the year after. The band was now a trio, consisting of mastermind Sommerhoff (vocals, guitar), Andreas Schulz still on bass and Carsten Bald behind the drums. Also soundwise they added a proper pound of power and occasionally played a very speed driven melodic type of Power Metal, not much unlike Helloween and bands of that caliber. The only disturbing issue are those few commercial Heavyrockers that simply won't fit to the album at all. Otherwise "Don't lose your dreams" was a very sold affair. Not sure, when Acid split up, but for sure during the very early 90's.Discography:
"Livin' in a dream" 7" EP 1983 (selfreleased)
"Acid" Demo 1985 (selfreleased)
"Don't lose your dreams" LP 1989 (Megavolt)
Acid (Wipperfürth)
Lineup:
F. Korvas (guitar)
F. Witte (bass)
A. Weidmann (drums)
Band-info:
Here's another band that applied for the name Acid, even though there had been a band of the same name in the Dortmund area since 1979. These reproductive fanatics came from almost exactly the same region, just a little further south from Wipperfürth, near Wuppertal, and according to their early 80's Hard Rock sound you would think that they were up to mischief in the region at about the same time, which we suspect may have led to a misunderstanding or two. To top it all off, the Wippelfürther Acid also released a 2 song single, which definitely dates from the very early 1980's and most probably must have been released before the Dortmund Acid single, as both songs were still very much oriented towards the heavier Kraut Rock. Lyrically and visually the band was more interested in the horizontal genre, as both songs could be probably intended to be classified as “Love Rock”? The 7“ entitled ‘1’ is even harder to find than the Dortmund band's already very rare single.Discography:
“1” 7” EP 198? (selfreleased)
Acid Rain Dance
Lineup:
Fred (vocals)
Zulu (guitar)
Stephan (guitar)
Carsten Bucher (bass)
Quaddel (drums)
Band-info:
Not sure if the term alternative Death/Thrash already was created? In case the answer is no, I might claim my privilege to be the first one who used it. Nevertheless ACID RAIN DANCE from Bremen was active since around 1990 most probably, featuring former LEBERWOHLSTAND/LWS bass player Carsten "Jacke" Bucher and recorded a first 7" in 1991, that contained a quite idiosyncratic structured Crossover/Thrash. Though vocally the band could be easily thrown into the Death/Thrash corner, but their rather unstraight sort of playing reminds more of a Hardcore band. But with "Melting resistance", recorded in October '92, ACID RAIN DANCE pretty much got the curve and delivered a cool, absolutely raw sounding Death/Thrash mini album that fans of that style will truly have their pleasure with. Both, the single and EP are available in different vinyl colors.Discography:
"Acid Rain Dance" 7" EP 1991 (Skuld Releases)
"Melting resistance" MLP 1993 (Skuld Releases)
Advice
Lineup:
Ralf Nyenhuis (vocals)
Detlef Ziegler (guitar)
Walter König (guitar)
Rainer Such (bass)
Peter Frank (drums)
Band-info:
This band from the Lüneburg area was active since 1982 and performed a very NWOBHM inspired Heavy Metal. I'm not entirely sure if that "Demoband" entitled Demo indeed was the band's first lifesign (as mentioned everywhere on the net), because two of the tracks later appeared on the "Break Out" sampler, which would speak more for the fact that this tape was recorded at a later stage during 1986. Either stylistically both songs don't fit to their early NWOBHM attitude at all. On "Heavy Metal leather wariours" (1984) the band was still celebrating their old british style influenced Metal, soundwise comparable to Arrow or Angel War, but already on "Children of the dark" and "No way out" featured on "German Metal Tracks No. 2" compilation (1986) Advice's sound had changed into a bit more typically german sounding Heavy Metal with speed edge. Either for spring '85 an album production got announced, that yet retrospectively viewed we know wasn't realized. The guys didn't had problems to score compilation appearances it seems, but a record deal wasn't in sight at all. With their 1989 Demo "Destiny by dawn", they could save themselves a place on the underground sampler "Take This Song - Heart & Heavy Vol. 1" with the Demo tracks "Nuclear force" and "Heavy Metal", that once again presented Advice stronger than before, playing a contemporary heavy Power Metal, with George Hodur on the second guitar who had replaced the migrated Detlef Zegler. Also Ralf Nyenhuis had previously quit his job and D.D. Hink joined on the vocal position. After another Demo 1991, Advice tried a last comeback 1992 with the excellent "Persuer" 7" EP (with sticker incl.), introducing new drummer Kai-Uwe Richter, but though the guys hadn't moved away a single meter from their neat 80's style Power Metal, the story of Advice ended soon afterwards.Discography:
"Heavy Metal leather wariours" Demo 1984 (selfreleased)
"Demoband" Demo 1986 (selfreleased)
"Break Out - German Metal Tracks No 2" Comp.-LP Tracks 1986 (D&S)
"Destiny by dawn" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"Take This Song - Heart & Heavy Vol. 1" Comp.-CD Tracks 1989 (EMS Eastwood)
"The exposed" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"Persuer" 7" EP 1992 (Tom Tom)
Affair
Lineup:
Guillermo Marchena (vocals)
Bobby Altvater (guitar)
Tom Leonhardt (guitar)
Wenz Weninger (bass)
Andreas Lindt (drums)
Band-info:
A melodic Hard Rock/AOR act that was formed in Munich in 1986, featuring one of the owners of the Sky Studio, Bobby Altvater (ex-Bad Eden). We guess Affair in their later stage was more or less a sort of band project to score a major deal or something. The line up often changed and the band worked with different musicians and singers in shortest time throughout the late 80’s. Musically the typical Munich sound prevails on all of the recordings, US american style AOR influenced catchy Glam Metal/Hard Rock like Boysvoice, Bonfire etc. was their thing, whenalso they never got signed by any label in the high season of the glammy days. The band was founded in September ’86 by Bobby Altvater, Tom Leonhardt, Wenz Weninger and Guillermo Marchena, who went on stage after drummer Andy Lindt had joined, first time ever in August ’87. Lindt nevertheless quit the Affair after just within late 1987 to start a pop career. Demos was produced in September 1988 when keyboarder Jogi found native american female singer Bonnie L. Clarida, who was invited to come to Germany, doing vocals for the songs "Back in love" and "Do it your way". In May/June 1989 Bobby met swiss keyboarder Alan Guy who joined in and Affair produced new Demo material in December 1989, sung by the female ex-4 Sale singer Claudia Haas in 1990. In December that year the female rock singer Joal called Bobby, searching for songs for her second album, so Bobby Altvater wrote the 3 songs "Changes", "Wish you were here" and "Face to face" as Demo material for Joal’s label, that she completed with vocals during February ’91. Ralf Kugler was recruited for the drum parts, but it turned out that the major label wasn’t much fond of the songs, so they could be used later for Affair’s selfproduced debut CD “Face to face”, though with different vocalist Peter De Wint (ex-Ostrogoth/Crossfire/Mystery), that Bobby picked up in 1995. They produced one more Demo for japanese label Avex Inc. and “Face to face” was available in Japan in October ’97. The european edition was manufactured on their own label Sky Productions. The second Affair CD “No substitute” appeared in October 02, not turning away a single meter from their original 80’s style.(Thanx to Rumblefist for additional info)
Discography:
Agent Orange (Bayreuth)
Lineup:
Steve Fischer (vocals)
Thomas Hübner (guitar, synthesizer)
Wolfgang Köppel (guitar)
Jack Wich (bass)
Michael Waters (drums)
Band-info:
These Agent Orange from Bayreuth (not to be confused with the later band from Bisingen) definitely had the right Metal spirit and their only single belongs musically to the top releases of the whole 80's decade of the german Metal scene back in the day. Released on the local Bayreuth label SW Records the 2 songs offer feet seasawing true Heavy Metal with "Coming down just for you" beeing the heavier number of both picking up a similar style like Dark Avenger (godz!) or the finish Black Angel years later. The slower "Fighting with the saw" is trying to create a rather epic feeling and a few NWOBHM twin leads show clearly where the bands took their influences from. To me it's quite a mystery where all the Gama, Metal Enterprises etc. labels have been to not offer this promising band any album deal? I think we definitely missed a few more killer songs because of them...
Agnetha
Lineup:
Band-info:
Hamburg locals, that used to be a big number there during the turn of the year in the early 80's. There's just a single vinyl album left of their creative career, but that one pretty much nailed it. Agnetha's sound featured a late 70's proggy Hard Rock with organs in the Deep Purple vein, who most probably inspired the guys in the band the most. In terms of heaviness they might not have been ahead of their time at all, but their songs guarantee a really diverting pleasure, so that "Listen to the future" even nowadays still belongs to the most exciting old german Hard Rock albums of the 70's and 80's decades.
Aibon
Lineup:
Ralf Henzler
Band-info:
One more obscure find of the ex-GDR’s exploding Metal scene right after the communist system suffocated on it’s own inhuman vomit in 1989 and all kinds of new possibilities opened to countless young musicians living on the eastern side of the wall. Unfortunately the info we yet could track down of these Thrashers from Taucha/Leipzig as usual is almost zero. They also belong to that chosen bunch, that formed during 1989/90 and then vanished into nothingness quickly afterwards, leaving no single trace at all. During 1991 the trio, that actually was searching for a drummer, had recorded a Demo tape with a drumcomputer, but either vocals couldn’t be finished at that time since a vocalist in the James Hetfield vein was on their wishlist as well. So you could probably imagine which direction the lads prefered. If that recording was ever finished and what still happened with the guys after 1991 remains so far completely unanswered.Discography:
Air-Raid
Lineup:
Horst Lay (ocals)
Frank Schäfer (guitar)
Jürgen Heckers (guitar)
Ilonka Rayer (bass)
Martina Lay (keyboard)
Hartwig Roge Rayer (drums)
Band-info:
Air-Raid was a local Metal act from Duisburg, that consisted of Horst Lay (vocals), his wife Martina Lay (keyboard), Frank Schäfer (guitar), Jürgen Heckers (guitar), Hartwig Roge Rayer (drums) and Ilonka Rayer (bass) - his wife and all these 6 founded the band in early 1988 in Rheinhausen, a quarter of the city of Duisburg. Each one of them was found in different bands before, collecting the needed experience to develop their musicial career. I don't have a clue which bands the rest was in, but guitarist and main songwriter Frank Schäfer was founding member of Branded, a Hard Rock/Metal quartett based in Rumeln. Together with Reinhold Holzer (bass), Michael Holzer (guitar) and drummer Frank Gürtunca, Branded was founded in early 1986 and also had a few live appearances in the Duisburg area but was constantly looking for the right vocalist. A Demo was in the planning phase but never happened. While Branded failed, Frank Schäfer didn't feel to resign and that was the hour of birth for Air-Raid. Besides a very few live gigs, the band planned to record a 7" at the Sundown Studio in Duisburg containing 2 trax of their huge repertoire, whose only cover version was a Judas Piest tune btw, and pressed 1000 copies on their own label Sundown Records which were rarely spread by the band at the even rarer gigs. Also plans to record a full album were dreamt, but without financial help of a record company these dreams couldn't be realized, especially since most of the EP's wasn't sold at all. In 1993 Jürgen Heckers left the band and Frank Schäfer just took over the rhythm guitar parts because his band mates weren't that satisfied with his solo guitar skills. Instead they added another guitarist and this line up lasted till 1996 when Frank quit the band, who didn't make it much longer too. Both of the single trax, "Nightmare" and "Metallic wings", deliver a pounding sort of standard Heavy Metal with several keyboard appearance in a very traditional german style.
Amazone
Lineup:
Wiltrut Richter (vocals)
Manni Holländer (guitar)
Jörg Schmitz (guitar)
Manni Leuchter (keyboard)
Ralf Sunderdick (drums)
Band-info:
According to the label info Amazone (or Wiltrut "Willie" Richter as her real name is) is a real multitalent, by being composer, performer and actor all in one person. She founded the band in June '85 and debuted with two Pop/Dance singles first before the album "Rough, tough" went into a completely different direction and featured quite good AOR/Melodic Rock with Hard Rock edge in the Bon Jovi vein. Her voice either sounds very pleasant, so for fans of that category Amazone's album is surely worth a try. For the album she had hired Hard Rock musicians and Amazone's headquarter was based in West Berlin. The band is also known to have performed on the Rockfabrik Newcomer Festival 1989 and a local Berlin festival during 1990, so Amazone most probably split up a bit later during the early 90's. A Demo from 1989 exists as well and info was found that Amazone was preparing for the recordings of their second album during early 1990. Further info is welcome.Discography:
"Gino Gino" 7"/12" EP 1986 (Chic)
"Distance lover" 7" EP 1986 (Teldec)
"Rough, tough" LP/CD 1987 (Rekord)
"Sound of my heartbeat" 7"/12" EP 1987 (Rekord)
Antitoxin
Lineup:
Christoph (vocals)
Bert (guitar)
Gerald (bass)
Burkhard (drums)
Band-info:
Antitoxin (or Anti Toxin) was a Hardcore/Crossover act from Versmold in the Bielefeld area, who released a few vinyls during 1988 but then disappeared again. The band was founded in the mid 80's and recorded their first Demo 1986. TPC Records produced a 7" and an album of the guys that both featured thrashy Hardcore in the vein of US bands like Agnostic Front, partly Loss For Words (on the single) or the Crumbsuckers. Both vinyls are available in different colors.Discography:
"Antitoxin" Demo 1986
"The enemy is you" 7" EP 1988 (TPC)
"The tower" LP 1988 (TPC)
Apart
Lineup:
Ralf Zapke (vocals)
Andreas Schäfer (keyboard)
Markus Niklas (drums)
Burghard Zoch ( bass)
Peter Horn (guitar)
Band-info:
A melodic quite poppy sounding AOR act from Duisburg with a hardness grade of maybe Survivor in the mid 80's. The A-side features a completely forgettable attempt of a ballad and has nothing to do with heavy music at all. The B-side track "Feeling weak feeling strong" makes this 7" interesting, though the poppy feeling is still there, but I've heard worse AOR for sure. No release year mentioned but their single should be from the late 80's or even 1990.Discography:
"Be with you" 7"EP 198x (BMP)
April
Lineup:
Lars-Oliver Degener
Jim Knopf
Jörg Schwarz
Peter Gorges
Andreas Burghardt
Band-info:
An AOR/Melodic Rock band from Bochum, who previously was firming as April April and had published 3 more singles since 1984, while the first one of the bunch, "Thor macht bumm", featured only Pop/Rock. The band later during 1987 went into classic AOR sounds with poppy character, that due to the german sung songs for german guys appears almost Schlager related, if they wouldn't have had those heavy Rock guitars. The band name got changed to April in 1988, shortly before the album "Mitternacht" was released. Afterwards the band didn't publish any more records at all.Discography:
"Mitternacht" LP 1988 (BMR)
April April
Lineup:
Lars-Oliver Degener
Jim Knopf
Jörg Schwarz
Peter Gorges
Andreas Burghardt
Band-info:
April April was an AOR/Melodic Rock band from Bochum and had published 3 singles since 1984, while the first one of the bunch, "Thor macht bumm", featured only Pop/Rock. The band later during 1987 went into classic AOR sounds with poppy character, that due to the german sung songs for german guys appears almost Schlager related, if they wouldn't have had those heavy Rock guitars. The band name got shortened to just April in 1988, shortly before their sole album "Mitternacht" was released. Afterwards the band didn't publish any more records at all.Discography:
"Thor macht bumm" 7" EP 1984 (BSP Musik)
"Alte Erde" 7" EP 87 (BSP Musik)
"Weit zum Paradies" 7" EP 1988 (Magic Cube)
Aragon
Lineup:
Wolfgang Munderloh (vocals)
Wilfried Zoermer (guitar)
Raimund Schürmann (guitar)
Günter Reith (bass)
Martin Grau (organ)
Stefan Kasparek (drums)
Band-info:
Apart of the odd sounding songtitles, that unfortunately are either sung in german, the two track single of Germans Aragon offers straight forward Hard Rock in classic 70’s manner. Especially the song “Disc-oh-Fieber” comes with the sheer power that Hard Rock could ever deliver, reminding in places of Deep Purple and Rainbow. The band started originally under the name of Genitiv around 1976/77 in Hagen/Wetter, but later became Aragon instead. Guitarist Wilfried Zoermer came from the band Hardware and the new vocalist Rainer Hagen was ex-Crash member. After the release of their single “Blauer Montag” (possibly dating from 1981/82 or earlier), recorded with the new line up featurig Rainer Hagen (vocals), Wilfried Zoermer (guitar), Raimund Schürmann (guitar), Günter Reith (bass), Franz W. Steinert (organ), Eckhard Steinert (drums), the band did eventually split up again.Discography:
„Blauer Montag“ 7" EP 198x (selfreleased)
Asgard (Giessen)
Lineup:
Olaf Dietzel (vocals)
Andreas Püschel (guitar)
Jörg Gehlhaar (guitar)
Thomas Göttlich (bass)
Martin Winter (drums)
Band-info:
A just shortlived act from Giessen, that existed just about one year, from 1990 to '91, but their story started already during the mid 80's, when they founded the band Exray in July 1987 out of the ashes of Iron Breed. Still as Exray, after releasing their "Hungarian tapes" Demo, they received an offer of Ingo Nowotny to produce an album, but for some strange reason Nowotny wanted the guys to change their name to Asgard (He did similar crap with Heaven Ward, if you may remember.). The quintet agreed and recorded the "Dark horizons" album 1990. Though I'm pretty sure the band never saw a single Cent for the album, we should be thankful for this whole illegal transaction, as "Dark horizons" easily enters the top ranks amoungst the Heavy Metal albums released during 1990/91. The guys was playing a somewhat fresh and uncomplicated sounding speedy Power Metal in the Atlain/Running Wild/Powerlord vein, that it was indeed a shame they band split up shortly after the release.Tomi Göttlich could subsequent join Grave Digger and got at least a part of the fame, that the other Asgard was denied.
Avengers
Lineup:
Nico Torretta (vocals)
Michael Sperner (guitar)
Alois Brückl (drums)
Harry Enzian (bass)
Gerald Sailer (keyboards)
Band-info:
These guys came from Landshut/Bavaria and fortunately only made it to this lonely single. The metallic Hard Rock they offer here sounds quite boring. "She's gone" is the better number of both and it's a ballad with a kinda almost bluesy touch. For 1986 they do sound quite a bit modern, more like from the late 80's and Torretta's voice is spreading a somewhat british flair that one might think they are NWOBHM survivors.Discography:
”Avengers” 7”EP 1986 (RC)
Aviary
Lineup:
Bernd Brand (vocals)
Achim Ziegler (guitar)
Joey Bellinger (guitar)
Lars Neuner (bass)
Ralf (drums)
Band-info:
A band from Biberach, between Ulm and Memmingen, that formed sometime around 1990 and recorded just a single Demo during 1991, featuring 3 tracks of progressive Power/Thrash. The vocalist left Aviary afterwards and got replaced by another (unknown) guy, while the band split up around 1993 again. Bernd Brand and Joey Bellinger formed Circle of Elements afterwards.Discography:
"Desperated eyes" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
Axxis
Lineup:
Bernhard Weiß (vocals, guitar)
Walter Pietsch (guitars)
Werner Kleinhaus (bass)
Richard Michalski (drums)
Band-info:
Founded in the very early 80's in Lünen (greater Dortmund area) the Heavy Metal band Anvil started playing gigs in every venue possible at that time. After finding out that there was a canadian band already using that name, they changed it to Axis in around late 1983/early '84. During 1984 the lads decided to record a Demo at the Dierks Studios, that featured the two songs "Hot summer night" and "Out of the nation", before they successfully participated on the "Pop am Rhein" Festival, that happened at the Philipshalle in Düsseldorf 1984. After recording another Demo track with Richard Michalski (drums) and Walter Pietsch on guitar, replacing Klaus Jankord, in 1988, that they sent to the EMI, that label signed the band, who had to change their name due to legal reasons to Axxis and released their debut album "Kingdom of the night" in 1989, that worldwide sold more than 100000 units. Axxis' melodic yet catchy Hard Rock and Heavy Metal mix in the vein of Bonfire, Vamp, Zeno, Fair Warning or Aidean fulfilled the needs of that time's need for melodic Metal sounds, performed in a traditional american tradition. For the second album "II" keyboarder Harry Öllers was hired, while the band's sound got even more melodic, almost leaving off the former Metal influences. During the following years their career constantly continued, the band until today released countless albums and singles (that we do not list here).Discography:
"Kingdom of the night" LP/CD 1989 (EMI)
"II" LP/CD 1990 (EMI)
"Access all areas - Live" LP/CD 1991 (Harvest)
"The big thrill" LP/CD 1993 (EMI)
A’s & B’s Project
Lineup:
Mark Lovell (vocals)
Klaus Gröber (keyboard)
Chris Justin (guitar)
Andy Marberger (bass)
Gerhard Egger (drums)
Band-info:
Another Munich based melodic band, seems Munich was the capital of these kinds of bands. They played a quite fantastic mix of Melodic Metal and heavy AOR, guitar driven but with great melodies and a pretty good vocalist. Perhaps Pop Metal would be another term I guess, on the same level as the similar sounding Vera Cruz or other Munich bands such as Magenta, Firefox or Burning Heat. Unfortunately the Single contains the same song twice (on B side as Instrumental version) so you won't get much for your money. And for info, the Label was owned by a Recording Studio (Tonstudio Stubai).Discography:
"Too late to fall in love" 7"EP 1989 (TSS)
Backslash (Osnabrück)
Lineup:
Guido Stöcker (guitar)
Christian Stöcker (bass)
Joachim Dölker (drums)
Band-info:
One more band with the name Backslash, that was also active during the early 90's just like the other band from Freiburg, while these lads most probably was originating from the wider Osnabrück area. The trio recorded just a single Demo back in 1991 that featured 3 classic Hard'n'Heavy songs.Discography:
"Backslash" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
Backstage
Lineup:
Matthias Staib (vocals)
Michael Staib (guitar)
Heiko Meßer (guitar)
Marcus Staib (bass)
Rainer Seidler (drums)
Band-info:
The family venture Backstage from the Illertissen area in Bavaria released a strange 7" that opens more questions than it answers. The title track is completely a waste of vinyl. Rock 'n' Roll influenced, in places almost punky sounding "something", but the good song that can save this single is the flipside Hard Rock ballad "Come back and stay", which truly is giving the band the authorization to appear in this database. You’ll get the same impression by their self titled demotape, that’s possibly dating from around the same time, but features 4 different tracks in a kinda Melodic Rock/AOR direction with certain Hard Rock influences as well.Discography:
“Backstage” Demo 198? (selfreleased)
”Lookin’ like an angel” 7” EP 1989 (GIC)
Backtrack
Lineup:
Ron Quiror (vocals)
Klaus Wagner (guitar)
Achim Rausch (bass)
Andreas Lahm (keyboard)
Mathias Braun (drums)
Band-info:
Unfortunately, we couldn't find any information about the Hardrockers Backtrack either, although the band which consisted of Ron Quiror (vocals), Klaus Wagner (guitar), Achim Rausch (bass), Andreas Lahm (keyboard) and Mathias “Tiger” Braun on drums, released a pretty decent single on the indie label Blue Cue Records in 1989. The band was originating from Kusel, a bit western of Kaiserslautern and north of the Saarbrücken/Homburg area. In the end, it doesn't really matter with the two stunning songs “Take a Chance” and “Rock with force”, as both speak for themselves in terms of quality. As with most of these obscure German local singles from the Bavarian region f.e., Backtrack are also completely convincing and offer 2 x melodic Hard Rock in a class of its own. “Take a Chance” even offers hints of the good, more modern mid 80's phase of Deep Purple. The single is available with 2 different sleeves btw.Discography:
“Take A Chance" 7" EP 1989 (Blue Cue)
Bad Steve
Lineup:
Philipp Magoo (vocals)
Accu Becher (guitar)
Jan Kömmet (guitar)
Dieter Rubach (bass)
Fritz Friedrich (drums)
Band-info:
A Solingen based act, that was founded by the ex-Accept fighters Dieter Rubach, Jan Kömmet and Fritz Friedrich and ex-Sin City shouter Philipp Magoo in 1983. Accu Becher completed the band, that won several contests, which resulted naturally in signing a record contract with Mausoleum Records. "Killing the night" was released 1985 with an additional single release, featuring the non album track "Seconds of eternity" on the flipside. As a whole package the LP offers a quite entertaining Hard Rock/Metal mix with influences from both genres, the commercial Mainstream stuff and either the classic Metal, which might be the "problem" connected to it. For fans of metallic Hard Rock "Killing the night" will be an amusing album, as it could be truly counted to the best mid 80's german albums of that scene for sure. Sadly the sales stayed far behind Mausoleum's expectations and the promising troop split up already 1986. Dieter Rubach afterwards tried a while with Udo Dirkschneider's new band U.D.O. around 1987/88, but quit before "Mean machine" was out. The rest of the guys disappeared.Discography:
"Killing the night" LP 1985 (Mausoleum)
"Across the rainbow" 7" EP 1985 (Mausoleum)
Big 'n Juicy
Lineup:
P. W. Rose (vocals)
Ralf Teichmann (guitar)
Klaus Kistner (bass)
Ingo Ramin (keyboard)
Blacky-X (drums)
Band-info:
A five piece from Baden-Baden, south of Karlsruhe, that was born in 1986, rising up from the ashes of the Heavy Rock band Van Teichmann, formed by brothers Ralf and Peter Teichmann together with their friend Luki (we guess it's Klaus Leppert who's meant here) during x-mas 1981. Klaus Kistner was informed right the next day and enthusiastically joined the bunch, who all had been playing in different bands of the Baden Baden area (south of Karlsruhe) at that time, but none of them was indeed happy with it. The foursome started rehearsing in Peter Teichmann's living room, but despite many of the other bands wasted their time with mainly playing cover versions, Van Teichmann fully concentrated on composing own material right from day one. The name apparently refers to Van Halen, a nice little gimmick. May 1st 1982 was the day of their first gig ever, happening at the Schützenhaus in Lichtenau, that started it all for the band, who at that time still used to sing in german. More gigs soon followed and the desire for an own vinyl rose up, resulting in the production of the 2 track single "Warum?", recorded at the Aleph Studion in Rastatt, which was released in June '83. Van Teichmann's style featured quite aggressive Heavy Rock, sort of pre-stage to Heavy Metal. Later in the same year a second guitarist joined, namely Peter Lasch, who already played together with Peter Teichmann previously in Acid Proof. Van Teichmann's music now went heavier, but around 1984 Peter Teichmann left the band to start something new at Munich's scene. French vocalist Robert Locatelli came instead and by now the once german lyrics changed into english. A 6 track Demo was produced in 1985, but either Locatelli couldn't stay for long in Van Teichmann and had to quit due to private reasons within that year, so the next vocalist Michael took his part until the band's temporary end in 1986, when they decided to change their name to Big 'n Juicy early in 1988, due to many changes, wether optically and musically. The Big ‘n Juicy line then featured P. W. Rose (vocals), Ralf Teichmann (guitar), Klaus Kistner (bass), Ingo Ramin (keyboard) and Blacky-X (drums). 1989/90 became two rather promising years in the band history since Big 'n Juicy participated at the Rockfabrik Newcomer Festival 1989, after recording a 2 track Demo around spring/summer that year. The guys prior to the event already appeared at a TV show and recorded another outstanding Demo in 1990. The tape features 4 stunning Melodic Metal rockers in the Only Child/Dokken/Ozzy vein, US american influenced so to say, but playing on a similar level like other german acts of the same caliber that made it big like f.e. Vamp or Bonfire. Their vocalist was canadian born. Nevertheless like many other hopefuls, the long expected record deal was bursting like a bubble in the wind and late 1992 Big 'n Juicy decided to play on under their old monicker Van Teichmann. They eventually did so in February '93 with now Harry Meier on bass. 1994 the guys recorded another Demo and then created the "Rosenmontagsrock", a sort of Anti-Carnival-Gig, that Van Teichmann since 1994 celebrate regulary. The band was active still at least 2017.Discography:
"Big ‘n Juicy" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"1990" Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
Big Rat
Lineup:
Rat Gepard (vocals)
Pete de Lena (guitar)
Francis Strudl (keyboard)
Chris Tough (bass)
H. H. Hammer (drums)
Band-info:
A local Nuremberg Heavy Rock act, that's still active since 1988 and managed to record a quite unknown selftitled album in 1990 on the austrial label Tyrolis Records. The album itself isn't either bad and features welldone, catchy material with commercial touch from the Hard Rock and Heavy Metal spectrum, sometimes reminding of a german version of Mötley Crüe, then going much heavier on "Cats go pussy" or "Bad bad boys" f.e., to end up on "Strongest of our kind" almost in melodic Power Metal fields. Especially Pete de Lena's excellent guitar work deserves a special mention. For my taste the (loud) keyboards aren't always used on right positions and often give the songs a quite poppy touch. Nevertheless, the album could be rated definitely above common standards and should be worth a listen for fans of the melodic stuff like Mydra, Aidean and similar acts. Not sure what happened later with these guys. 2007 a single with the title "Second life" was released, but that's everything known of these lads. Further info is welcome.Discography:
"Big Rat" LP/CD 1990 (Tyrolis)
Black Cross
Lineup:
Slimmy (vocals)
Gössy (guitar)
Dirk (bass)
Jochen (drums)
Band-info:
A local Remscheid fourpiece, that independently produced one of these obscure underground singles, that you'll just find once in a hell of years. There wasn't much info to find of this band at all, so lets focus on the music directly. Both songs "I'm not guilty" and "Under the vulture" got an utterly heavy Accept-ish edge, but can surprise with excellent guitar work. Not sure if Black Cross has had any satanic/antichristian stage image, at least on both of the trax there isn't anything like that to find, yet fans of Angel War or Mordor and especially Accept will love it nevertheless. Further band info is desired.(Thanx to emosteel for the suggestion)
Discography:
"I'm not guilty" 7" EP 1988 (selfreleased)
Black Jack (Witten)
Lineup:
Axel Schunder (vocals)
Siegfried Wronski (guitar)
Ralf Boettcher (guitar)
Burkhard Steinki (bass)
Ralf Knajder (drums)
Band-info:
A band from Witten, that formed during 1992, but every single one of the guys was previously active in other locals bands as well. They released their selftitled debut Demo one year later, still with the original singer Axel Schunder (ex-Road Crew/Anger/Ambivalenz) behind the micro, who then left Black Jack late in 1994 to join the band Tears of Passion. Nevertheless, all of the 3 tracks deliver a typical 80's feeling with the speedy neckbreaker "Pearly Spencer" to stand out. Also "Heroes" offers wellsounding midtempo Metal, while only the hardrocking "Never be mine" won't fit stylistically on that Demo. Vocalwise their singer reminded strongly of James Hetfield. Black Jack later released the album "I" and added keyboarder Marcus Eckhardt, while on their "Back in town" CD Uwe Becking took care of the vocals. The last album "Straight ahead" followed in 2002.(Thanx to Axel Schunder for additional info)
Here you can listen to Black Jack
Discography:
”Black Jack” Demo 1993 (CeeM Records)
Black Roses
Lineup:
Andres Cousillas (vocals)
Frank Goersmeier (guitar)
Michael Schäfers (bass)
Jürgen Sprenger (keyboard)
Tobias Lüke (drums)
Band-info:
A classic Hard Rock/Metal band from Büren in the Paderborn area, who appeared in the underground scene during the fall of the 80's firstly with a melodic, slightly Rainbow influenced 5 song Demo tape in 1990 and shortly later delivered one more tape in 1991, now with the new drummer Dirk De Koninck. The label Miracle Records either pressed a single with two of these Demo tracks, featuring the pretty listenable ballad "Reach for the sky" and the more metallic "Edge of the night", that's sounding like somewhere between Accept and the Scorpions. The original Demo though contained with "Out of the dawn" a third, more Hard Rock rooted track, but also quite epic sounding and with Heavy Metal middle part. After the single the band disappeared again from the screen, but seems to have been active till at least the early 2000's.Thanx to Rumblefist for additional info!
Discography:
“Demo" Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
"Black Roses" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"Reach for the sky" 7" EP 1992 (Miracle)
Black Velvet
Lineup:
Band-info:
The band Black Velvet is mainly known for a track on the "Schwarz auf weiß" compilation released on CBR Records. Their song "Welcome to the show" is an ok Hard Rocker with rocking background, that appears probably heavier due to the rough sound. Already in 1984 the C.B.R. label had produced a scarce 2 song single as well. If you got more info of this band, please get in touch.Discography:
“House of dreams/Spread your wings” 7" EP 1984 (C.B.R.)
"Welcome to the show" Comp.-LP Track 1986 (Schwarz auf weiß)
Blitzz
Lineup:
Kerstin Radtke (vocals)
Thomas Feiler (guitar)
Jens Hellmann (bass)
Frank Viehbach (drums)
Band-info:
The band Blitzz was originally founded late 1982 in Erfurt (ex-GDR) by manager Lutz Mielke who tried to cast a new Pop band with the name Prinzz. Jens Hellmann (bass), Thomas Feiler (guitar), Kerstin Radtke (vocals), Karl-Heinz Schüller (keyboard) and Gerrit Pennsler (drums) built the first line up at that time. During their early years they also could place a few songs on several compilations till 1985 Thomas Feiler due to health problems had to pause for about a year. When he returned in late 1986, the core of the band decided to play heavier music. Since his former band Macbeth during that time just got prohibited, the drummer Frank Viehbach agreed to join Prinzz as well. After a short phase that the band spent with covering Mötley Crüe and Van Halen songs at gigs, they started writing own songs like "Es treibt mich die Gier", "Leichte Beute", "Die Titanic sinkt", and could record some songs for the national broadcast service like the Speed Metal hammer "Tarantella" (german version) and the instrumental "EL 34". More and more Prinzz' style got heavier and 1988 their repertoire contained Metallica, Helloween and Anthrax cover versions as well, while the band saw it as neccessary to change the band's name to Blitzz, to avoid confusions with the pop star Prince. A live broadcast of the band during a festival in Berlin 1988 was noticed by Gama Records who got interested to release an album of Blitzz. While the band either was trying to sing only in english and that's been one of the requirements of Gama's offer, the GDR officials agreed and Blitzz recorded their "Money rules the world" album during 1989. After the recordings was finally finished in late '89, Gama wanted the album to be remastered, which caused the GDR officials to ask for more money and that's been the end of the cooperation of both part companies. To defend Gama, indeed the album mix wasn't much compatible for the western market at all, though the album featured a few speedy Power Metal pearls like "Tarantella" or "Lucifer". During the days of the political renewal inside the GDR, Blitzz became friends with Holy Moses and shared the stage together, so it happened when Holy Moses was recording one of their albums at the Horus Sound studio in Hannover, Blitzz had been invited to visit them, which in the end led to Steamhammer signing the band. In April '90 their "Do the Blitz" mini album was recorded at the same Horus Sound studio where they got introduced to Steamhammer. The album featured re-recorded songs of the unreleased album btw, this time with the "correct sound" and sold more than 10000 copies in the western part of Germany and the world, while inside GDR the demand had been "manageable". During 1991 after hiring Kai Tenneberg as second guitarist, the band paused for a while due to the new situation inside the country. They recorded their "Dive" Demo 1992, which was originally meant for their record company as Demo for the "Do the Blitz" follow up album. But instead Steamhammer released them of their running contract and fired the band. Though they still got offers by smaller labels, they declined every single one of them and eventually understandable frustrated called it a day in 1994. Kerstin Radtke seriously could be counted to the best female vocalists in Metal business, though the material of Blitzz had it's ups and downs nevertheless. They've been more than listenable on their speedy songs, but just average during the midpaced passages. The unreleased album was finally released on the label German Democratic Recordings in 2013 under the title "Tarantella" on CD.Discography:
"Money rules the world" Album 1989 (unreleased)
"Do the blitz" MLP/MCD 1990 (Steamhammer)
"Dive" Demo 1992 (selfreleased)
Broadcast Recordings:
"Greed/Demon of the night/EL 34/Tarantella/Easy Booty/I'm Alive" Live Radio Broadcast (1988)
Blizzard
Lineup:
Eßer
Wolters
Band-info:
Impossible to say where these lads hailed from as their scarce 7" as usual doesn't provides any infos. The single was pressed by the EMI and I remember the seller mentioned it should be from around 1978 or 1979, as he seemed to know something about the band. Nevertheless, for Hard Rock fans these Blizzard guys are highly recommended, when also you most probably won't see so many copies of this release surfacing at all. The title track, a proggy ballad, strongly reminds of the old spacy Berluc stuff from their debut album, while the B-side got more of a classic Hard Rocker, in places showing similarities to the Lucifer MLP. To mention is the solid raw production that's making this band (and single) worth to search for. If you got more info, please get in touch.
Bloody Climax
Lineup:
Matthias Müller (vocals)
Holger Volk (bass)
Thomas Krämer (drums)
Frank Heller (guitar)
Daniel Loesch (guitar)
Band-info:
Bloody Climax from Schweinfurt was one of the most interesting german Metal bands of the 80's and sadly only produced a single album, but "Back to the wall" belongs to the top 5 of the classic Heavy Metal recorded of german bands (if not even into top 3). Despite most of the people running after Bloody Mary or Black Fate (dunno why...), the real treasure was Bloody Climax' LP recorded in April '85. Their technical level and songwriting skills was simply outstanding. "Back to the wall" features melodic yet pretty heavy songs that none of them lacks in quality at all. In places a bit of Iron Maiden influences (generally some NWOBHM hints) could be heard, but more or less the material and especially the godlike vocals (I wonder, is Matthias Müller really german?) are almost without concurrence on the german Metal market. Two years later they again got a chance to prove their class on the D&S compilation Break Out - German Metal Tracks 5, featuring the speedy "Ride with the wind" and the banger "Run for cover". But the band split up the same year in 1987 and made it just 4 years. Frank Heller and Thomas Krämer would years later complete the reformed Vendetta's line up.Discography:
"Back to the wall" LP 1985 (Arena Sound)
"Break Out - German Metal Tracks No 5" Comp.-LP Tracks 1987 (D&S)
Blue Velvet
Lineup:
Thomas Matiszik (vocals)
Björn Gralla (guitar)
Peter Schickert (bass)
Marius Ader (keyboard)
Enrico Karolczak (drums)
Band-info:
Blue Velvet was originating from the Dortmund area, and this five piece recorded a quite solid melodic Hard Rock album with feeling in the typical Bonfire style, focussing on late 80's heavy rocking US american Hair Metal stuff, much reminding of Vice, Vamp or either Pink Cream 69. Thomas Matiszik and Björn Gralla also was part of the Science Project (SP), who recorded a benefit 12" in 1990. the D&S label who published the CD, alsop made a few promotional singles that featured the song “Two different words" on both sides.
Bonfire
Lineup:
Claus Lessmann (vocals)
Hans Ziller (guitar)
Horst Maier-Thorn (guitar)
Jörg Deisinger (bass)
Dominic Hülshorst (drums)
Band-info:
One of the german top exports in terms of Melodic Hard Rock/Metal, who made it big worldwide with their uncomplicated and catchy sort of Heavy Metal and either conquered the US of A. Bonfire's roots are originating from 1972, when Hans Ziller formed the band Cacumen together with his brother Karl. The lads had recorded several albums already, when they in 1986 just had scored a major deal with the RCA and renamed the band into Bonfire. The debut "Don't touch the light" from 1986 still adopted the former Cacumen style, but right with their breakthrough album "Fire works" Bonfire became what they got later known for, an US style oriented Hard Rock/Hair Metal band with glammy and highly melodic influences, that was perfectly trimmed for the amerian market. The band's discography also includes tons of singles that we do not specifically list here at all.For more detailed info we advice you to visit Bonfire's Homepage
Discography:
"Don't touch the light" LP 1986 (RCA)
"Fire works" LP/CD 1987 (RCA)
"Point Blank" LP/CD 1989 (MSA)
"Knock out" LP/CD 1991 (RCA)
"Live...The Best" CD 1993 (BMG)
Breez
Lineup:
Jens Hoffmann (vocals)
Pete Adams (guitar)
Nico Montano (bass)
F.X. Fischer (keyboard)
Knut Schütze (percussion)
Chris Meyer (drums)
Band-info:
A band from Düsseldorf, that basically doesn't belong to this database, as we truly believe they've been just an ordinary Rock band, but nevertheless on their independently produced single "Diana", from November 1988, the title track features a really nice Melodic Rock/AOR power ballad, that could be interesting for fans of the genre. The B-side sadly sounds weaker and offers much more commercial Pop/Rock.Discography:
"Diana" 7" EP 1988 (Auf Punkt)
Breeze
Lineup:
Thorsten Münch
Sönke
Conny
Fedor
Hardo
Jörg
Band-info:
A local Progressive Rock band that published an independently produced utterly obscure single on DOC Records (probably their own label as Thorsten Münch's nick was "Doc") in 1982. We do not need to focus on the B side "Bring back the sunshine" at all in this case, as it's just a simple Prog Rock number without spirit. Instead we concentrate on the title track, that though being Prog Rock in the first as well, but it gets interupted by pretty heavy AOR outbursts, that do move this number without doubts into Hard Rock realms. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"One day fly" 7" EP 1982 (DOC)
Burning Angel
Lineup:
Uwe Hahn (guitar, vocals)
Petra Trappe (vocals)
Gerhard Müller (guitar)
Roger Völker (bass)
Karsten Schaub (drums)
Band-info:
As the title of Burning Angel's debut 7" mentions, this troop was originating from Baunatal and published just an appetizing single 1987, plus the corresponding selftitled album during the following year. The 7" features solid Classic/Melodic Rock with slightly Hard Rock edge and if anyone wants to check out the band, it's fully enough to purchase the single. Both tracks had been the most listenable on the whole album, that just contained weaker songs, who didn't sound as hard as the 7" songs anymore at all and only must be categorized as plain Melodic Rock. On the LP the keyboarder Hartmut Schmidt additionally had joined the guys, but after 1988 nothing was heard of this band anymore.Discography:
"Rock aus Baunatal" 7" EP 1987 (Iron Curtain)
"Burning Angel" LP 1988 (Iron Curtain)
Canadyan
Lineup:
Sammy O. Thomas (vocals)
Rainer Heggelke (drums)
Burkhard Göttsch (bass)
Stephan Söth (guitar)
Enrico Rode (guitar)
Band-info:
A Hamburg based melodic Hard Rock band that started back in 1982. Sammy O. Thomas (vocals) completed the band in 1983 and they released their first vinyl in 1984. The 7" features 2 trax combining Hard Rock with melodic Heavy Metal influences that for '84 sounded quite fresh and they kept on playing that style on their LP "Canadyan" released again on Xymax (like the 7") in 1985. The album contains both songs ("In the night" and "Can't stop") of the single too but in re-recorded versions, and in general is driving the melodic Hard Rock rail with Metal edge, while Sammy O. Thomas is doing a pretty good job vocalwise. The album is highly recommended for those who are into the melodic Heavy Rock stuff. Then it became silent around the band but they returned in 1987, having 3 tracks on the local Blizz IIX compilation that showed them a bit more melodic rocking now. Nevertheless, their ballad "Would you sell the world" is a highlight on that sampler.Discography:
”In the night” 7”EP 1984 (Xymax)
”Canadyan” LP 1985 (Xymax)
"Blizz IIX" Comp.-LP 1987 (Deep Cut)
Captain
Lineup:
Mathias Ebeling (guitar)
Frank Ebeling (guitar)
Thomas Ebeling (bass)
Band-info:
The band Captain was most probably locals of the Ruhrpott Rock scene. At least we can say that these guys was produced by Ulrich Pösselt and his RA.SH Musikverlag management, who either pressed a less known promotional single with the german sung songs "Schöne Mädchen" and "Träume" in the mid 80's. The foursome featured the 3 Ebeling brothers who later in 1988 also recorded an album with the Klaus Enkmann Band. Surprisingly both tracks should be of high interest for the melodic Hard Rock/AOR faction, as both offer a certain grade of musicality and deliver well produced, catchy and nevertheless vital commercial Heavy Rock.Discography:
"Schöne Mädchen/Träume" Promo 7" EP 1985 (Crime)
CC Seven
Lineup:
M. Prätorius
Band-info:
A less known band with less known single and that's even less info known or to find about. The title track starts like a "(I can't get no) Satisfaction" rip off attempt, but with the refrain develops into an ok AOR number. "Nicolette" is just a Rock ballad, a forgettable single. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"Runnin'/Nicolette" 7"EP 1983 (Crime)
Chronical Diarrhoea
Lineup:
Thorsten Benning (vocals)
Ilja (guitar)
Roman Gebauer (bass)
Reiner Henseleit (drums)
Band-info:
Chronical Diarrhoea from Mühlheim/Ruhr was an extreme Crossover act, which was active since the mid 80's and who after an indpendent single 1987, got signed by the former Punk/Hardcore label Nuclear Blast Records, who produced the guys debut album "Salomo says..." the following year. During the first years of their existence Chronical Diarrhoea was performing an absurdly hyperfast grinding Speedcore, most likely comparable to Lethal Aggression, while during their later phase, especially on "The last judgement" album, musically moved into a more Thrash influenced Crossover style, in the vein of D.R.I. on "Crossover". The band disbanded like so many others too in the early 90's.Discography:
"Royal diarrhoea" 7" EP 1987 (Anti-Schelski)
"Salomo says..." LP 1988 (Nuclear Blast)
"Abstract carnage E.P." 7" EP 1990 (Off The Disk)
"The last judgement" LP/CD 1991 (Nuclear Blast)
Circle of Sig-Tiu
Lineup:
Josef Maria Klumb (vocals)
Dennis Raymond Plummer (guitar)
Holger Düchting (guitar)
Nikolaus Martin Mertens (bass)
Steffen B. (drums)
Styk Thriller (drums)
Band-info:
The Circle of Sig-Tiu was an apocalyptic Punk Metal troop from Bingen/Sprendlingen, that was founded 1984 and published quite of bunch of vinyls during their short period of existence. Members of the band previously played in the Punk band Aus-98, who either published a single 1983. The bands early releases (especially "Feuer und Asche") still was very (Thrash) Punk/Hardcore influenced, but the guys also adopted influences of the Gothic/Dark Wave scene. They appeared on a number of compilations and singles and published the second album "Signs of time" 1987 on Sonic Records, with Siegfried Grampe on guitar, who replaced Holger Düchting. Then most of the members quit and found substitutes in Hüsseyin Ekzi (bass), Dirk Mohr (drums) and Thomas auf dem Berge (drums) with only Klumb (Jay Kay), Plummer and Grampe remaining. The Metal influenced album "We come in love but not for peace" was recorded in December '87 and published in early '88 on the bassist's own label EXs Records. The sound of the material is quite bizarre. Occult Speed Metal merges with Punk and either some Thrash tunes appear, which doesn't make the LP being an easy to swallow piece of vinyl, though some Crossover fans might find it interesting. Jay Kay disbanded Circle of Sig-Tiu still within 1988 to publish the solo album "And all your glamour will turn into dust", that hadn't much in common with his old band anymore. 1990 Klumb founded the band Gothic band Forthcoming Fire.Discography:
"Feuer und Asche" LP 1985 (Sonic)
"Kulturschock Attacke Vol. I" Comp.-LP Tracks 1986 (Sig-Tiu)
"What's harder than live" Live Tape 1986 (Intelnet)
"Fahnenflucht" Comp.-LP Track 1986 (Wie lange noch?)
"Signs of time" LP 1987 (Sonic)
"Im Namen des Volkes" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Kulturschock Attacke Vol. II)
"Life is a joke" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Weird System)
"Signals on Tiusday" 7" EP 1987 ( EXs)
"3. Reich" Split 7" EP Track 1987 (Z Siege)
"We come in love but not for peace" LP 1988 (EXs)
"But every sunday morning" Comp.-LP Track 1990 (1984 The Fourth)
"Golden calf und silent dreams" Comp.-Track 1991 (Noisegate)
Clan Rouge
Lineup:
Band-info:
Obscure alternative Hard Rock band from Bochum with almost Grunge touch, reminding slightly of early Nirvana or something on their single from 1992. Just "Tis notcha day" has a speedy edge, but a rather punky one. Quite odd style, so better be afraid. Besides the 3 track 7" released in red vinyl without PS, Clan Rouge already appeared one year earlier with "Kick" and "Everything is mine" on the local compilation "Rock around Bochum '91". Further info is needed.Discography:
"Rock Around Bochum '91 Spabo 005" Comp.-CD 1991 (Sparkasse Bochum)
"Yes/No" 7" EP 1992 (Olgo)
Cobra
Lineup:
Steffen Bayer (guitar)
Frank Eichhorn (vocals)
Bodo Hildebrand (bass)
Jens Kuge (drums)
Band-info:
When you listen to the known material of Cobra you hardly believe that their main aim was to be posers like their faves Van Halen, Bon Jovi or Ratt. Founded in June '86 in East Berlin (ex-GDR) by ex-Rocket/Mephisto/Vantom (Frank Eichhorn) and ex-Regenbogen (Jens Kuge) members together with Steffen Bauer (ex-Pumphut) and Bodo Hildebrand they pretty quickly got the chance to record songs for the national broadcast service and to appear in a national TV show. These 4 songs became a part of the triple Split LP "Kleeblatt № 22" with 2 other Metal bands MCB and Plattform. But Cobra wasn't much satisfied with the result as the songs appeared too heavy for their own set concept (to be posers). Frank Eichhorn already quit Cobra early 1987 to join Vantom, but returned in summer to eventually leave the band for good late '88. Hildebrandt left in May '88 and Frank Binke grabbed the bass. Cobra started searching for a second guitarist and a keyboarder that they found in Thomas Rosanski (ex-Weissheim/Badboy) and either Badboy's vocalist Michael Kaspar was invited to join the band in November '88, while Amiga planned to release more material of the band like a Quartett single and sent the band again into a studio to record 4 new songs ("We want Rock", "Girls, Girls, Girls", "Nachtboy" and "I'm on fire"). In the meanwhile "Träumer" got a place on the Rockbilanz '88 compilation. But the single got cancelled because Cobra disbanded already in October 1989. All songs remained unreleased. There is also an inofficial Demo recording from 1988 available, featuring 4 songs, as well as several live cuts from 1987 and '88. The track "Take me" from that tape indeed pretty much tends into the US Glam Metal with huge melodic edge sounding more american than most american bands of that era. For fans of Shout, Ozzy, Quiet Riot or Keel it's pretty much a treat.Check out Cobra in TV
Discography:
"Kleeblatt № 22 - Hard & Heavy" Split LP 1987 (Amiga)
"Träumer" Comp.-LP Track 1988 (Rockbilanz '88)
"Demo" Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
Demo Recordings:
“Feuer unterm Eis” (1986)
Collaps
Lineup:
Maju (vocals)
Buju (guitar)
Dirk (guitar)
Hauke (bass)
Jens (drums)
Band-info:
A Hardcore band from Siegen, that was active as Vollrausch since already 1984, and after recording a Demo tape 1985, changed name to Collaps in 1986 to publish some more Demos. The label Double A records took these guys under contract afterwards and produced two singles and one album ("Bacteria") in 1988, that contains fast US american style Hardcore/Crossover with lotsa thrashing parts, stylistically mainly comparable to the D.R.I. stuff of the late mid 80's era.Discography:
"Before the albums" Demo 1986 (selfreleased)
"Germania fuck off" Demo 1986 (selfreleased)
"Not just aggression" 7" EP 1987 (Double A)
"Bacteria" LP 1988 (Double A)
"I burnt the bridge to Hollywood" 7" EP 1990 (Double A)
Copyright
Lineup:
Günther Thoemmes (bass,vocals)
Johannes Roesgen (guitar,voc)
Thomas Eulgem (guitar)
Wolfgang Schwarz (drums)
Stu Krechel (keyboard)
Band-info:
A Hard Rock band from Mayen that was founded in 1982. According to their own info they played modern Hard Rock but also live covers of the Rolling Stones, Chuck Berry etc. They released a single privately in 1989, but the poppy drum sound sadly spoils the recording. In a way the term modern Hard Rock might be true, but due to the poppy production AOR/Melodic Rock is hitting the nail better on the head.Discography:
"Our love" 7" EP 1989 (selfreleased)
Cox-Orange
Lineup:
Weini (vocals)
Tom Henkel (guitar)
Dirk von Suckow (guitar)
Moppel (bass)
Ingo Gumin (drums)
Band-info:
Cox-Orange was a Crossover/Thrash band from Schrobenhausen, active since the late mid 80's. The guys directly debuted with a vinyl single 1989 (released in different vinyl colors), that featured technically quite well executed Hardcore with Metal edge in the vein of the late Mottek or Scarecrow. Though the guys was crossing the border to Thrash Metal quite often, the vocals of Weini still clearly got a punky/HC touch. 1991 the lads produced one more Demo tape featuring Solo on bass and Kai Büschl on guitars, but for their last Demo recorded in April '93, Tom Henkel returned to replace Solo, while Robert Haßfurter was singing. The band split up in the mid 90's.Discography:
"Hypnotized" 7" EP 1989 (Amok)
"Demo '91" (selfreleased)
"Demo '93" (selfreleased)
Crusader (Nuremberg)
Lineup:
Klaus Beck (vocals)
Oliver Gruber (bass)
Horst Schwarz (drums)
Michael Pech (guitar)
Band-info:
Do not confuse these Crusader with the other band from Wuppertal that was active around the same time. This band was from Nuremberg or the area of Nuremberg, as on their 7" there is a sponsor printed on the sleeve. The 2 tracks featured offer quite hard rocking Metal with easy beats and melody but repeating the same riffs again and again, with a few NWOBHM hints. Nothing groundshaking so to say but solid stuff. The Single should be from around 1984 but a year isn't mentioned anywhere.Discography:
"Rock hard" 7" 198x (Altera Pars)
Cyclone
Lineup:
Markus Heger (guitar, vocals)
Jürgen Schuster (guitar)
Klaus Zeitlhofer (keyboard)
Jürgen Halpap (bass)
Thomas Braunmüller (drums)
Band-info:
A Hard Rock band from Meitingen, north of Augsburg, who played a sort of Melodic Rock/AOR and could quickly develop a well respected name within Augsburg’s Rock scene, not just for winning a local Talent Contest, that happened in 1986 at the Morning Star in Meitingen. The guys independently produced their single "A burning fire" in 1986 with the line up Markus Heger (guitar, vocals), Jürgen Schuster (guitar), Klaus Zeitlhofer (keyboard), Jürgen Halpap (bass) and Thomas Braunmüller on drums. The two tracks "A burning fire" and "I want you" both reminded of Saga with a little piece of Europe, and Cyclone got invited to promote it either in Thomas Gottschalk’s (one of the top german entertainers) radio show back in day, broadcasted on BR3. During December ’87 the original band went into the common internal issues connected with Cyclone's further way. Markus Heger wanted to lead the band more into the poppy Europe stuff, while the rest of the guys prefered a way heavier sound. Therefore during January '88 Heger subsequently reformed Cyclone with new musicians, connected with further line up changes. Members of the late 80's has been ex-Exodus Robert Pschorr (guitar, later in Mandrake), Werner Pschorr (keyboard), Erwin Fries (drums) and Michael Egger (guitar). The last known Cyclone line up featured Markus Heger (guitar, vocals), Christian Grunwald (bass), Thomas Jenuwein (keyboard), Oliver Liesegang (electronics) and Richard Durner (drums, vocals). Guitarist Jürgen Schuster after the 87er split joined the band Stratford On Avon and Thomas Braunmüller followed him a bit later on there as well.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"A burning fire" 7" EP 1986 (selfreleased)
Czakan
Lineup:
Axel Triebel (guitar, vocals)
Oliver Güttinger (guitar)
Frank Schrafft (bass)
Hans-Peter Mötzing (drums)
Band-info:
If you remember that Czakan from Calmbach got a first positive article in a Metal Hammer from early '85, with the mention of some first local successful moments during their short career at that time (the band was founded in mid 1984), it's quite surprising that it took till 1989 when they got a record deal. The guys either had Demo recordings ready in early/mid 1985, that wasn't sold at all, but could be obtained for free, by whoever sent them an empty tape. At that time during 1986 the shortlived label Bregenzer Records announced a Czakan 12" with the title "Heaven" to be available soon, which in the end remained unreleased as the label folded quickly afterwards. 3 years later, introducing a new team consisting of old fellows Oliver Güttinger (guitar), Frank Schrafft (bass) plus Randy Arcachon (drums), Michael Schennach (vocals) and Tommy Fein (keyboard), Czakan's debut album was finally available and their kind of melodic Hard Rock/Metal was well worth to get heard. Just like the Scorpions, Zeno, Vice, Bonfire and similar acts, the Czakan guys tried to copy the US Hair Metal stuff, sometimes heavier, mostly softer, though always keeping a constant level that made their songs appearing catchy nevertheless. The single "Tears" from 1990 either contains with "Stand and deliver" an exclusive (heavy) non album track, so make sure to not miss that one. The band split up in the very early 90's with certain members forming other bands like Red Heat and Backbone Slide.(Thanx to ObsessedByCruelty for the additional info)
Discography:
"Tears in my eyes" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Rock Meets Metal - Volume II)
"State of confusion" LP/CD 1989 (Intercord)
"Tears" 7" EP 1990 (Intercord)
Darxon
Lineup:
Massimo de Matteis (vocals)
Markus Szart (guitar)
Peter Schmidt (bass)
Dominik Hülshorst (drums)
Band-info:
Markus Szart and Peter Schmidt founded Darxon 1983 in Bochum. With Massimo de Matteis and Dominik Hülshorst they recorded a first Demo tape still within the same year and immediately earned a record deal with the also Bochum based Wishbone Records label. In spring '84 the NWOBHM inspired "Killed in action" debut was recorded and featured a quite Judas Priest influenced classic Heavy Metal style. One year later in spring '85 the excellent "Tokyo" EP would become the last recording of the classic Darxon line up, since the band split up in Winter '85 with just Massimo de Matteis remaining, who subsequently formed a completely new band. Dominik Hülshorst joined Cacumen who would soon change name to Bonfire and later was active in Kymera and EZ Livin also. The new guys in the band was Thomas Smuszynski (bass), Michael Hebestadt (guitar) and the Universe drummer Ingo Plass, while in summer '86 also ex-Snakebite/White Witch/Stormwind and recent Universe guitarist Wolfgang "Wolla" Böhm came. The first release of the new Darxon was the single "Holding on", published on the label of their manager Willi Wrede, who either piloted the band to the Rockport label, who immediately started a campaign to promote Darxon's coming album that was produced in summer '87 by Accept's Jörg Fischer and was originally planned under the title "Love conquers them all". In the end the album got the title "No thrills" and was available in late 1987 on Rockport's Metal sublabel Energy Records. The album sounded different to the early Darxon material, though the level of quality rose. The band's fresh melodic Heavy Metal knew to attract, though the one and other commercial Hair Metal part entered their sound as well. But the guys had been in good company with bands such as Steeler or Sinner and especially most of the scene internal independent latecomers that published records around 1990. An european tour was planned for March '88, but the guys just played 12 dates with Zed Yago, which resulted in Ingo Plass to quit Darxon. He joined a while later the german Sleaze band Crash n' Burn that was living in London. Michael Hebestadt prefered to form the band Nero in Essen and either Thomas Smuszynski accepted a job offer by Udo Dirkschneider for his band U.D.O. Massimo de Matteis, though having quit Darxon, instead spend time on his solo project, while Wolfgang Böhm hired his ex-Stormwind mate Klaus Lemm (vocals), guitarist Jens Frank plus the ex-Holy Moses members Jochen Fünders (bass) and Herbert Dreger (drums) to start another attempt to record one more album, that wasn't finished at all since he couldn't keep the band together for a longer period anymore. But a rough mix of the planned album should exist. Böhm in the meanwhile was focussing on Universe and joined U.D.O. 1990 as well. When Massimo de Matteis reformed the inactive band 1990 with Frank Dielewski (guitar), Thomas Thanscheidt (guitar), Ingo Geiger (bass) and ex-Avenger/Steeler Jan Yildiral (drums) the reanimated Mausoleum Records got the award to produce Darxon's last album "Shout!", that was eventually finished in October 1991 and provided classic 80's Heavy Metal with either hints of the old Darxon sound of the early days of the band. During 1991 Darxon also participated on the All Star Project "German Rock Project" and provided the song "Waiting for your heart". But once again after the "Shout!" CD was published 1992, the musicians went all their own ways. 2006 Jens Frank tried to revive Darxon with former musicians, but had to firm under the monicker Noxrad due to legal problems.Discography:
"Demo 1983"
"Killed in action" LP 1984 (Wishbone)
"Tokyo" 12" EP 1985 (Wishbone)
"Holding on" 7" EP 1986 (Project)
"No thrills" LP/CD 1987 (Energy)
"Hungry" Comp.-LP/CD Track 1988 (Metal Ballads)
"Don't give up" Comp.-LP/CD Track 1989 (Metal Ballads Vol. 2)
"Shout!" CD 1992 (Mausoleum)
"Waiting for your heart" Comp.-CD Track 1992 (German Rock Project - The Ballad Album)
Dead
Lineup:
Dany Ringer (guitar, vocals)
Uwe Stolze (bass, vocals)
Peter Krügel (drums)
Band-info:
The Death Metal trio Dead was founded in Nuremberg in early 1990 actually as Deadlogik, but shortened name to just Dead later on. The band got quickly picked up after their first Demo by Poserslaughter Records for a sole 7" release (grey vinyl). At this point the guys was playing a kind of Gore/Death Metal with Grind parts, comparable mainly to Pungent Stench early phase. During the following years their "lyrical concept" started to change and the band prefered to adopt Porn/Grind themes. The "Slaves to abysmal perversity" single was released on MMI Records 1993, still continuing the style of the previous 7", before Dead's career really started rolling and innumerable EP's and CD's got published till nowadays.Discography:
"Far beyond your imagination" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"Far beyond your imagination" Comp.-CD Track 1991 (Appointment With Fear Vol.1) (1991)
”Defeat remains” 7” EP 1991 (Poserslaughter)
"Defeat remains" Comp.-MC Track 1992 (Apocalyptic Things 4)
"Slaves to abysmal perversity" 7" EP 1993 (MMI)
Dead's-Head
Lineup:
Ralf Chiduch
Jörg Helling
Ulrich Christen
Volker Schuster
Band-info:
Late 70's Hardrockers with an obscure single featuring good Hard Rock, that's closer to the 80's than the 70's with diverse Boogie influences though. Further band info is needed.Discography:
"You and I wer're going back" 7" EP 1978 (QDS)
Deadly Sin
Lineup:
Paul Power (guitar, vocals)
Uwe Reese (guitar)
Frank Hesse (bass)
Michael Felchner (drums)
Band-info:
Deadly Sin from Wuppertal was founded by Paul Power and Uwe Reese in December 1985, who both previously played together in a Punk band. First drummer Michael Felschner joined and last Frank Hesse on bass in summer '86. The guys worked out a 80 min program that would cover all kinds of Metal and started playing live. After a first show the lads already felt able and strong enough to record an own single in November '86. "Screams and thunder" plus "Evil attack" are the titles of the chosen numbers and both couldn't be more different. While the first mentioned one provided an Accept influenced quite typical midpaced Heavy Metal rocker, with the flipside the lads secured themselves an entry in the eternal book of German Metal history. "Evil attack" is storming forward in typical german underground power/thrashing manner with no holds barred. Vectom comes to my mind as comparison, but seriously, they've been not even close to this raging Metal tune. After the single Deadly Sin recorded one more Demo with 4 songs at around 1987/88, but Paul Power had left the band and got replaced by female guitarist Sabine Dahlmann and vocalist Markus Laumer. But then the traces of the band trail away.Discography:
”Screams and thunder/Evil attack” 7” EP 1986 (selfreleased)
"Slave of celebrity" Demo 198? (selfreleased)
Deathrow
Lineup:
Milo Van Jaksic (bass, vocals)
Thomas Priebe (guitar)
Sven Flugge (guitar)
Markus Hahn (drums)
Band-info:
A Thrash legend from Düsseldorf, that you could often see having announced in the early Metal Hammer magazine, looking for members to join them. When the band formed in October 31st 1984, it was originally called Samhain and used to play a pretty rude chaotic Thrash Metal. Both Sven Flugge and Markus Hahn originally lived in Bremen and just had moved over to Düsseldorf, while Thomas Priebe was pretty unhappy with his recent band that was playing an Accept/Priest style Heavy Metal. When his old band split up, he just joined the other 3 to build the classic Samhain line up. During 1985 and 1986 the Demos "Lord of the dead" and "Eternal death" was recorded, that gained the guys a deal with Noise Records, leading into the production of the first album "Satan's gift" 1986. Since Noise was afraid the album would be indicated for the prude american market (due to the name "Satan" in the title), they decided to rename the album and re-release it under the title "Riders of doom" with either different artwork. Deathrow's type of Teutonic Thrash was different to lets say Sodom's or Kreator's. While the lads was playing with hyperspeed, they kept a special degree of technical superiority. In May '87 one of the highlights of the german Thrash scene was recorded - "Raging steel". The Deathrow guys distanced themselves from the chaotic parts of the debut and created a number of raw, yet technically experienced, but straight forward thrashing jewels. Sadly with Thomas Priebe's quit after "Raging steel" and Uwe Osterlehner took his part. With Osterlehner a more progressive, technically explicit complex Thrash was executed now, but Milo's voice hadn't the right range for that purpose at all. Actually they should have searched for a new vocalist, who was able to sing those new complex structures, but they didn't. Nevertheless, "Deception ignored", recorded December 1988, became Deathrow's best selling album. Due to financial trouble with Noise, the band declined the option to record another album for that label and the name Deathrow disappeared from the scene, till in 1991 they returned with the "Tower in darkness" single. The band's sound had slightly changed, but still the old Deathrow could be recognized, playing a mix of "Raging steel" and "Deception ignored" type of Thrash Metal. West Virginia Records took the guys under contract and one more album ("Life beyond") was produced in 1992, before the band after sliding into judicial trouble with the label, called it a day around 1993/94. The band had to fight with the typical modern influences that other Thrashers got plagued with too on "Life beyond" and therefore it doesn't really justify the first positive impression that "Towers in darkness" left after its release.Discography:
"Satan's gift" LP 1986 (Noise)
"Riders of doom" LP 1986 (Noise)
"Raging steel" LP 1987 (Noise)
"Scattered by the Wind" Comp.-Pic LP Track 1988 (Doomsday News)
"Deception ignored" LP/CD 1989 (Noise)
"Machinery" Comp.-LP/CD Track 1989 (Doomsday News 2)
"Towers in darkness" 7" EP 1991 (Metal Machine Music)
"Life beyond" LP/CD 1992 (West Virginia)
Delicate News
Lineup:
Dietmar Felten (vocals)
Rainer Ressemann (guitar)
Thomas Siegl (bass)
Peter Zupancic (drums)
Band-info:
A modern sounding Thrash Metal act from Erlangen that was originally founded 1988 as Rattlehead and recorded already 2 Demo tapes under that monicker, before they decided to change the name to Delicate News in 1991. One more Demo followed, and then Delicate News prepared their debut album "The mirth in a dead man's yell", that just like the afterwards released single ”4-Track E.P.” features quite strange, progressive and almost unbearable kind of modern Power/Thrash, that possibly in places could be compared to the weird Mortality from Munich. While that still wasn't enough, 1996 the albums "Scoff" and 2002 "Flashback" followed, while this band is active still nowadays. The single should include a free sticker.Discography:
"Occurences beyond the bark" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"The mirth in a dead man's yell" CD 1992 (NET)
”4-Track E.P.” 7” EP 1993 (Tug)
Depp Jones
Lineup:
Dirk Felsenheimer (vocals)
Rod Gonzalez (guitar)
Michael Beckmann (bass)
Olaf Kobold (drums)
Band-info:
Depp Jones was a Crossover band from West Berlin, formed by members of the famous german Rock bands Die Ärzte (Dirk "Bela B." Felsenheimer) and Rainbirds (Rod Gonzalez & Michael Beckmann), together with Atze Ludwig in 1989 as S.U.M.P., but changed name to Depp Jones after their first mini album 1990. During the recordings for their debut album "Return to Caramba" Ludwig left the band and the ex-Rubbermind Revenge drummer Olaf Kobold joined. A number of singles followed as well as the live album "Welcome to hell" all released within 1990/91, before Michael Beckmann called it a day and Peter Sonntag joined instead. After the second album "At 2012 A.D." Depp Jones split up late 1992 but since Felsenheimer's ex-Die Ärzte mate Farin Urlaub disbanded his band King Kong too, they reactivated their old band and added Rod Gonzalez to the new line up. Depp Jones' music was a mix of Hard Rock, a bit Punk, Indie Rock and either a few Metal influences popped up here and there.(Thanx to emosteel for the heads up)
Discography:
"¡Return to Caramba!" LP/CD 1990 (Epic)
"Promo" MCD 1990 (Epic)
"Luxury/Mission impossible" 12"/MCD 1990 (Epic)
"Love is a ghost" 7" EP 1990 (Epic)
"Welcome to hell" MLP/MCD 1991 (Cyclon)
"At 2012 A.D." CD 1992 (Dragnet)
Dezztroyer
Lineup:
Band-info:
Not a single info could be found on Dezztroyer's privately pressed single from 1981. It seems either that the record was published without a picture sleeve, which makes this an obscurity par excellence as I'm sure all of the copies made, was spread just locally. Both tracks strongly remind me of the similar sounding eastgerman Hardrockers Berluc on their debut album, though Dezztroyer was much more connected with the typical Kraut Rock, whenalso a serious proggy, late 70's Hard Rock sound could be attested nevertheless. If you got more info about these guys, please get in touch.
die Balls
Lineup:
Band-info:
"die Balls" was an Indie Rock band originating from Hamburg, who independently pressed a single for their "Babylon Tour" in 1985. Though there are occasional slightly Hard Rock influences noticable and either heavier guitar solos, die Balls are absolutely uninteresting for Hard Rock fands and could be compared to f.e. Die Ärzte or similar german Rock bands. So better beware!Discography:
”Fallen angels” 7” EP 1985 (selfreleased)
Die Kanzlers
Lineup:
Thomas Kennel (Gesang)
Dirk Gesell (guitar)
Jörg Götzen (guitar)
Martin Otto /bass)
Frank Otto (drums)
Band-info:
A Heavy Rock band from Duisburg, that started in the very beginning of the 80's decade and used to sing in german. Late October 1989 the band recorded a selfproduced single, that contains the songs "Wenn es die Zeit erfordert" and "Alte Liebe", both featuring a lightweight radio friendly Heavy Rock (without keyboards), stylistically somewhere between the Scorpions and Rockfire. The cover, that's layoutet like a daily newspaper features a hand written number. According to the number on my copy, at least 1000 of these singles was pressed. If you got more info, pleae get in touch.
Dirty Laine
Lineup:
Band-info:
This obscure Melodic Metal band originated supposedly from Bavaria and it seems there has been two different versions made of their scarce 7". So far I've only ever seen two copies for sale yet and both had a different sleeve, while the sleeve of my own copy reveals the title "Special Secret Edition", dating from Nov. 13th 1992. As far as the info source is trustful, this seems to be a kinda testpressing or something, which probably wasn't even meant for sale. The original copies should come with the standard sleeve of Memphis Tonträgerproduktionen and got a logo sticker on front. The two trax are called "In the heat of the night" and "Shake me" and offer a mix of mid 80's AC/DC and Scorpions style melodic Heavy Rock, almost sounding similar to the Minestone 7", produced by the Memphis Tonträgerproduktionen too. No matter what copy of the single you may come across, both are the same single with same labels, but just different sleeves. We definitely need more info of this band and release.Discography:
"In the heat of the night" 7" EP 1991 (Memphis Tonträgerproduktionen)
"Special Secret Edition" 7" EP 1992 (Memphis Tonträgerproduktionen)
Disaster
Lineup:
Joachim Mayr (vocals)
K. Lang-Dietrich (guitar)
Lemmy (bass)
Chancy (drums)
Band-info:
Another obscure Disaster troop, hailing from Sonthofen/Bavaria, who seemed to exist since around 1987 and released the scarce single “No escape” on the local Marimba Records label right in the same year. The lads seemed to be musically impressed by the classic Motörhead style, delivering 2 quite british sounding songs with slightly punkish edge, not wondering at all why they used to call their style "Power Metal meets Rock'n'Roll". Especially the title track needs to be mentioned separately here, because during the second part it turns into a furious Speed Metal banger. One of the guys was called Nick Wirth, singer Joachim Mayr prefered to be rather called "Jerry". 1988 the troop also released their “In my blood” Demo and prepared another tape in 1989, entitled "Heavy Metal Pure", though if it was ever finished or officially released is yet not confirmed at all.We need more info of these hairy gentlemen.
(Thanx to Tatjana Menk for additional info!)
Discography:
“No escape” 7" EP 1987 (Marimba)
"In my blood" Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
"Heavy Metal Pure" Demo ??
Disaster (Bad Doberan)
Lineup:
Alex Blank (vocals)
Matthias Dankert (guitar)
Ulf Achenbach (guitar)
Axel Hennig (bass)
Alex Stuhr (drums)
Band-info:
A Heavy Metal band from Bad Doberan, west of Rostock on the coast of the Baltic Sea, formed after the political change inside the ex-GDR 1991. The band played several gigs/festivals and either won a compilation appearance on the local sampler "Rock'n MV" (not a single info found of that sampler yet, get in touch please). Prior to the release of their selfproduced album "The flying dutchman" from 1994, 4 of the album tracks already appeared on an obscure compilation with the title "Ride on the Underground - A heavy Compilation" in 1993. Disaster's sound was melodic and Power Metal related with some Iron Maiden and early 90's Metallica influences, and sometimes reminded a bit of the late Hardholz. Further info is needed.Discography:
"Rock'n MV" Comp.-CD Track 1993
"Ride on the Underground (A heavy Compilation)" Comp.-CD Tracks 1993 (Tepa)
Disaster (Pfaffenhofen)
Lineup:
Peter Stickler (vocals)
A. G. Brown (guitar)
Robert Klinger (bass)
Werner Heckmeier (drums)
Band-info:
A Hard Rock band from the Pfaffenhofen area in Bavaria, not to be confused with the Motörhead influenced Sonthofen Disaster band, active at around the very same time with a 7” available as well. These lads instead focused on being an 1:1 (seriously) AC/DC clone and according to the title of their scarce single “Black 'n' Bad” it shouldn’t be too difficult to figure out at all, what era of the band they had in mind. There isn’t much to add here, for AC/DC fans a worthy equivalent to check out! Not sure if Disaster just broke up afterwards or simply had changed the name to Shulk a few years later, because both Peter Stickler and Werner Heckmeier was found in Shulk, who released the “Taste delight” 12” in the very same style right in 1989.Discography:
“Black 'n' Bad” 7" EP 1986 (Murena)
Disgrace (Düsseldorf)
Lineup:
Herbert Fischer (vocals)
Thomas Rothes (guitar, vocals)
Theo Weyers (drums)
Band-info:
There’s "Dedicated to all SWEET fans" printed on the cover of this obscure Düsseldorf Heavy Rock outfit's sole vinyl single, released in 1986, but still there's no need to ignore this band. Sure, yet another cover version of Sweet's "Ballroom blitz" you may think, and indeed it’s surely not the best choice if you dedicate your musical legislating to only play coverversions of one band, while hundreds of others already did the same over and over again prior to your own grand idea. Therefore these lads put a Heavy Metal version of “Burn on the flame" on the flipside, a true power track. Sadly no other band info could be tracked down yet.Discography:
“The ballroom blitz” 7" EP 1986 (selfreleased)
Driving Force
Lineup:
Roman Breisch (vocals, keyboard)
Karl Krollmann (guitar)
Roger Bredel (guitar)
Clemens Freisinger (bass)
Stefan Prinke (drums)
Band-info:
A band from Gersthofen in the Augsburg area, that was formed in 1978 by Roman Breisch, who abraded quite a bunch of local musicians namely Herbert Dressl (bass), Norbert Müller (bass), Christoph Bergmann (guitar), Heinz Behrmann (guitar) and Robert Ruddigkeit (drums), till a steady line up finally had crystallized. At around 1980 an info sheet described Driving Force to act between the Scorpions and Black Sabbath, weil Breisch himself didn't stop at all trying to lead the musical development of the group always further. Driving Force split up during 1983 and Stefan Prinke, Karl Krollmann, Heinz Behrmann (guitar, ex-Greyhound) and Norbert Müller (bass) of the last Driving Force line up formed Kick Down, while Roman Breisch recorded a single with the Funk Rock band No Limit.Discography:
Dysentery
Lineup:
Robby Zschille (guitar, vocals)
Mark Habicht (bass, vocals)
Rico Bail (drums)
Band-info:
Dysentery from Altenburg (ex-GDR), was founded during the disturbances of the political change in 1990 and recorded a Demo tape plus a limited single (500 copies) in 1991 for Poserslaughter Records. Afterwards not much happened anymore, which according to the common Death/Grind these lads used to play wasn't much surprising at all. 1993 the dutch Lowland Records gave these guys another chance and published Dysentery's "...brings me no tears" CD, that for sure showcased a more experienced sort of once again grinding Gore/Death Metal, but not of the kind to set any course within that scene. 1995 they tried with the "Pro Patria" Demo and 1998 with another tape called "The distance", but no label showed interest anymore. In the 2000's they recorded 2 albums plus one more Demo before they at last called it a day in 2006.Discography:
"Abnormal faecal" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"Pathological waste" 7" EP 1991 (Poserslaughter)
"...brings me no tears" CD 1993 (Lowland)
Eisenbeisser
Lineup:
Band-info:
Eisenbeisser only released one 7" on Woolfe Records and this single is quite a confusing affair because both songs was written by a producer (Frank Becking) and soundtechnican (Norbert Grimme). I dunno if these guys was part of the band since there is no line up mentioned on the sleeve. The title track is quite a cheeky rip off of Judas Priest and Fastway with a little piece of AC/DC. They indeed managed to use the refrain of "Breaking the law" in slow motion and sell it as their own. The B-side is a solid midtempo Hard Rocker. What's uncommon with this band was that they used to sing in german. There is no year mentioned but it should be from around 1983.Discography:
"Kohle machen" 7"EP 198x (Woolfe)
Lineup:
Harry Wieser (vocals)
Peter Schneider (guitar)
Lupo Greil (guitar)
Jürgen Weigt (bass)
Harry Stümpfl (keyboard)
Dieter Stümpfl (drums)
Band-info:
A shortlived AOR project from Munich (we think), featuring Harry Wieser and Harry Stümpfl, who both released a Kraut Rock album 1975 with Rockin' Mona. Apart of the quite outstanding AOR/Hard Rocker "Eagle in the sky" (with hit ambitions), the album contains very common for that time standard Classic Rock/AOR tunes, that won't really impress most of you, though for Classic Rock fans the LP might be worth a try. Harry Stümpfl 1982 at the peak of the NDW released a single with the NDW/Pop band Nervös and later 1984 an album with M.P. (not the Metal Priests!!), featuring once again ordinary Pop music. His brother Dieter hooked up with famous german Rock/Schlager superstar Wolfgang Petry, while Jürgen Weigt (he worked at the Glashaus Studio) produced Nervös' first album.Discography:
"Welcome to our Rock'n'Roll dreams" LP 1980 (Jupiter)
Emm Cramer Band
Lineup:
Günter Rosenberger (guitar)
Helmut Nöker (bass)
Klaus Stell (guitar)
Bernward Ackerschott (drums)
Band-info:
The Emm Cramer Band was based somewhere in the Sauerland area (between Bielefeld and Wuppertal) and there's a selfproduced 7" available of this female fronted Rock band from probably the very late 80's. Unfortunately I just could find 4 names of ex-musicians, but not of the quite good singing girl behind the microphone, as the lads was active till in the late 2000's as a cover band by playing songs of Metallica, AC/DC, Van Halen, Ozzy etc. The sleeve of the single doesn't provides any info at all and musically they pretty much hadn't much in common with the aforementioned bands on both featured trax. Musically somewhere between AOR and Hard Rock acting, the songs "Rainbow in the night" and "Ride on" got a strong bluesy edge. On "Ride on" I feel slightly reminded of Blues Rockers The Black Crowes. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
”Rainbow in the night” 7” EP 8? (selfreleased)
Empire (Wuppertal)
Lineup:
Bernd Kaspers (guitar, vocals)
Roland Lange (guitar)
Gerd König (bass)
Raimund Naumann (drums)
Band-info:
A classic Hard Rock band from Wuppertal, that was active from the late 70's till around 1982 and debuted with the "Sadistic Sadie" 7" 1980 (not much recommended). 1981 before the bands only album was recorded, Oliver Petry (vocals), Dirk Fleck (bass) and Fred Otto (drums) replaced König and Naumann. The selftitled album features just typical AC/DC style powerful Hard Rock sound with slightly Blues edge. After the album the band split up already around 1982, while Dirk Fleck and Fred Otto played together for a short while in Fleck's band "Fleck". Otto would subsequently found the legendary Random in 1983. Dirk Fleck after this musical sidestep would join the right path again in the late 80's with the band Mama. During 1988 all of the guys, Bernd Kaspers, Roland Lange, Dirk Fleck, Oliver Petry and Fred Otto returned united under the monicker Exit and released a single on Rooceter Music, featuring the Led Zeppelin cover "Whole lotta love".Discography:
"Sadistic Sadie" 7" EP 1980 (RRR)
"Empire" LP 1981 (Repertoire)
"Let me love you with lights on" 7" EP 1981 (Repertoire)
Endless Pain
Lineup:
Gutzi (bass)
Denis (drums)
Heiko Gerull (guitar)
Mario (vocals)
Band-info:
A thrashing Death Metal act from Trusetal/Thüringen (ex-GDR) founded in 1990 that imo published both their releases too early. The demo contains low level Death Metal with Thrash influences and at least on the title track you can hear hints of the classic Death sound from the 80's. But then the level goes down drastically and the interaction of the musicians appears far below the usual standards. On the "False truth" 7" (with white labels) you got almost the same picture while here the sound is just terrible low and now you clearly can hear all the mistakes that on the Demo the bassy sound prevented. The songwriting either is catastrophic. I bet they didn't sell much of these singles back in the day. On the 7" the troop shrunk to a trio. The old drummer Denis was replaced by Kranich and Heiko Gerull took over the vocals as well and exactly this Heiko Gerull later founded the Pagan Metal band Menhir.Discography:
"Broken world" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"False truth" 7"EP 1992 (selfreleased)
Entera
Lineup:
Carsten Lutter (bass, vocals)
Bernd Schönborn (guitar)
Olaf Wilken (drums)
Band-info:
Founded in Zweibrücken 1990, Death Metallers Entera's first lifesign was a selfproduced single, recorded in June '93, that featured 3 songs with bad Demo production (not as worse as the Endless Pain single tough), stylistically in the vein of Benediction rehearsal trax for "Subsconscious terror" or something like that. Especially the vocal trax are lacking a hell of power, caused by the bad production and the nonexistent vocal effects, that usually belong to any proper Death Metal recording session. For a Demo it would have been ok, lower middle league stuff, but for a vinyl release it's a pretty low level affair. The lads later in the 2000's started releasing a number of albums and are still alive nowadays.Discography:
”Crossing” 7” EP 1993 (selfreleased)
Entry
Lineup:
Stefan Vermehren (vocals)
Michael Gliese (guitar)
Thorsten Ritter (guitar)
Holger Timm (bass)
David Roth (keyboard)
Michael Link (drums)
Band-info:
ENTRY from Hamburg originally formed during 1981 as SEPARATE REALITY and released a nice 7" on the Pirol label in 1988 that features the cool Heavy Rocker "Metal skies" and the more or less rather AORish "Enough", who's refrain could be compared to a heavier form of BACHMANN TURNER OVERDRIVE's "You ain't seen nothing yet" in a way. Later the guys also recorded a 6 track Demo tape in 1991, who's drum parts was all done by still Jürgen Schlottau, but the booklet already mentions Michael Link (ex-TRON/LADY/INFERNO/MP) as new drummer. Additionally David Roth (keyboard) and Goetz Sucke (vocals) had joined the band while Struck and Gliese left SEPARATE REALITY after the single. That tape featured their wellknown blend of Prog Metal and Hard Rock sounds, offering either occasional FATES WARNING hints. 1992, when Stefan Vermehren became their new singer, the lads decided to change the band's name to ENTRY and released the "Out of court" Demo the following year. ENTRY in the meanwhile kept the former upperclass melodic Hard Rock/Metal sound that SEPARATE REALITY used to perform as well and presented quite typical late 80's material during the mid 90's. Another Demo was recorded before the band went into a studio to record the album "Face the world" back in 1996, which though wasn't released before 1999, due to different internal hassle.Discography:
"Out of court" Demo 1993 (selfreleased)
Excrement Terror
Lineup:
Tino Mothes (guitar, drums)
Andreas Schwach (vocals, bass)
Band-info:
Excrement Terror was a short lived Grindcore project from Schneeberg/Saxony (ex-GDR) consisting of the two Bloodbrain guys Tino Mothes and Andreas Schwach who got a little help from ex and future band mates Heiko Kahn (drums) and Tino Röder (guitar) to produce some ear-battering noise in 1990. The demo got not released before 1993, but nobody would spill a single tear if they would have locked it in their basement.Discography:
"Achachnophobia" Demo 1993 (selfreleased)
Exit
Lineup:
Bernd Kaspers (guitar, vocals)
Roland Lange (guitar)
Dirk Fleck (bass)
Oliver Petry (keyboard, vocals)
Fred Otto (drums)
Band-info:
Not sure if this was just an accident or indeed a last attempt to revive the old Hard Rock band Empire from Wuppertal, that all the involved musicians previously had played in during the early 80's. As we know Dirk Fleck had his own band Mama on the start and Nietenpapst Fred Otto was working on Random's big breakthrough, so whatever this band was trying to achieve, we can't tell ya. The Rooceter label released a 2 track single in 1988, that featured a quite poppy/commercial sounding Hard Rock band, while "Whole lotta love" was a cover of Led Zeppelin. Nevertheless this single is indeed quite obscure nowadays and seldomly seen.Discography:
"Whole lotta love" 7" EP 1988 (Rooceter)
Exodus
Lineup:
Andreas Lill (drums)
Band-info:
This AOR/melodic Hard Rock band was originating from Kaiserslautern and was kinda pre-Vanden Plas, featuring their Andreas Lill on drums. Most probably other early Vanden Plas members was part of the band too. The guys was around during the early mid 80's and either recorded several Demo songs, but when they found out about the US Thrashers, was forced to change their name to Vanden Plas during 1986. Lill's brother Stephan then joined the band on guitar and Andy Kuntz (ex-Rock Zock) became their vocalist, and as Vanden Plas they released their debut single "Double A side" on BEE Records the same year.Discography:
Expect No Mercy
Lineup:
Eberhard Stettner (vocals)
Frank Thoms (guitar)
René Schütz (guitar)
Jörg Vitt (bass)
Mike Külpmann (drums)
Band-info:
Expect No Mercy was founded by Eberhard Stettner and the still very young Frank Thoms 1981 in Siegen, but they needed several months and dozens of musicians to find Mike Külpmann 1982 on drums, who'd keep up longer with the guys. In mid '84 bassist Jörg Vitt joined and shortly later Rene Schütz on guitar, who would appear on the band's 3 track debut Demo. That Demo caught the interest of Ingo Nowotny, who took the guys under contract and produced their "Steelbreed" album, which was later published on Mausoleum Records, but without Rene Schütz, who joined Thunderbolt in 1985 and later the more prominent Accu§er. The sound of the fourpiece at that time was very powerful Metal in the vein of Warrant/Wallop with in places slightly Motörhead touch. After the album the story of Expect No Mercy is getting kinda opaque. We know that Ingo Nowotny was involved and that's something where your warning bells should start wringing. Frank Thoms quit Expect No Mercy 1985 to join Breaker, who would soon become Accu§er, while Mike Külpmann founded Escape late 1986. Jörg Vitt on the other hand joined the band Area 1986. I dunno how that looks for you, but my mind tells me that Expect No Mercy in 1986 had been pretty much finished. But out of nothing 1988 another Expect No Mercy album was written and produced by Ingo Nowotny & team (Simon Sobkowiak, Matthias Raue, Patrice Jones, Michael Cloud, Pete De Oliveira and Ralf Förg), with either the ENM contact address being Ingo Nowotny's. My thesis, ENM's contract was running for several albums and Nowotny most probably fulfilled ENM's part for another album that they still owned him, by composing and producing it himself. Nevertheless "Watch your ears..." in contrary to other of his selfwritten fake albums, hitted quite hard. Faultless speed driven Power Metal (fake or not) left no other questions unanswered. But the whole farce hadn't found it's end yet, two years later another Expect No Mercy album surfaced with the title "The dreams of Marquis de Sade", once again featuring quite cool powerful Heavy Metal and this time not a single name of involved musicians was printed anywhere. Did he screw the band once again? After this 3rd album, the outputs of the band ended abrupt. I guess the contract was fulfilled now? It would be nice if there's someone out there who could bring light into this dark chapter of german history. Please note, although Metal Archives lists further Demos "Tamed a fist" (1984) and "Ride the sky" (1987), I tend to leave em out of their discography. My info that was confirmed till ENM's debut album, did only mention one Demo the lads had recorded and as for "Ride the sky", since the band most probably split up around 1986 and returned 1988 as Nowotny fake, I rate "Ride the sky" as highly doubtable. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"Demo Cassette" Demo 1984 (selfreleased)
"Steelbreed" LP 1984 (Mausoleum)
"Watch your ears and save your neck we are back to our second attack!" LP 1988 (Metal Enterprises)
"The dreams of Marquis de Sade" LP/CD 1990 (Metal Enterprises)
Exray
Lineup:
Dirk Mühlig (vocals)
Jochen Bach (guitar)
Jörg Gehlhaar (guitar)
Thomas Göttlich (bass)
Martin Winter (drums)
Band-info:
A Power Metal band from Giessen, that used to call their style "progressive Heavy Metal" and was formed by ex-Iron Breed guys Jörg Gehlhaar, Thomas Göttlich and Martin Winter in July 1987. In May '88 it was time to record their first Demo, simply entitled "First tapes", followed by "Hungarian tapes" in 1989 with Volker Kostorz (guitar) replacing Jochen Bach, and another tape with the title "Time for Exray" that should date from around early 1990. The ex-Hammerschmitt axeman Andreas Plüschel had joined Exray on the second guitar and either their former Iron Breed vocalist Olaf Dietzel replaced Dirk Mühlig, while the band received an offer by Ingo Nowotny to produce an album, but for some strange reason Nowotny wanted the guys to change their name to Asgard (He did similar crap with Heaven Ward, if you may remember.). The quintet agreed and recorded the "Dark horizons" album still in 1990. Though I'm pretty sure the band never saw a single Cent for the album, we should be thankful for this whole illegal transaction, as "Dark horizons" easily enters the top ranks amoungst the Heavy Metal albums released during 1990/91. The guys was playing a somewhat fresh and uncomplicated sounding speedy Power Metal in the Atlain/Running Wild/Powerlord vein, that it was indeed a shame they band split up shortly after the album release in 1991.Tomi Göttlich could subsequent join Grave Digger and got at least a part of the fame, that the other bands Exray/Asgard was denied.Discography:
"First tapes" Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
”Hungarian tapes” Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"Time for Exray" Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
Faceless
Lineup:
Jörg Bock
Band-info:
Minotaur's Jörg Bock during 1990 tried to start a solo project with the name Faceless and wanted to record a Promo 7" till the end of that year, together with other local Hamburg musicians. Seems, the project was just shortlived as that single was never released as we do know. Further info is welcome nevertheless.Discography:
Fact
Lineup:
Reent Fröhlich (vocals)
Michael Otto (guitar)
Patricia Huth (guitar)
Thorsten Kath (bass)
Peer Würfel (drums)
Band-info:
Another promising band from Sande that was just around for a too short time, but at least could produce two classic Metal LP's in the mid 80's, surprisingly featuring a female guitarist. The band was founded in June 1983 and already in November had plans to record a single. But being already in the studio, the guys quickly recognized that drummer and vocalist had to be exchanged quickly. Peer "Michael P. Cube" Würfel (drums) and Reent "Randy Son" Fröhlich (vocals) was added and already in February '84 the "Heavy Metal power play" Demo was recorded, that was good enough for Mausoleum Records to sign the band immediately. In a way "As a matter of..." could be seen as the Heavy Metal version of Accept, due to Reent's voice that sounded close to Udo Dirkschneider's, but Fact just acted way heavier, delivering in places NWOBHM sound combined with the well known german heaviness. Same picture on the band's second album "Without warning", that Axel Thubeauville produced for his Earthshaker label in Roctober '85. Raw typically german Metal noise, heavily Accept influenced is swinging the scepter and might be the right equivalent for all those who like the Accept-ish Metal but Accept themselves still was too much Hard Rock rooted. After the album it became silent around Fact, but in 1987 one final, lesser known 4-song promo demo was recorded with a new singer, only known as Mike so far. Supposedly it was a bit more melodic in style without being considered 'commercial' and included titles like "Locked Up In A Cage", "Chinese Wall" and "Lawless". In early '88 ex-Brainfever Horst Neumann replaced their vocalist Michael Feyer, who went on to sing for Fandango. Later that year then parts of the band united with ex-Diamond Breaker guys to form the successful Crossroads, white guitarist Michael Otto formed the slightly less remembered Douglaz AM.Discography:
"Heavy Metal power play" Demo 1984 (selfreleased)
"As a matter of..." LP 1984 (Mausoleum)
"Without warning" LP 1985 (Earthshaker)
"Shout out loud" Comp.-LP Track 1985 (Metallic Bunny's Fast Collection)
Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
Fair Warning
Lineup:
Hannes Holzmann (guitar)
Holmer Graap (drums)
Michael Schmitt (bass)
Petros Roudeniklis (keyboard)
Stefan Donatin (vocals)
Band-info:
As far as I know these guys from the greater Coburg area only released a single in 1987. It's more or less a privately pressed vinyl since MG Studios is the name of the studio where they recorded that 2 trax in May '87. The title track has a slightly epic touch and is a midpaced kept metallic number, but "I need you" is delivering the full power. That one is fastpaced with melodic NWOBHM touch, a little bit like Virtue sounding, but the vocalist has had it's problems. Unfortunately both songs are rather short. Michael Schmitt would later join Thrashers Justice. Holzmann and Graap started the James Blast Orchestra (J.B.O.) in 1989 to make us all laugh.Discography:
"True lovers" 7" EP 1987 (MG Studios)
Faithful Breath
Lineup:
Heinrich Mikus (guitar, vocals)
Horst Stabenow (bass)
Reinhold Immig (guitar)
Walter Scheurer (guitar)
Jürgen Fischer (drums)
Band-info:
Faithful Breath was founded already in the early year 1967 by the two teenagers and ex-The Magic Power members Heinrich (Heinz) Mikus and Horst Stabenow in Bochum together with Reinhold Immig, Walter Scheuer and Jürgen Fischer. Either Ulrich Bock (saxophone, flute) joined the group, but Immig already quit in spring '69. In Autumn '70 Jürgen Fischer left the guys as well due to his required army service. The band moved to Witten and found Jürgen Weritz (ex-Mama Werwolf) to replaced him early 1971. Ulrich Bock was forced to leave as well due to a tuberculosis disease and late '72 either Walter Scheurer went his own path. Manfred von Buttlar (ex-Mama Werwolf) was hired on organs and the band's sound changed sides to a more symphonic, spacy Prog Rock sound with the line up Mikus, Stabenow, Weritz and von Buttlar, that recorded Faithful Breath's debut album "Fading beauty" in late '73, while the album was manufactured and published independently on their own label FB Music in a limited edition of 1500 copies. 1975 the guys had to press another edition with different sleeve. After two years of heavy touring, vocalist Jürgen Renfordt joined the band and October '77 one more private 7" (Stick in your eyes") appeared on their label FB Music and parallel to the single release, Faithful Breath recorded the "Back on my hill" LP 1978, that was introduced during a radio show, but the guys hadn't even found a label yet. Aladin Records signed the band, but didn't publish the album at all, which resulted in Faithful Breath to judicially cancel the contract, which took some time and could finally publish the LP on Sky Records in 1980. Still the album has to be counted to the Prog Rock genre and shouldn't be of interest for us at all. After the "Die Mörderbiene" 12" 1981, Manfred von Buttlar, Jürgen Renfordt and Jürgen Weritz left Faithful Breath to concentrate on their personal professional careers. Mikus and Stabenow started from zero with drummer Uwe Otto on the "Rock lions" LP, that introduced Faithful's Breath stylistical change towards the Hard Rock and Heavy Metal business. Originally the trio had planned to change the band name to Hurricane by the release of the album, but Sky Records didn't allow that at all. But the lads from this day forward screwed on the horns on their newly bought helmets and optically transformed into Germany's answer to swedish Heavy Load, while musically Faithful Breath's music had nothing in common with the old Prog Rock anymore. Classic Hard Rock with 70's touch incl. Boogie and AC/DC influenced songs heralded a new era of the band's career. Uwe Otto already left the band late '81 and Jürgen Düsterloh joined 1982, to record the once again heavier sounding "Hard breath" album 1983. Faithful Breath was moving closer to real Heavy Metal step by step and finally succeeded that aim 1984 with "Gold'n'Glory", that featured the ex-Bullet guitarist Andy Hönig, and adopted several Judas Priest and Accept influences. "Gold'n'Glory" became Faithful Breath's best selling album, but Stabenow quit the same year and Peter Dell took his part. Horst Stabenow would later in 1988 found the band Magic Power and record an album with Syntra. Due to Mausoleum's financial problems Faithful Breath was forced to search for a new label to release the album "Skol", and ended up on a follow up label of one of the Mausoleum Records guys, Ambush Records, who sadly couldn't promote the band the way they needed it to gain the big breakthrough in Germany. The album was hardly available at local shops nationwide and therefore the co-operation got ended right after one album. "Skol" just like the previous "Gold'n'Glory" delivered just typical mid 80's german Metal, somewhere between Accept and Judas Priest. Thilo Hermann on the LP replaced Andy Hönig, who went back to Bullet in 1984 and two years later formed the band ABH/Spitfire. Still benefiting from "Gold'n'Glory"s success, Faithful Breath subsequently signed a contract with Noise in the meanwhile and published a live album 1986, that was meant to bypass the time till the release of the new fullenght. But it shouldn't happen this way anymore. After a tour through Poland the lads early 1987 once again changed their musical direction, outfits and band name to Risk and heralded once again a new era as Speed Metal act. Faithful Breath songs also appeared on numerous compilations, that we don't list here at all.Discography:
"Fading beauty" LP 1974 (FB Music)
"Stick in your eyes" 7" EP 1977 (FB Music)
"Back on my hill" LP 1980 (Sky)
"Rock lions" LP 1981 (Sky)
"Die Mörderbiene" 12" EP 1981 (Sky)
"Hurricane" 7" EP 1981 (Sky)
"Hard breath" LP 1983 (Sky)
"Gold 'n' glory" LP 1984 (Mausoleum)
"A million hearts" 7" EP 1984 (Mausoleum)
"Skol" LP 1985 (Ambush)
"Live" LP 1986 (Noise)
"Double thing" Comp.-CD 1989 (Steamhammer)
Fancy
Lineup:
Kerpacs
Diehm
Demsky
Wiedmann
Band-info:
An obscure german Hard Rock band with independent single from 1982. The lads used to play a quite melodic classic Hard Rock with heavy guitars and kinda spacy touch. Looks like the band was heavily influenced by the Scorpions. Seriously one of the better early singles. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"Big city lights" 7" EP 1982 (Messidor)
Fargo
Lineup:
Peter Ladwig (guitar, vocals)
Hanno Großmann (guitar)
Peter Korn (bass)
Frank Tolle (drums)
Band-info:
The band Fargo was founed in 1972 in Hannover by Peter Korn, Peter Ladwig, Hanno Großmann and Frank Tolle, but it would take until 1977 to release a first single. 1979 due to good contacts to the other Hannover bands Eloy and Jane, Fargo recorded their first album in the own studio of the band Jane, while Eloy guitarist Frank Bornemann convinced the label of his band to release Fargo's debut. The "Wishing well" entitled LP featured a still Southern Rock inspired sort of Hard Rock, a style which basically would also get carried over to the band's second effort "No limit" from 1980. Drummer Frank Tolle got replaced by Rudi Kaeding (ex-Firehorse) on the band's breakthrough album "Frontpage lover" 1981, that opened several doors for the band's further career. On "Frontpage lover" Fargo had eventually fully turned into a classic Hard Rock act and the lads could support AC/DC and April Wine during their tours, which ended in the fact that Hanno Großmann left the guys to concentrate on his studies. Tommy Newton played the additional guitar on Fargo's 4th album simply entitled "F" in 1982, that might be the heaviest of the bunch, celebrating a solid typical early 80's Hard Rock sound in the vein of Kiss, orientated towards the future. Nevertheless, Fargo was disbanded in early '84 due to band internal problems concearning the musical direction, but that either was the birth of another band called Victory. In 1984 when Tommy Newton and Peter Knorn of Fargo was preparing another album and looking for new members, their long time friends the Scorpions organized a new management from the US, that immediately started preparing a big career for the band with the first step being to change the band name to Victory. The rest is history...Discography:
"Comin' together" 7" EP 1977 (Lava)
"Wishing well" LP 1979 (Crystal)
"No limit" LP 1980 (Crystal)
"The last" 7" EP 1980 (Crystal)
"Frontpage lover" LP 1981 (Harvest)
"Tokyo" 7" EP 1981 (Harvest)
"F" LP 1982 (Harvest)
Fast Eddy
Lineup:
Band-info:
Utterly obscure HM act from Troisdorf, between Bonn and Cologne, whose even more scarce single "Hot Metal nights" we've never ever have heard about earlier yet. It seems a little misleading at first that the band chose the name Fast Eddy, as one immediately thinks of the master himself, Fast Eddie Clarke. Also very interesting is the outrageous fact that this 7" is a demo EP, which means that there shouldn't really be many copies in circulation. Musically, both trax "Hot Metal nights" and "Hell is breaking out" offer a strong NWOBHM sound, the latter even reminiscent of Crucifixion's "On the run". One source mentioned the year 1989, but there is no information on the single itself.Discography:
“Hot Metal nights" Demo 7" EP 1989 (Klug)
First Attempt
Lineup:
Darko Ceh (vocals)
Sabine Romeyka (vocals)
Johannes Tunyogi-Csapo (guitar)
Jörg Martin (bass)
Lilo (drums)
Band-info:
A female fronted band from Frankenberg, north of Marburg, with a privately released single, recorded in March '88. Though there is a male vocalist mentioned in the line up, both songs on the vinyl was sung by Sabine Romeyka. The single is also known under the title "Cry for love" and this particular track could be either labelled Heavy Rock, that sadly due to the poppy keyboards gets an typical AOR touch. The flipside track then features a slightly softer tune with R'n'R edge. If you got more info, please get in touch.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"First attempt" 7" EP 1988 (selfreleased)
Formel 1
Lineup:
Norbert Schmidt (vocals)
Wolfgang Densky (guitar)
Detlef Dudziak (bass)
Peter Fincke (drums)
Band-info:
Being the undisputed number 1 amoung the Heavy Metal bands from ex-GDR, the band Formel 1 was activated in 1981, when previous members (Norbert Schmidt, Wolfgang Densky, Peter Fincke) of the defunct Joco Dev Sextett from Berlin, that was active since the late 60's and was playing proggy Kraut Rock in the beginning, but moved on musically towards an Hard Rock inspired sound during the last phase of their career, formed a new band with the aim to worship their new heroes Iron Maiden and Judas Priest. Caused by their previous more than 10 years the lads had been in the business, they gained a huge advantage to the other young Metal bands and soon after officially got promoted from governmental side, which allowed them to appear in national TV shows and to participate on vinyl compilations, that helped spreading the name Formel 1 throughout the whole country and climbing the top. Detlef Dudziak joined them soon on bass and also the slovakian guitarist Andrej Horvath was added 1982. But the latter just stayed for a short time and was replaced by Bodo Kommnick still in '82 first and in 1983 Reinhold Heß was permanently hired. Schmidt, Densky, Dudziak, Heß and Fincke would build the classic line up of Formel 1, and after becoming professional musicians, the band started recording several songs per year for the national broadcast service. The very first appearance on a sampler was with "Eddie" in 1983 on the "Heiße Würstchen" LP, shortly after followed by "Hiroshima Kranich" on the "Denke daran" Split 7". The success on the national hitparades earned the guys a first own single, that was produced in 1985 and as the very first Heavy Metal band of the GDR ever, Formel 1 could release a full (live) album right in 1986, which was entitled "Live im Stahlwerk". Funnily besides their own well known creations, they was allowed to feature coverversions of Maiden and Priest on the LP either. The band's sound got even heavier during the mid 80's, new songs like "Kreuzritter" and "Hart wie Stahl" was composed, but early '87 Reinhold Heß quit and the ex-Mephisto/Vantom guitarist Michael Sündermann replaced him for a very short time. Though a second album was planned, the officials didn't really want to co-operate with the band, as the influence Formel 1 had on the Heavy Metal fans wasn't much liked by the government's fat cats. Due to the bullying from official sides, two of the members had officially requested to leave the country, which resulted in Formel 1 disbanding in December of the same year. Fincke and Schmidt left the country, Densky joined Babylon, while Dudziak and Sündermann hooked up with Pharao. Formel 1's sound was tightly connected to the NWOBHM, especially the classic Iron Maiden sound with massive twin lead attacks built the backbone of Formel 1's music.Here you can watch a clip of Formel 1
Discography:
"Eddie" Comp.-LP Track 1983 (Heiße Würstchen)
"Hiroshima Kranich" Split 7" EP Track 1983 (Denke daran)
"18 Jahre sein/Mach keine Wellen" 7" EP 1985 (Amiga)
"Der Weg nach oben" Comp.-LP Track 1986 (Rock-Bilanz 1985)
"Live im Stahlwerk" LP 1986 (Amiga)
"Heavy Metal" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Rock-Bilanz 1986)
"Eddie" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Berliner Rocker - Zwischen Prenzlauer Berg und Mont Klamott)
"Der Weg nach oben" Comp.-CD Track 1993 (Deutscher Demokratischer Beat - Vol. 2)
Broadcast Recordings:
"Mensch Rosie" (1982)
"Willste nich uffstehn" (1982)
"Sie will weg" (1983)
"Jenny" (1983)
"Da bleibt was von mir" (1984)
"Der Fußballfan" (1984)
"Wär mein Leben programmierbar" (1985)
"Der Weg nach oben" (1985)
"Der Edelrocker" (1985)
"Speedway" (1985)
"Berlin" (1986)
"Letztes Rad am Wagen" (1986)
"Hart wie Stahl" (1986)
Demo Recordings:
„Kreuzritter“ (1987)
Forum
Lineup:
Thomas Martin (vocals)
Holger Kaniß (guitar)
Reinhard Pestel (bass)
Jens Schmidt (keyboard)
Klaus Fechtner (drums)
Band-info:
A Melodic Rock/AOR band with slightly proggy touch hailing from the eastgerman city of Werdau in the south of the ex-GDR, that formed during 1980. The line up naturally changed during the first few years of Forum’s existence, but during 1984 the band eventually consisted of Thomas Martin (vocals), Holger Kaniß (guitar), Reinhard Pestel (bass), Jens Schmidt (keyboard), and Klaus Fechtner (drums), who got rewarded for their successful participation on the “7th FDJ Werkstattwoche Jugendtanzmusik” happening in Suhl during 1984, and could produce the song “Die letzten Stunden” in a professional studio. This song that reminds kinda of Berluc’s material at that time (especially the vocals), appeared on the sampler “Auf dem Wege 4” the following year as well. Forum’s kind of melodic AOR with Hard Rock guitars could entrap the officials to push the future career of the band and therefore more studio recordings happened during summer of 1985. In the meantime guitarist Holger Kaniß was replaced by Anselm Riess (ex-Dialog/Block) and within May of the same year also ex-Dialog Günther Franz (vocals) and the new drummer Jörg Markgraf joined. One song („Verraten und verkauft") of that mentioned studio session from summer 1985 appeared on a split single entitled “Startschuss”, featuring other GDR newcomers like Perl, Condor and MEX. The band was also immortalized on the 4-way split LP “Kleeblatt № 19” with 2 more tracks, in addition to “Verraten und verkauft”, which probably reflected the complete studio session from the summer of 1985. However, the high expectations could not really be fulfilled by the band and so FORUM slowly but steadily disbanded. Anselm Riess had the duo PROJEKT M with former FORUM singer Thomas Martin for a while, but then went his own way.Discography:
“Die letzten Stunden” Comp,-LP Track 1985 (Auf dem Wege 4)
„Verraten und verkauft" Split 7" EP Track 1986 (with Condor/Perl/MEX, „Startschuss“)
„Kleeblatt № 19“ Split LP Tracks 1987 (with Condor/Chicorée/Lucie, Amiga)
Four Wheel Drive
Lineup:
Roger Eckel
Jürgen Grescher
Jürgen Keller
Ali Patzak
Jochen Volpert
Band-info:
A Heavy Rock band from Würzburg that appeared the first time ever on vinyl on a self financed obscure single from sometime in the early 80's. The band's sound marked a sort of Classic Rock inspired Hard Rock (like early Survivor f.e.) at this time but that would change with the coming years, just like the track "Straight through the heart" on the local compilation "Musik aus Würzburg" proves, where they for sure have been the best band featured with their Melodic Metal, that had some Hard Rock edges as well. They afterwards released a 7" privately once again in the fall of the 80's, but now fully had turned into melodic Hard Rock with metallic solos. Just the B-side track "This must be magic" features a rather poppy sounding ballad.Discography:
"Lady of the night" 7" EP 198? (selfreleased)
"Straight through the heart" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Musik aus Würzburg)
"Gimme your love" 7" EP 1989 (selfreleased)
Foxfire
Lineup:
Chuck Deely (guitar, vocals)
Claus Ackermann (bass)
Andreas Urban (drums, vocals)
Band-info:
Foxfire from Heidelberg are still quite unknown amoung Hard Rock fans, what’s not really hard to understand since the group’s legislating fell into the peak of German Krautrock movement, and seriously their debut album "Between a rock and a hard place" from 1979 has a huge proggy edge nevertheless. Despite that fact, fans of the heavy Prog Rock may risk an ear or two, as the creations of the trio are quite ambivalent, having dreamy parts that abruptly getting cut through with sawing guitars. The band consisted of the German guys Claus Ackermann, Andreas Urban plus the US American guitarist Chuck Deely (Charles Edward Deely III), who seemed to have tinkled around across Europe to play with several bands back in the day till he stranded in the Netherlands until his death during 2017. With Foxfire he recorded 2 albums plus a single featuring the song “Rebellion”, taken from the way heavier second Foxfire album “Good to go” from 1980, plus the non album number on the flipside “For ever and a day”. Speaking of “Good to go”, that’s overall quite raw sounding Hard Rock with tons of Heavy Metal approaches and especially that “Rebellion” song surprises with an absolutely evil riff that reminds of Flames of Hell. Deely still released another album entitled “Enjoy” in 1982 with Chuck Deely's Rockaine, before lights went out for a long while. During the 2000’s he reappeared as a street musician in Den Haag, where he recorded and sold a number of privately produced CD’s of his own until his death.Discography:
"Between a rock and a hard place" LP 1979 (Stall Studio)
"Good to go" LP 1980 (Stall Studio)
"Rebellion/For ever and a day" 7" EP 1980 (selfreleased)
Frantic Blue
Lineup:
Ronald Rusz (vocals)
Volker Stolte (guitar)
Ralf Brinkmann (bass)
Mathias Büsseler (drums)
Band-info:
Another obscure local Hard Rock act hailing from Bremen, with one of those obscure singles that was manufactured by Memphis Tonträgerproduktionen around 1990/91. Like other Memphis singles, also Frantic Blue's had these standard labels with the "Promotion only" tag, but at least came with a picture sleeve. Nevertheless the sound of these guys was a typical early 90's style metallic Hard Rock, with especially "Don't you remember" rocking pretty hard, but with sleazy touch. The title track sadly features some ugly funky undertones among the heavier parts, so we better leave this one off. Further info about the band is needed.Discography:
"Hometown" 7" EP 1991 (selfreleased)
Funny Revival
Lineup:
Jürgen (vocals, guitar)
Tommy L. (guitar, vocals)
Mony (bass, vocals)
Mike (drums)
Band-info:
It's difficult to say which region this quartet came from. There is only scant information on their only single. According to the recording studio they most probably originated from the Dortmund/Hagen/Iserlohn area. Musically they didn't seem to have progressed much beyond mediocrity. Their antiquated sounding Boogie Hard Rock was fundamentally rooted in the sound of the 70’s, and STATUS QUO was probably one of their favorite bands. FUNNY REVIVAL rocked at least in the same style as the Brits, only 2 leagues below, and offered plenty of R'n'R infected Hard Rock with an emphasis on the Boogie sound.Discography:
“German Power Rock” 7" EP 1981 (TBS)
Future
Lineup:
Telemar Rosenberger (guitar, vocals)
Hanns Talhorst (guitar)
Michael Sprindt (bass)
Peter Dischhäuser (keyboard)
Reiner Schützler (drums)
Band-info:
A Hard Rock band from Moers/Duisburg, that wasn't so easy to find any background info about at all. A very obscure single with the songs "Say goodbye" and "Queen of Scotch" exists and though there is no year printed anywhere, another source once mentioned the year 1981. Musically this would fit perfectly, as both of the trax deliver a proggish sort of Kraut/Hard Rock with either some rare NWOBHM influences, but mainly of these early british bands that wasn't purely Metal and neither pure Rock at all. The single pops up just very seldom nowadays, only a really few copies surfaced so far. Further info is welcome.Discography:
"Say goodbye" 7" EP 1981 (selfreleased)
Gambit
Lineup:
Michael Richter (vocals)
Stefan Lange (guitar)
Siegfried Simon (bass)
Klaus Mertens (drums)
Band-info:
A band from Langenfeld between Düsseldorf and Leverkusen, that just produced a single CD in the early 90's for Steps Records. The songs on the album are residing in the merge of Hard Rock and Metal, some heavier, some with R'n'R touch and mostly slightly american glammy influenced. Otherwise a solid album for Hard Rock fans.Discography:
"Gambit" CD 1992 (Steps)
Gamma Ray
Lineup:
Ralf Scheepers (vocals)
Kai Hansen (guitar)
Uwe Wessel (bass)
Mathias Burchardt (drums)
Band-info:
Basically we seriously don't expect that it's needed to introduce Gamma Ray at all. The long time Helloween guitarist Kai Hansen founded the band when he departed from Hellloween in 1989 with ex-Tyran' Pace shouter Ralf Scheepers, ex-Bullfrog Uwe Wessel and Mathias Burchardt and immediately released his first album strangely on Noise Records, who pretty much caused all the trouble that threw Helloween back in their career for several years in the fall of the 80's and was responsible indirectly for Hansen's departure. Normally the band was firming under the name of Kai Hansen in the beginning, but during the process of manufacturing the records the name Gamma Ray was chosen, so the LP's got a special sleeve with still Kai Hansen printed as band name on, that covers the regular Gamma Ray album inside. Not surprisingly Gamma Ray's debut sounded very Helloween-ish, which might be caused by Hansen being one of the main songwriters for his old band. In the following years the band's line up changed permanently, accompanied by a stylistical change, away from the Helloween roots, but the same time Hansen established Gammy Ray being one of the leading german Heavy Metal bands throughout the 90's and on, releasing numerous albums and singles till 2016.Discography:
"Heading for tomorrow" LP/CD 1990 (Noise)
"Sigh no more" LP/CD 1991 (Noise)
"Father & son" Comp.-CD 1992 (German Rock Project - The Ballad Album)
"Insanity and genius" LP/CD 1993 (Noise)
Gipsy (Thalheim)
Lineup:
Fredy Lieberwirth (bass)
Wilfried Opitz (guitar, vocals)
Dietmar Bergert (keyboard)
Achim Pöschel (drums)
Band-info:
The eastgerman Hard Rock/AOR band GIPSY arose out of the ashes of the band SATORI from Thalheim, that formed in 1973 and disbanded in 1977, which was the official date of birth of the rockers GIPSY, featuring Fredy Lieberwirth (bass), Wilfried Opitz (guitar, vocals), Dietmar Bergert (keyboard), Achim Pöschel (drums). The guys was playing cover versions of international rock stars and are still active until nowadays. In the 80's the band was working with different line-ups and musicians and either could produce several trax for the national broadcast service, that got also featured on different compilations, but are more or less to count to the Classic Rock genre like "Marie" on the "Auf dem Wege 4" sampler proves. On the "Startschuss 2" Split 7" from 1986, GIPSY was backing group for female solo vocalist Petra Schwerdt. During their live shows and especially in the later 80's the guys added songs of RAINBOW, DEEP PURPLE, KISS, AC/DC, FOREIGNER, TOTO, BON JOVI, WHITESNAKE or EUROPE to their repertoire, but also are performing own compositions like "Song of Gipsy". After the premature end of MOSHQUITO, guitarist Rochus Roder joined GIPSY, where he stayed from 1992-94. Though the lads was often booked to perform at important ex-GDR TV music shows like "rund", "STOP! ROCK" or "bong", they wasn't allowed to produce own singles or albums at all. None of the official releases featured below are of interest for the classic Hard Rock or Metal faction, but due to their hardrockin' live shows, GIPSY truly needs to be mentioned at all.For more info please check out Gipsy's Homepage.
Discography:
"Marie" Comp.-LP Track 1985 (Auf dem Wege 4)
"Gib deine Welt" Split 7" EP Track 1986 (with Lama/Rosalili/Amor und die Kids, "Startschuss 2", Amiga)
"Ein Viertel Jahrhundert Studentenclub" Split 7" EP 1987 (with KJB Kasseturm Jazz Band Weimar, Amiga)
Broadcast recordings:
"Song of Gipsy" (1982)
"Dort wo kein Land für Kinder ist" (1982)
"Wir werden nicht noch einmal geboren" (1982)
"Live in Karl-Marx Stadt" (November 1982)
"Gipsy Live für Duett - Musik für den Recorder" (1985)
"Stein deiner Träume" (1985)
"Hab' dich erkannt" (1987)
Gomorharr
Lineup:
Chris Angelreaper (bass, vocals)
Band-info:
A Death/Thrash Metal band from Dortmund, that formed in 1989. The band was labelled as Dortmund's answer to Sodom and claimed themselves to stylistically return to the early days of Sodom and Hellhammer fame. During summer/autumn 1989 a single was said to be avalable soon. Either songtitles like "In the sign of Gomorharr" and "Ausbruch des Bösen" (Sodom cover) was mentioned. If you got further info, please get in touch.Discography:
Grace
Lineup:
Andy Kuhlmann (guitar, vocals)
Hansi Becker (guitar, vocals)
Udo Schlenther (bass)
Walter Müller (drums)
Band-info:
The sleeve of the obscure single of this band from northern Germany (most probably from the Hamburg area) pretty much point it out what's to expect musicwise (Hard Rock), including the suggestion to play it loud. And indeed, late 70's inspired, pounding, and even boogie-ing Hard Rock drones out of the speakers with not just a little AC/DC edge. Basically those who like stuff like the Rusty Nail singles or the first Powerage LP, will definitely enjoy Grace as well.Discography:
"Roll rocker roll" 7" EP 1981 (Thorofon)
Grade A
Lineup:
Lee (vocals)
Punky (guitar)
Werner (guitar)
Ralph (bass)
Dennis (drums)
Band-info:
Now these Grade A are quite interesting. The “band” features musicians all hailing from different areas. There are Punky from Munich, Werner from Heidelberg and the 3 US boys Lee (Oklahoma), Ralph (Washington DC) and Dennis from New Jersey. No clue how they managed to write a whole album that way in times before there was internet at all, but they did! Seems like the 2 track single “Set me free” was just released to promote their future LP “Dreams & diamonds”, since both was taken from that album, which on the other hand didn’t ever see the light of day it seems. The flipside track “Takin’ back” is the heavier tune, straight up Hard Rock with slight Boogie edge. The title track offers a sort of Power Pop/Hard Rock, quite typical stuff for the beginning of the 80’s. Further band info is needed though.Discography:
“Set me free” 7” EP 1981 (Big Key)
Gravestone
Lineup:
Berti Majdan (vocals, bass)
Wolfgang Rittner (guitar)
Rudi Dorner (guitar)
Andy Müller (keyboard)
Mike Schmidt (drums)
Band-info:
The origins of Gravestone already refer back to the year 1975, when Rudi Dorner and Mike Schmidt founded the band Heizkörper in Illertissen. 1976 when vocalist Berti Majdan joined them on bass guitar, the name got changed to Oregon and in 1977, after Wolfgang Rittner and Andy Müller was added, eventually the name Gravestone popped up. At his moment the guy's sound was typical Kraut/Prog Rock influenced and while they was rehearsing all day and night, they recorded several Demo tracks in 1978, that made the the idea growing to produce an album, which indeed was recorded in February '79. The "Doomsday" entitled LP was manufactured and sold by the AVC studio directly, and contains mainly instrumental proggy Kraut Rock songs. But the band's line up wasn't of permanence, only Rudi Dorner and Andy Müller was still remaining of the original Gravestone to record the band's second album "War" in 1980. Sokrates Gradl (guitar, ex-Jump), Dieter Behle (drums, ex-Sphinx) and Dietmar Orlitta (bass, vocals, ex-Sphinx) has been the new guys in the band and Gravestone's sound got slightly heavier now. First Hard Rock tunes merged with the previous Prog Rock. During the following 2 years the band's line up was plagued by continuous line up changes, that just stabilized at around 1982, when Berti Majdan had returned. The guitars got handled by Mathias Dieth (ex-Dust) and Klaus Reinelt (ex-Solaplexus), while the bass was still in Dietmar Orlitta's hands and drummer being Dieter Behle. Parallel to the new line up, the style of Gravestone had changed also. During a local Baden-Württemberg band contest in December '83, the band's show was broadcasted both in TV and radio, and Gravestone got rewarded with a live track feature ("Sitting on a bench") on the "Radio 3 Südfunk Stuttgart Nachwuchs-Festival 1983" sampler, that introduced that contest. Getting clairaudient by the band's first success and free promotion, Peter Garattoni added Gravestone to the Gama stable in March '84 and produced the "Victim in chains" album in April. Dietmar Orlitta subsequently quit his job because he wasn't much happy of the band's decision, so Thomas Sabisch became new bassist, while the album was available in August. Carried by the wave of success, Garattoni didn't waste much time and Gravestone's 4th album "Back to attack" was standing in the shops already in April '85, featuring even heavier sound than on "Victims of chains". Gravestone had casted its feathers to one of the leading acts of the Gama empire, right behind the all ruling Tyrant, influencing musically a not low number of other german bands of the mid 80's. But in the fall of 1985 Dieter Behle left the band (later in Tyrant and the godly Arrakis) and got replaced by the 18 years old drummer Thomas Imbacher. Mathias Dieth switched over to the band Sinner after playing some last gigs with Gravestone in December '85 (and later was a musical pillar in U.D.O.), while the guys quickly found Jürgen Metkos to replace him early '86. The band's last album "Creating a monster" either was recorded a while later and just like the previous albums sold quite well, but the collaboration with Gama got a crack, due to the dubious financial policy that almost all Gama bands had to struggle with, so both parties went separate ways in 1988. Gravestone, although having received offers by different labels, decided to handle the promotion and production of the further albums by themselves and founded their own label Fortune Records. In combination with that, 1990 the band name got changed to 48 Crash which probably was a huge mistake seen retrospectively viewed. The "Some like it hot" entitled album is dominated by a kinda R'n'R driven Hard Rock/Metal mix while only songs like "Madelaine" remind us of their old exploits and can be considered true Heavy Metal. Despite of the highly developed musical skills of the single musicians in the band, "Some like it hot" never could affiliate the earlier success and especially sound of Gravestone. I guess the lads came to the same conclusion and eventually disbanded in 1992. Please note, several album tracks of the band was featured on numerous compilations, that we don't list here at all.Discography:
"Doomsday" LP 1979 (AVC)
"War" LP 1980 (AVC)
"Sitting on a bench" Comp.-LP Track 1983 (Radio 3 Südfunk Stuttgart Nachwuchs-Festival 1983)
"Victim of chains" LP 1984 (Scratch)
"Death & reality" Comp.-LP Track 1985 (Hard & Heavy)
"Back to attack" LP 1985 (Scratch)
"Creating a monster" LP 1986 (Scratch)
"The Best of German Heavy Metal" Split LP 1987 (High Light)
Grex
Lineup:
Wolfram Rieder (vocals, guitar)
Celia Gomez (backing vocals)
Matthias Stroezel (keyboards)
Roman Frik (guitar)
Christof Stroezel (bass)
Alexander Redlich (drums)
Band-info:
Grex was a melodic Heavy Rock band from Stuttgart, that released a single in 1991 and a MCD two years later, both selfproduced and in limited quantity. Their sound was kinda inspired by melodic US Hard Rock bands with midpaced pounding beats and keyboard shaded, that reminds me in places a bit of the softer trax of australian White Metal band Disciple.Discography:
"Warfever" 7" EP 1991 (selfrelased)
"Stop it now" MCD 1993 (selfreleased)
Greyhound
Lineup:
Michael Schnäbelin (vocals)
Peter Fastenrath (guitar)
Rainer Humpert (guitar)
Andreas Schwamborn (bass)
Joachim Stüpp (drums)
Band-info:
Obscure local Hardrockers originating from Haan/Solingen in the Düsseldorf/Wuppertal area, that just shortly existed from the fall of the 80's to the very early 90's. The guys recorded a quite unknown single, that offered lightweight Hard Rock, turning almost into post-NWOBHM on the flipside number "Save your love" with heavy Boogie touch, that strongly reminds of bands of the early era, like f.e. Hammerhead. After the split all musicians went to play in different bands from Solingen.Discography:
"One More Time" 7" EP 1991 (Metra Sound)
Gypsy
Lineup:
Thomas Horst (vocals)
Hacki (guitar)
Carsten Herres (guitar)
Peter Schu (bass)
Marc Haas (drums)
Band-info:
This is post-Ion Faith from Leiwen/Mehring (east of Trier). As Ion Faith they recorded an outstanding classic melodic Heavy Metal Demo with the title "Cold cut steel" in 1988. Before the Ion Faith era, the band had already existed in a different form since the beginning of the 80s under the name Iron Faith and released the single “Life in dreams” privately in 1983. Unfortunately the guys didn't release anything after that, but they could still be seen live on stage every now and then until 1987. At the beginning of 1988, singer Shane Campell, originally from Los Angeles, Norbert Donowen (guitar), Carsten Herres (guitar), Peter Schu (bass) and Marc Haas (drums) decided to rename the band to Ion Faith and were able to arouse some interest with their live supports for Trans Am and Zed Yago, among others. In the summer of '88 the band was invited to the TV Metal show “Mosh” for an interview. After Shane Campell was replaced by ex-Wild Axes/Princess singer Thomas Horst and new guitarist Hacki joined the band for Norbert Donowen, Ion Faith began recordings for “Cold cut steel” in 1988 at the renowned Franz. K Studio in Witten. You get everything here, 8 tracks all of the same high quality, squealing guitars all along, a great vocalist and melodic Heavy Metal that your balls are going to burst. Their sound was a mix of the late 80's classic german Metal with a not unimportant dose of US steel. The lads even had a french management. Ion Faith then went on a short “Cold cut steel” promotional tour in 1989, but no label signed the band. During late 1989 then Ion Faith to change their name to Gypsy, but soon would vanish off the screen completely.Discography:
Hard Stuff
Lineup:
Michael Hotop (vocals, keyboards)
Rüdiger Thiel (guitar)
Siggi Holz (guitar)
Doc Janning (bass)
Schorse Creutzinger (drums)
Band-info:
Hard Stuff was founded by Siggi Holz back in 1974 in Hannover originally as a Rhythm & Blues cover band, but since 1979 the guys used to perform just their own material. Hard Stuff's sole release was a fist shaped 10" EP in orange vinyl, that was manufactured in just a very limited edition of approx. 100 copies, that got the Merseyside's Greatest picture label on side A and a black label with song titles on side B. But there is also an even smaller edition known to exist with black labels on both sides, while just about 10 copies are rumoured to be made of this particular obscure version. Musically the 4 songs featured are based on the classic 70's Hard/Kraut Rock with naturally (due to the guys' past) a Blues edge. During the rising NDW revolution in Germany, Hard Stuff recorded the single "Daß es dich gibt" under the monicker of SPECIAL at the Horus Sound studio in 1981/82, which became a national top 10 hit, but shouldn't be of interest for our readers at all, since we're talking of ordinary Pop/Rock here. 1986 the band also recorded songs for the planned album "The last time", which wasn't released though and Hard Stuff got disbanded in 1994. Siggi Holz revived the band in 2010 and is playing live on stage again.Discography:
"Bad years" Shaped 10" EP 1979 (Merseyside's Greatest)
Hardware
Lineup:
Sven Freytag (vocals)
Sigi Sigismund (bass)
Jörg Franz (guitar)
Bob Schiprowski (guitar)
Ralf Ehlert (guitar)
Gero Lütke (drums)
Band-info:
The Hannover band Hardware was formed in May 1982 and recorded 2 early Demo tapes in this and the following year. Shortly after they recorded their debut album "Common time heroes" independently with a 4 track machine, while the still young Steamhammer label only needed to manufacture the vinyls. The album recieved good feedback which I seriously can't really share. Though it sounds quite well produced for a 4 track recording, the material appears rather dull, without real ideas. The band took their influences besides an of course german touch, mainly from british bands, but rather was unsure if they wanted to play Hard Rock or pure Heavy Metal. Thankfully Steamhammer didn't drop them after that sleeping pill they called debut album and in January '85 with Mark Städler on vocals and new bass player Roland, the mid 80's classic "In cold blood" was recorded at the Sonic Acoustic studio in Wuppertal. Due to a stylistical change Hardware refocussed soundwise and added speed elements that sharpened their steel, so the guys could play in the same league like bands such as Vampyr, Atlain or Metal Sword. Sadly after that little ballbuster the band completely disappeared into the sinking for the rest of the 80's and only returned shortly in the early 90's with two CD singles that they wrote for their favorite football club Hannover 96. The former singer Sven Freytag returned with Lawdy in the late 80's and Jörg Franz was also playing with the band Attack.Discography:
"Demo 1982" (selfreleased)
"Demo 1983" (selfreleased)
"Common time heroes" LP 1984 (Steamhammer)
"In cold blood" MLP 1985 (Steamhammer)
"Wir fahren nach Berlin! MCD 1991 (Lava)
"Schwarz Weiß Grün Wir waren in Berlin" MCD 1992 (Lava)
Hauden & Lukas
Lineup:
Lukas Hilbert (bass, vocals)
Kieran Hilbert (guitar)
Band-info:
Hauden & Lukas originally was (or still are) 2 (teenage) brothers, who started making music around 1984/85, when Kieran formed the band "The Future" together with Lukas and drummer Maik Buchwald. The boys won the NDR Hörfest contest 1985 and won a record contract, resulting in their first single "Isabell". Germany's leading Panik-Rocker Udo Lindenberg discovered the 2 boys and engaged both for his band. During 1988 they wrote a few songs for their own Hard Rock band "Hauden & Lukas" and the Polydor released a Maxi, that gained them a bit of attention in several teenie magazines. Musically the material adopted just the typical AC/DC style with slightly Boogie edge, similar to some of Lindenberg's own songs as well. The Maxi would remain the band's sole release though, both focussed later on their job in Lindenberg's band and started solo careers during the 90's.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"Kopfhörer" 7"/12"/MCD 1988 (Polydor)
Headless
Lineup:
Thomas Post (vocals)
Roland Tschech (guitar)
Uwe Lerach (guitar)
Sven Rappold (bass)
Ronald Schulze (drums)
Band-info:
Headless was the ex-GDR band Metall from East Berlin under their new given name from August 1989 and with the new name they also tried to develop Metall's old sound into a more modern and international sounding US style, now singing all songs in english. They even translated the lyrics for the once originally german sung "Eisenhart" and "Easy rider" trax. After the Quartett Single that was planned by Amiga for late '89 got cancelled, the sublabel of Amiga Zong released these 4 songs as a triple Split LP together with the Power Metallers Hardholz and Merlin. The 2 new Headless songs sounded pretty listenable and well arranged but is was doubtable if that direction was the right step towards success since the Metal crowd more and more requested Thrash and Death Metal at that time. Headless wrote 14 new trax while 6 of them together with "Metal for you" and "Heart of steel" was chosen to be their first album that should be released a few months after the "Speed up" LP was out, but the label went bankrupt and noone felt demand for that kind of Metal anymore, especially not from an eastgerman band. They released those 6 tracks as a Demo in 1991 and disbanded a while later due to lack of interest of the old fans.
Headstone
Lineup:
Franklin Hofmann (guitar)
Harald Liebhäuser (keyboard, vocals)
Georg Hölderlich (bass)
Michael Brieger (drums)
Band-info:
Headstone from deepest Bavaria (Oberammergau) was founded in 1981 by Franklin Hofmann and Georg Hölderlich and with the drummer Michael Brieger the trio started recording the "Burning ambition" album in 1983, after they already recorded several Demo trax. Harald Liebhäuser (ex-Mephisto) was found to sing the vocal parts. And now there are 2 stories concearning that album available. The first one says that though the band was searching for a proper label to release that selfrecorded album, they couldn't find any label willing to so and it remained unreleased (info: Heavy Metal made in Germany - Book). According to Pure Steel/Karthago Records it was indeed pressed as a limited vinyl edition by the band itself, but so far no one has ever seen a single copy up for sale and this pretty much makes the whole thing suspicious, as before the CD re-edition on Karthago Records was available, noone ever heard of this album. Georg Hölderlich frustrated subsequently quit and got replaced by Roman Wagner. The guys either found a new vocalist; Harald Karg, and recorded another Demo in 1984. After receiving the offer from Unit Art to produce a full album, the band went to northern Germany in 1985 to record "Excalibur", at the Unit Art studios and the studio either manufactured about 500 copies on vinyl. The album knows to attract with an outstanding artwork, but seriously that's it already. Musically Headstone never left the middle field of the german bands with their common Heavy Metal, and either suffered from a rather weak vocal performance of Harald Karg. Still compared to the "Burning ambition" recording, that was more rooted in the slightly 70's influenced Hard Rock/Metal sound (but with better vocals), the more solid sounding "Excalibur" album musically was a huge step forward for the band towards a classic Metal style and either gathered a few british influences, but somehow the speed elements was missing. Wasn't much surprising that Headstone already split up aroiund 1986. The former vocalist Harald Liebhäuser also used to sing for the band Veto.Discography:
"Burning ambition" LP 1983 (selfreleased - or not released at all..)
"Excalibur" LP 1985 (Unit Art)
Heartlyne
Lineup:
Thomas Conrad (vocals)
Chris Lyne (guitar)
Claus Johannson (guitar)
Jogy Rautenberg (bass)
Alexander Strauch (keyboard)
Karsten Krause (drums)
Band-info:
Heartlyne was a band from West Berlin, that was formed out of the ashes of Dark Avenger in 1986 by former members Tommy Heart (Thomas Conrad), Jogy Rautenberg (ex-Dead Marian), Karsten Krause (ex-Ballantinez) and Claus Johannson. Chris Lyne (ex-Countach) and ex-Devil's Soldier Alexander Strauch was found to complete the band and quickly the debut Demo was available in 1986. The band's sound hadn't much in common with the old Dark Avenger sound, but either would meet requirements of Zeno's sound. It was easy to understand the musical vision of the lads would burst the common expectations and they proved that by winning a local Berlin Rock contest in 1987. Heartlyne started recording a couple of songs throughout 1987 at the Hansa Studios Berlin and bigger labels started showing interest, but still hesitated to offer a record deal, though in summer '87 a bigger label produced a single of Heartlyne, which sadly wasn’t released at all. Tommy Heart in the meanwhile received the offer to join V2 who already had a deal inpetto and therefore quit Heartlyne, which resulted in Heartlyne disbanding after a last gig together in May '88 and all of the members went separate ways. Tommy Heart after being done in V2 joined Zeno and Fair Warning, Claus Johannson founded Mr. Nasty and then joined Double Action, Alexander Strauch returned with She's China in the late 80's, while Jogy Rautenberg was found in Skew Siskin's line up. Chris Lyne and Tommy Heart would found Soul Doctor at the end of the 90's, that Rautenberg and Strauch would join also at a later stage. A CDR bootleg entitled "Starlight", appeared in the late 90's, featuring Heartlyne's studio recordings from 1987/88 and therefore the guys decided to officially publish the songs under the title "No retreat no surrender" in 2008. Just like on the early Demo, the band's sound could be compared to the classic Europe stuff that made them big, combining top notch melodic Hard Rock with pompish AOR on highest songwriting level and without a single sucker featured.Discography:
"Heartlyne" Demo 1986 (selfreleased)
Helicon
Lineup:
Andrea Münster (vocals)
Manfred Pütz (guitar)
Kurt Reichert (guitar)
Guido Kaul (bass)
Uwe Heepen (drums)
Band-info:
Helicon was founded by Uwe Heepen and Kurt Reichert in May '87 in Aachen, and originally should take the place that Helloween once had within the Noise International stable, when they left the label to sign a major deal. But the whole things didn't work out like expected because the much more melodic playing Helicon, aren't Helloween at all. The band around female vocalist Andrea Münster debuted with two Demos in 1988 and '89 and subsequently published an obscure 7" with Axel Heusch on second guitar (replaced Reichert) on the Cauldron label from Düsseldorf in 1989, that contains two melodic Heavy Metal rockers, featuring the very powerful track "Woman", that makes the single recommendable. The re-recorded track "Black and white" was known from the previously released "Black and white" Demo, that featured 4 songs in total. Due to different opinions they stopped co-operation with Cauldron Records. who originally wanted to release a 5 track MLP of Helicon in January '91 and started to record material for their debut CD privately. The line up had changed once again and also during the recording sessions Andrea Münster and their recent guitarist Volker Marx left the band. Münster joined the band Heaven's Force, while Marx went to Axe La Chapelle. In the meanwhile Uwe Heepen used to handle the vocalparts himself. But one by one left the band and in the end Uwe Heepen was the only remaining member in the band, when he signed the contract with Noise and had to form a completely new band, consisting of himself on vocals, Christian Guth (guitar), Tom Kusters (guitar), Sylvester Wasielewsky (bass) and drummer Andre Ostapeschen. The debut album "Helicon" that finally was released in 1993 and featured a wild mix of midpaced Metal rockers and a few speedy bangers, received good feedback and the band toured alot through Germany and parts of Europe to promote the album, so afterwards the lads recorded the follow up album "Mysterious skipjack" in 1994. But this album wasn't as successful as the debut, and Noise dropped the band, that eventually split up in around 1997.Discography:
"The Heimbach Tapes" Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
"Black and white" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"Black & white" 7" EP 1989 (Cauldron)
"Helicon" LP/CD 1993 (Noise)
"Fight for your fame" Comp.-MCD Track 1993 (Melodic Metal strikes back)
Hellfire
Lineup:
Klaus Böhlke (guitar)
Holger Reinicke (guitar)
Andre Reinicke (bass)
Harald Riemer (drums, vocals)
Band-info:
Hellfire’s a very obscure local Thrash Metal band, that's active under different monickers since already 1983 in the greater Halle area (ex-GDR). The very first steps of Hellfire are dating back to 1979, when Harald Riemer (drums) and guitarist Klaus Böhlke formed a Bluesrock band in Diemitz/Reideburg. Lots of musicians joined the duo and went away again, while stylistically Hard Rock and NWOBHM influences began to sprout in the minds of the guys and dominated more and more their performances. Since 1983 Heavy Metal had completely taken over command of the guys minds and a first stable line had eventually established during 1985, featuring Klaus Böhlke (guitar), Holger Reinicke (guitar), Andre Reinicke (bass) and Harald Riemer (vocals, drums). By that time the name Hellfire got ultimately picked up and the foursome started composing own material during 1985/86. A bit later on in 1988 Andre Reinicke had to pause for a while due to army services and couldn’t return before late in 1989, so Frank Bölke joined on bass, untill he tragically died in 1989. At that time Hellfire’s line up was built by Lutz Felsberg (vocals, also the band's own technician), Klaus Bölke (guitar), Holger Reinicke (guitar), Frank Bölke (bass) and Harald Riemer (vocals, drums). Recently a Demo tape of this band surfaced in the inheritance of Matthias Hopke (hoster of the "Tendenz Hard bis Heavy" radio show), featuring 1 untitled rehearsal song in 2 different versions, that stylistically reminds of eastgermans Rocket with yet a slightly early Slayer vibe. This rehearsal tape (probably not official) should be dating from around that era of the band, or possibly even 1989, while the guys started recordings for their “Kill the beast” MC, recorded in their practise room, that included 6 songs written between 1986 up to 1990 with a new line up: Klaus Bölke (vocals, guitar), Holger Reinicke (guitar), Andre Reinicke (bass) and Holger Riemer (drums, vocals). The tape was eventually finished during 1991 and spread just locally at their gigs. One of the last Hellfire gigs we could track down yet, was dating from 1991. Just the following year Klaus Böhlke quit Hellfire, who subsequently changed name to Eternal Quest, featuring Andre Chleborath on guitar. But at the end of the 90’s decade either Harald Riemer left Eternal Quest, whose remaining members became Eternal Brave instead, but faded away shortly after. Klaus Böhlke and Harald Riemer in 2011 accidentally met once again, just to find out that the flame’s still burning. Both revived Hellfire and independently recorded the single “Nights of vampire”. In the meanwhile ex-Eternal Brave shouter Tobias Neumann as well as their ex-bassplayer Andre Reinicke plus Lucas Loch on guitar was recruited and Hellfire, that had to change their name due to judicial reasons to Hammer Of Daemons now, recorded albums, that are all available at the band’s website, including Hellfire’s debut album “Kill the beast”, now in a re-recorded version from 2016.(Thanx for the kind help and info to Klaus Böhlke and ZZF/Nachlass Matthias Hopke and Nikolai Okunew)
Discography:
"Pharao" Reh/Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
"Kill the beast" MC 1991 (selfreleased)
High Voltage
Lineup:
Michael Bormann (guitar, vocals)
Dirk Bormann (guitar)
Robert Mourek (bass)
Jörg Schuhknecht (drums)
Band-info:
High Voltage from Duisburg was founded by the teenagers Michael and Dirk Bormann in early 1980, trying to play Stones, AC/DC, Beatles coverversions. In summer 1982 with a steady line featuring additional members Robert Mourek and Jörg Schuhknecht, the boys won the first prize of the schoolboy band Rockfestival of North Rhine-Westphalia, which automatically catapulted them into the german news and resulted in numerous TV appearances, live gigs and either the production of the single "Scheiß Schule" in 1983, that featured 70's like Hard Rock with Boogie edge, as well as the second single "Believe me", released in 1984 on the indie label BWS Records. Just with the release of the 3rd and last High Voltage single "Without love", the whole venture got hand and feet and presented a grown band, that was trying to play a mature melodic Hard Rock, stylistically trying to move away from their early schoolboy Hard Rock image. But their former teenie band hype already died away and the guys dissolved High Voltage in 1987 without any further releases. Both Bormanns and Mourek subsequently formed the Metal band TAX, who released a cool album in 1988.Discography:
"Scheiß Schule" Comp.-LP Track 1982 (Viele Grüße Aus Dem Underground Vol. II Life)
"Scheiß Schule" 7" EP 1983 (Columbia)
"Believe me" 7" EP 1984 (BWS)
"Without love" 7" EP 1985 (BWS)
Horus
Lineup:
Björn Gbur (guitar, vocals)
Ritchie Rücker (guitar)
Alf Diehl (bass, vocals)
Markus Diekmann (drums)
Band-info:
Power/Speedsters from Hiddenhausen/Herford, north of Bielefeld, who started as fivepiece back in 1988 still with a separate vocalist (Auge), but later since the second Demo operated only as a trio without Ritchie Rücker. The debut "The second flood" was recorded in October '89, while Björn Gbur was singing all vocal parts. The follow up release "The sound prism" from August '91, mixed with the help of Ricky van Helden (Attack) already was recorded as trio. Horus' style was just archetypical Power Metal with Helloween-ish speed influences, presented technically quite experienced, though the dull thin vocals. They disappeared 1996 after producing the 2 track CD Single "Promo '96" once again with Ricky van Helden, but Björn Gbur reformed the band in 2005 with completely new team and style, to keep Horus going till at least 2011.Discography:
"The second flood" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"The sound prism" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
Hot Legs
Lineup:
Siegbert Springer (guitar, vocals)
Stefan Wukowitsch (guitar)
Bernd Lüddemann (bass)
Stefan Lüddemann (drums)
Band-info:
A casted teenie group most probably, if you take a look at all the songs on their debut LP "Here we are", published in 1980 by the Ariola. Except of the "Hot Legs Song", the entire material was written by Anthony Monn and Ralph Dahmen plus a handful of other guys, so the Hot Legs was for sure just an attempt to catch the hearts of teenie girls. Fanclub address was in Munich and on the back sleeve of the album the boys mentioned that they prefer Hard Rock, especially AC/DC, Status Quo, Scorpions, Led Zeppelin and Van Halen being faves of them. So that's where we actually end up, late 70's Hard Rock with 70's Glam/Boogie Rock touch. A few more singles afterwards was still thrown on the market till 1982 till they lost breath. Bernd and Stefan Lüddemann in 1984 formed the band Dragon in Karlsruhe together with Oscar and Bruno Di Blasio, that later would become Kymera.Discography:
"Here we are" LP 1980 (Ariola)
"Linda" 7" EP 1980 (Ariola)
"On the highway to Chicago" 7" EP 1981 (Ariola)
"Was für 'ne Nacht" 7" EP 1982 (M Music)
Hunting Deadheads
Lineup:
Dirk Adam (guitar, vocals)
Uwe Fischer (guitar)
Wolfgang Adam (bass)
Wolfram Schäfer“ (drums)
Band-info:
Obscure Heavy Metal outfit, hailing from Neuwied, near Koblenz. The band should have been active during the early 80’s, if we’re not mistaken. Despite it’s widely unknown even in collector circles, these lads had produced an independent single at around 1983/84, that featured the trax "Religion wars" and "All but nothing", with the first song tending roughly towards MOTÖRHEAD, which is mainly caused due to Dirk Adam's vocal style (though his voice doesn’t sounds like Lemmy's at all). On the whole, however, there is no doubt that this nice lil piece joins the list of obscure local acts with tiny limited vinyl output, even if it doesn't manage to stand out in any way. Nevertheless, both songs offer exactly what the German Metal lover would expect, solid, midtempo Heavy Metal.Discography:
“Hunting Deadheads” 7” EP 198? (selfreleased)
Ill Prophecy
Lineup:
Michael Kiske (vocals)
Ulrich Schulz (guitar)
Raico Ebel (guitar)
Patrick Hampe (bass)
Karsten Nagel (drums)
Band-info:
Hamburg's Ill Prophecy was founded by Michael Kiske and Karsten Nagel back in 1984, when Kiske saw Queensryche live in Germany and thought that he could sing like Geoff Tate as well. While still being in school, they quickly recruited ex-Chaos Raico Ebel (guitar), Patrick Hampe (bass) and Ulrich Schulz (guitar) and started writing own material. When their principal wanted them to play at the yearly graduation ceremony, the guys performed 4 songs, that opened several doors for them. Mania immediately recruited them as opener for some of their local shows and shortly later Helloween's manager got in touch with Michael Kiske. At around the same time Ill Prophecy wanted to record a Demo, but none of the lads knew that Kiske needed it for his later job in Helloween. 3 weeks after the Demo was finished Kiske left Ill Prophecy in autumn '86 to join Helloween and start a furious career that catapulted him into the premier league of german Metal vocalists. Nevertheless, if he would have stayed in the band, who knows what these guys could have achieved. Their Demo still belongs amoungst the best that the german Heavy Metal underground scene has ever spit out. While we know Ill Prophecy was Queensryche fans, they managed to reproduce the early Queensryche sound like an 1:1 copy on the same musical level and created a topnotch US Power Metal demo, while the schoolboy Kiske at no single minute had to hide behind Tate at all. Unfortunately the remaining guys tried to replace Kiske but didn't succed at all. For a short while Chris Klauke joined on vox during 1986, but soon was recruited by Mania. After trying to record another Demo during 1988 with the help of Ralf Scheepers (ex-Tyran' Pace) on vocals and Kai Hansen mixing the whole and adding backing vocals, the band split up shortly later. We are not sure if that second Demo was officially released at all. The last line up in spring '89 featured Karsten Nagel (drums), Roland Guadrelli (guitar), Ulrich Schulz (guitar) and Patrick Hampe (bass), while Raico Ebel already had joined Not Fragile in 1987 and later formed Mad Alien.Discography:
"Demo 1986" (selfreleased)
Inferno
Lineup:
Bernhard Hlava (vocals)
Stefan Vetter (bass)
Igor Velican (guitar)
Peter Ziegler (drums)
Band-info:
Augsburg's Hardcore legend Inferno just deserves a mention here either due to their last album, that clearly has to be counted to the Thrash Metal scene, whenalso the guys used to play a rather Crossover/Thrash because they couldn't completely get rid off their old Hardcore roots. Inferno was founded already in November '81 by Stefan Vetter, Bernhard Hlava und Peter Ziegler as a Punk band. Igor Velican (guitar) joined in February '82 but soon got replaced by Christian Pfister. July '83 the new drummer Lorenz Braxenthaler came for Ziegler and this line up, consisting of Hlava, Vetter, Braxenthaler and Pfister, would become the classic backbone of Inferno for several years. Already in 1983 the guys recorded two highly respected Demo tapes, that gained them a great reputation within the early international Hardcore scene and led to several compilation appearances (which we do not mention here at all). Mülleimer Records signed the band who recorded their legendary debut album "Tod & Wahnsinn" in November the same year, while the album was available in 1984 in different editions. "Tod & Wahnsinn" in contrary to most of the other german Hardcore bands adopted the fast american Thrash/Punk style like Septic Death, that either the S.O.D. cover on one of the re-editions of the album pays tribute to. A number of singles followed as well as a Split LP with Execute on the Pusmort label during 1985/86 before the lads started their own label Rise & Fall Productions in 1986, where they published the "Hibakusha" and "Live and loud" albums in 1986, that marked a first step towards their later Metal influenced style. The following year Inferno used to play several gigs throughout Europe, while in November '87 Christian Pfister quit and got replaced by new guitarist Andreas Ferucci. The very last Inferno album "It should be your problem!" was released in 1990 and showcased the band from a Thrash Metal influenced side, that naturally still offered several Hardcore edges and could be called metallic Crossover. Inferno split up in 1990, while Hlava and Vetter formed the similar sounding Soulstorm and published one more album in 1991.Discography:
"Anti Hagenbach Tape" Demo 1983 (selfreleased)
"Gott ist tot" Demo 1983 (selfreleased)
"Tod & Wahnsinn" LP 1984 (Mülleimer)
"Live Jz Kapu 14.12.85" Live Tape 1986 (selfreleased)
"Execute/Inferno" Split LP 1985 (Pusmort)
"The son of god" 7" EP 1985 (Subversive)
"Die Ruhe vor dem Sturm" 7" EP 1985 (Rise & Fall)
"Hibakusha" LP 1986 (Rise & Fall)
"Live and loud" LP 1986 (Rise & Fall)
"Geschöpf ohne Gehirn" 7" EP 1990 (Snake)
"It should be your problem!" LP/CD 1990 (Rise & Fall)
"Die Allerletzte..." 7" EP 1991 (Rise & Fall)
Insert Coin
Lineup:
Dave Wodle (guitar, vocals)
Charly Pichl (guitar)
Klaus F. Backer (bass)
Harry Rödel (keyboard)
Caesar Z. Kronmüller (drums)
Band-info:
A local Melodic Metal/Hard Rock outfit from Forchheim/Bavaria, a bit north of Nuremberg, who started in the mid 80's. These guys last activities we could track down so far go back to at least 1989/90, while already in 1987 an obscure private single was manufactured, also known as "Nights of mystery". The B-side "Warriors" offers rough edged straight forward pounding Teutonic Metal with though purplish organs, that doesn't affect the main impression of the good song in any way. There's most probably another CD of Insert Coin with the title "Get paid" being made in 1994, released on the B 27 Musikverlag from Ludwigsburg. But the line up on this album features different musicians: Eckardt Dietel (guitar, vocals), Guido Weischedel (bass, vocals), Charlie Schmid (keyboard), Harald Ebensperger (drums, vocals). If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"Insert Coin" 7" EP 1987 (selfreleased)
Intricate
Lineup:
Peter Schiffler (vocals)
Nils Werner (bass)
Jens Schembritzki (guitar)
Phillip Zum Felde (guitar)
Oliver Schewerda (drums)
Band-info:
A Metalcore band grom Hilden, that formed in 1989 and got signed after their Demo from around 1990 by Snoop Records, who published a single (1991) and Intricate's debut album in 1992. After the album Intricate went on tour through Europe, which resulted in one more live tape and a Split 7" with Majority Of One, both featuring live cuts, before the Century Media label picked them up for their last album, strangely entitled "[va:l]", in 1993. The guy's sound was for the early 90's typical modern Power/Thrash like Pantera mixed with a huge dose of US Hardcore, which made the whole material sounding more or less like Biohazard on their first two albums.Discography:
"Intricate" Demo 199? (selfreleased)
"Backwards" 7" EP 1991 (Snoop)
"Intricate" LP/CD 1992 (Snoop)
"A convulsion attempt" Live Tape 1992 (Horizons)
"Live in Europe" Split 7" EP 1992 (with Majority Of One, Lund Castle Core Records)
"[va:l]" LP/CD 1993 (Century Media)
Ion Faith
Lineup:
Shane Campell (vocals)
Norbert Donowen (guitar)
Carsten Herres (guitar)
Peter Schu (bass)
Marc Haas (drums)
Band-info:
Hereby we introduce one of Germany's hottest irons in the fire, even though they didn’t manage to release an own album at all. These lads was originating from Leiwen/Mehring (east of Trier) and easily must be called one of the most promising german Metal acts that never made it out of the Demo stage at all. The band had already existed in a different form since the beginning of the 80s under the name Iron Faith and released the single “Life in dreams” privately in 1983. Unfortunately the guys didn't release anything after that, but they could still be seen live on stage every now and then until 1987. At the beginning of 1988, singer Shane Campell, originally from Los Angeles, Norbert Donowen (guitar), Carsten Herres (guitar), Peter Schu (bass) and Marc Haas (drums) decided to rename the band to Ion Faith and were able to arouse some interest with their live supports for Trans Am and Zed Yago, among others. In the summer of '88 the band was invited to the TV Metal show “Mosh” for an interview. After Shane Campell was replaced by ex-Wild Axes/Princess singer Thomas Horst and new guitarist Hacki joined the band for Norbert Donowen, Ion Faith began recordings for “Cold cut steel” in 1988 at the renowned Franz. K Studio in Witten. You get everything here, 8 tracks all of the same high quality, squealing guitars all along, a great vocalist and melodic Heavy Metal that your balls are going to burst. Their sound was a mix of the late 80's classic german Metal with a not unimportant dose of US steel. The lads even had a french management. Ion Faith then went on a short “Cold cut steel” promotional tour in 1989, but no label signed the band. The last info that we found was Ion Faith to change their name to Gypsy during late 1989.(Thanx to Tatjana Menk for additional info)
Discography:
”Cold cut steel” Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
Iron Duke
Lineup:
Dirk G. (guitar)
Adrean (guitar, bass)
Claudius Hempelmann (drums)
Band-info:
A Kraut Rock band from Hannover that released an obscure 7" on their own label. The single turns up on certain wantlists but it doesn't contain any Metal influences at all. On the title track you can hear in places a Hard Rock guitar but seriously, it's more or less just a Rock band. Hands off! One of Claudius Hempelmann's other bands at that time (he also played in Kosmonautentraum and "Der Moderne Mann"), namely the Trivales single, though belongs to the early german Hard Rock/Metal gems.Discography:
"Funky story" 7" EP 1981 (AdDi)
Iron Faith
Lineup:
Band-info:
A Metal band from Leiwen, in the area around the city of Trier, that published an independently manufactured single in 1983, but couldn’t really get much attention afterwards. Both of the trax feature a quite rough styled powerful Heavy Metal with idiosynchratic vocals, which makes the 7" to stand out. Unfortunately this obscure piece almost never turns up, so I guess the edition hasn't been that large at all. Despite no more releases of Iron Faith seem to exist, the band though was still playing live up to 1987, before they changed name to Ion Faith in early 1988 and could once again surprise with an outstanding Demo under that new monicker!Discography:
"Life in dreams" 7" EP 1983 (selfreleased)
Jail
Lineup:
Peter Knapp (guitar, vocals)
Alexander Kraft (guitar)
Mario Winnikes (bass)
Oliver Lampertsdörfer (drums)
Band-info:
A Hard Rock band from the Mannheim/Ludwigshafen/Heidelberg area (most probably Heidelberg directly). The guys was active since the late 80's already and recorded their first Demo "Pure Rock" (3 trax) end of October '89, featuring just typical US Hard Rock with raw sound and Glam/Sleaze edge, that didn't need to hide behind certain acts of the sunset strip scene at all. These lads knew their craft and produced another tape with the title "...more pure Rock" right in December '90 with 4 similar songs included, this time with stronger Metal edge, yet not leaving the US Glam Metal/Hard Rock path a single cm. A third Demo was still published in 1992 though, but this time featuring just the trax "California" and "We want it louder" of the previous Demos plus the live trax "Jailhouse Rock - Medley" and "Time to say goodbye", that both was recorded during July '92. In a way the title of the last track most probably could be seen as a (bad) omen, as we can't really remember that more of Jail's publications still followed after this 3rd one. Further info is naturally welcome.Discography:
"Pure Rock" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"...more pure Rock" Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
"All idiots" Demo 1992 (selfreleased)
Jan Kaveh Band
Lineup:
Jan Kaveh Alishahi (vocals, keyboard)
Thomas Schnabel (guitar)
Michael Bieber (bass)
Bernd Peters (drums)
Band-info:
The Jan Kaveh Band was formed around the middle of the 80’s and named after their vocalist Jan Kaveh Alishahi, who in the beginning either run the group only under the monicker Jan Kaveh, but after 1986 they added “Band” to the name as well. Previously active as fourpiece in Großwenkheim in the northern Schweinfurth area with Jan Kaveh Alishahi (vocals, keyboard), Thomas Schnabel (guitar), Michael Bieber (bass) and Bernd Peters (drums), they released their first vinyl, the “My other self” single in 1986 on the indie label CCA, and made clear that the band’s passion was to compose catchy melodic Hard Rock tunes. Afterwards Manuela Maria Metz was permanently engaged as a background singer for the band, who started recordings for their self titled album which was recorded at the Woodhouse Studios at the end of 1988, lasting till 1989 and also included with “Whole lotta love” an unconventional sounding Led Zeppelin cover. With the impressive ballad "Babe", the band also managed an absolute hit, even if nobody took much notice of the album. Even though they seriously belong to the Hard Rock spectrum, Thomas Schnabel's production was a little too poppy, with the heaviness unfortunately taking a back seat. Nevertheless, Melodic Rock fans will certainly enjoy the album. It though would remain the only album of the Jan Kaveh Band, who still continued for a few more years, but subsequently changed musicians. Paul Hippeli later became the bass player and Helmut Meyer joined on drums.Discography:
“My other self" 7" 1986 (CCA)
“Jan Kaveh Band" LP 1989 (Knock Out Music Service)
Jaws
Lineup:
Christoph Wegmann (guitar, vocals)
Uwe Hermannnsen (bass)
Mike Glashörster (drums)
Band-info:
A Punk influenced Hard Rock band from Münster that was founded around 1976. The trio had been schoolfriends who was working for a PA rental company. Influenced by bands of the growing british Punk movement such as The Clash, Sex Pistols and also Thin Lizzy, the guys used to play a few songs for soundcheck purposes at gigs of the company they was working for. There is a weird story connected to this band, that says their boss liked the songs of the band and after they finished school in mid '77 and all went their own ways, leaving the city of Münster, he manufactured a limited single 1978 without permission and knowledge of the guys, that featured two trax that he had recorded during such a soundcheck test. When the ex-drummer of the band came back home to visit his parents, he was told about the single and confronted his ex-boss with it. The latter gave him, after attesting that only 200 copies had been pressed, 25 singles. What speaks against this story is that the backsleeve mentions the contact address of the bass player, who, according to the story above, moved already in 1977 to another city. Nevertheless, musically the lads used to play a slightly Punk inspired Hard Rock with Thin Lizzy hints and either a dose of Southern Rock. Sadly the single nowadays isn't that easy to find anymore, since it was spread just locally back in the day.Discography:
"Loser" 7" EP 1978 (Schallwand Musikhandel)
Jezebel's Tower
Lineup:
Charly Weibel (vocals)
Michael Wiesner (guitar)
Klaus Schäfer (bass)
Rüdiger Rudolph (keyboard)
Manfred Kuhnle (drums)
Band-info:
A band from Reilingen in the Heidelberg area, active since March '92. Jezebel's Tower's musical spectrum included Melodic Metal, Power Metal and mainly Progressive/Symphonic Metal sounds. After winning the local "Rockförderpreis Rhein-Neckar-Kreis" in June '93, their debut album "Like every mother's son" was recorded and released wether late 1993 or in very early 1994. The 2 album songs "Don't cry" and "Always on my mind" already appeared during 1993 on the local "1. Bruchsaler Sampler". Rüdiger Rudolph later was replaced by Andreas Wurm (keyboard) and also guitarist Michael Wiesner left the band during the mid 90's and got substituted by first Rainer Schönfelder, then Ralf Jung came in 1998 and finally Mathias Wurm filled out the guitar position till the band's decline. Besides a few singles released during the mid 90's, the band published a "Live" CD (1996) and the second studio album "Selling the wind" in 1998 independently and eventually split up in 2003.Discography:
"1. Bruchsaler Sampler" Comp.-CD Tracks 1993 (House Master)
"Like every mother's son" CD 1993 (House Master)
Jod S-11
Lineup:
Alex Kiritsis
Jürgen Wochnik
Uwe Böttcher
Carsten Köppe
Kurt Kühnpast
Band-info:
Just for reasons of completion I tend to add the band Jod S-11 from Paderborn (or surrounding area) here as well, because their quite unknown single from the mid 80's (I think) features a mix of AOR/Melodic Rock/Hard Rock and Power Pop. It's not so easy to categorize their sound, as pretty much pieces of everything melt together here. The band was female fronted with (good) vocals sung in german, and the guys pretty much scooped the whole spectrum of the above mentioned styles. Both trax for what they did, are quite nice, the semiballad "Endlos" and either the brisky "Karneval" that somehow reminds of the "heavier" early Nena stuff. But Melodic Rock fans won't make any mistake here. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"Karneval/Endlos" 7" EP 8?
"Modernes Deutschland" Comp.-LP Track 1984 (Paderborn Rock)
Jojo
Lineup:
Robert Musenbichler (guitar, vocals)
Robert Kohlmeyer (guitar, vocals)
George Liszt (bass, vocals)
Lothar Krell (keyboard)
Band-info:
Jojo (or also JoJo) was an AOR band from Frankfurt/Main, that was founded 1985 by austrian musician Robert Musenbichler after the band Tokyo that he played earlier with, got disbanded. Also former Tokyo keyboarder Lothar Krell was steady member of the band and furthermore many ex-Tokyo musicians helped Musenbichler to record his songs, like Fritz Matzka (drums) and Ken Taylor (bass). Jojo produced 2 early singles during 1985/86 with hit producer Frank Farian (the guy who made Boney M. and Milli Vanilli - urgh!), that simply do not belong into this site's musical content at all, because "Shadows in the night" and "Take a little time" both just featured terrible Dance/Disco Pop. The more interesting debut album "Jojo" was released during 1988 and contained just typical 80's AOR/Melodic Rock with poppy edge, very similar to acts like She's China, Dominoe or Surprises. Curst Dress recorded the drum parts and Ken Taylor played additional bass lines, while Musenbichler, Liszt and Kohlmeyer shared the vocal parts. But after their last single "We scandalize" the band already split up during 1989.Discography:
"Shadows in the night" 7"/12" EP 1985 (CBS)
"Take a little time" 7"/12"EP 1986 (CBS)
"Jojo" LP/CD 1988 (Ariola)
"Woman's touch" 7"/12"/MCD 1988 (Ariola)
"Extasy" 7"/12" EP 1988 (Ariola)
"We scandalize" 7"/12" EP 1989 (Teldec)
Jon Symon’s Warlock
Lineup:
Jon Symon (vocals)
Charly Maucher (bass)
Detlef Klamann (guitar)
Werner Nadolny (synthesizer)
Peter Panka (drums)
Band-info:
Though I'm not sure if this "band" Warlock (later called Jon Symon's Warlock) was indeed a real band or just a project, we have to add it to the database neverthless because it clearly belongs to the Hard Rock spectrum. Jon Symon was a natural born britishman who came to Germany within the 60's and stayed here in Hannover. In the early 70's he was on stage as a one-man-show and either released several singles (which are not of interest here). 1978 he started working on the album "Warlock - Memories of a white magician" with Klaus Peter Matziol (bass), Eloy member Detlev Schmidtchen (keyboard), Epitaph drummer Jim McGillivray and Hajo Hoffmann (violin). In the early 80's Symon and the director of the Hannover ballet ensemble met each other and started working on two Rock ballets which for two albums was produced either. On the first one "Warlock" from 1983, Symon got supported by Charly Maucher (bass), ex-Mountain Ash Detlef Klamann (guitar), ex-Jane Werner Nadolny (synthesizer) and Peter Panka (drums). For "Lady Macbeth" ex-Mountain Ash Eckhard Wahlmann (keyboard) replaced Werner Nadolny and Bernd Klamann (drums) joined for Peter Panka. Due to both albums are more or less Rock ballet soundtracks, the musical width is different, but songs like "Eye of the witch", "Forever and a day" or "Banquet" will catch every epic Hard and Prog Rock fan's heart, as these are prime examples of how medieval pompish Hard Rock must sound like. For openminded guys worth a try...Discography:
"Warlock - Soundtrack zum Rockballet" LP 1983 (Lava, as Warlock)
“Lady Macbeth“ LP 1984 (Lava)
Juicy Lucy
Lineup:
Albert Jochum (vocals)
Bernd Ferone (guitar)
Volker Herschbach (keyboard)
Jörg Schaufert (bass)
Wolfgang Schulz (drums)
Band-info:
Neunkirchen Hardrockers founded originally as Scrap Manufactory in 1972, consisting of Bernd Ferone (guitar), Jörg Schaufert (bass), Volker Herschbach (keyboard), Rick de Soto (drums, vocals) back then, who’ve been known for dressing notoriously in leather already during the late 70’s, these lads drew quite a huge fan crowd to each one of their well visited gigs and quickly established their prominent status in their local area around Neunkirchen/Saarbrücken. After a few changes, the band eventually produced two songs with Ricky King, with the final line up featuring Bernd Ferone (guitar), Albert Jochum (vocals), Volker Herschbach (keyboard) and Jörg Schaufert (bass), for their first single “Little Jane” in 1979, and subsequently would change their name to Lancelot for the single release. A new drummer was found in Joachim Hammerschmidt (ex-Fun), who must have joined after the recordings for the single at around 1980/81 and was firstly introduced on the 81er compilation trax „Danger in sky“ and „You’re so young“, both featured on the "Musik Szene Saar II" LP. After the single “Stop man" on Leico (1982), that delivered a song which also appeared on their '83er debut, the guys got picked up by the Rock untypical label WPL Records and eventually recorded their first album "But I just can't stay behind" with new bassist Frank Rummler, which furthermore led into a deal with Ariola for another single ("Far away") and the 12” “Blinded” in 1984, eventually succeeding into Lancelot getting the spot to open for the Rock titans Queen at their Germany tour in 1984. The LP features quite listenable melodic Heavy Rock, that just missed to adopt a real Heavy Metal sound. But basically the lads knew how to handle their instruments and tried to compose catchy material. On the "Far away" and "Blinded" EP's Lancelot unfortunately dived too much into the Melodic Rock/AOR seas and therefore it's fully ok to only own the "But I just can't stay behind" LP, coz it contains the band's heaviest songs. Joachim „Hammer“ Hammerschmidt then after the „Blinded“ EP left Lancelot and shortly played with local Heavyrockers Natchez, before he ultimately left the music business. The rest of the band with Wolfgang Schulz on drums now, during the mid 80’s relocated to Hollywood, where talent scout Steve Verocca had a big career for the guys in mind. They produced about 40 songs in several studios of Los Angeles, recorded between 1987 and 1988, whereof the best of the bunch should be used for another Lancelot album to push their financial breakthrough. On the other hand the band was forced to once again change their name to a much more girls friendly sounding Juicy Lucy, to serve the growing Glam/Sleave wave optically and audible. As expected, the big labels didn’t see the potential of the guys, so the planned album moved into far future and some of the recorded material eventually saw the light of day in 1995, when the band was already dead and buried, on Juicy Lucy’s selftitled CD, with ex-McAuley Schenker Group Bodo Schopf behind the drums. Frank Rummler in 1992 formed Shortino together with Alexander Beyrodt (ex-Wild Axes/Princess/Sinner).Discography:
Juliet
Lineup:
Susanne Schätzle (vocals)
Peter Potens (guitar)
Günter Werno (keyboard)
Martin Bernhard (bass)
Jürgen Klein (drums)
Band-info:
A female fronted commercial Hard Rock/Metal band from Neunkirchen, that formed during early 1986. Juliet participated on an international band contest back in 1987, but already had published the "America/Lying" single on BEE Records just one year earlier. Most probably a Demo from that time (1986/87) exists as well. The single just recently surfaced accidentally, but features with "America" a pounding melodic top notch Hardrocker in classic US Pop Metal tradition. Susanne Schätzle shortly after the single release got enticed by female rockers Rosy Vista and therefore left the band. During 1987 the guys either won the local newcomer band contest hosted by the Live Magazin Saar. After several rather silent years, the band resurfaced in the early 90’s, when Axel Thubeauville 1993 produced a fullenght of Juliet for his own Shark Records label, but the band now featured completely different musicians, besides the returned Susanne Schätzle once again on vocals, also Steven Keusch (guitar), Ralf Dietze (bass), Chester Erdmann (drums) and ex-Bad Intention Pete Sorrentino on guitar. The same titled CD was released in September '93 and still contains oldfashioned catchy melodic 80's Hard Rock, reminding occasionally of bands like Saraya.(Thanx to emosteel for additional info)
Discography:
"America" 7" EP 1986 (BEE)
"Juliet" CD 1993 (Shark)
Karo
Lineup:
Lutz Salzwedel (vocals)
Hans-Jürgen Straub (keyboard)
Erich Holstein (guitar)
Dieter Seeburg (bass)
Ronald Bosien (drums)
Band-info:
Heavy Rockers from Berlin-Kreuzberg, that disappeared after just one album. The band was founded around late 1985 by the ex-Iris/Morgenrot musicians Ronald Bosien (drums) and Hans-Jürgen "Karo" Straub (keyboard), who've been in the music business since the mid 70's and either published a handful of albums and singles with Morgenrot till the early 80's when all of the Morgenrot guys went separate ways. The band was baptised Karo and started recording several Demos in studios across Germany and even London, to finally get picked up by Frontrow Records, who already signed a similar sounding act with Kingdom the same year. "Heavy birthday", as the album got entitled, is winning over by sophisticated Heavy Rock compositions of international standard with for german condidtions a brilliant vocalist, combining Hard Rock and heavy AOR like the Scorpions. Sadly the band already split up after the album in 1988 and both Straub and Bosien returned to Morgenrot in the mid 90's.Discography:
"Heavy birthday" LP/CD 1988 (Frontrow)
"Sister, sister" 7"/12" EP 1988 (Frontrow)
Khaily
Lineup:
Jürgen Dold (vocals, keyboard)
Siggi Dold (bass)
Frank Ellringmann (drums)
Thomas Dold (guitar)
Band-info:
The obscure Khaily was founded in 1978 in Kirchzarten, near Freiburg im Breisgau, by the 2 brothers Thomas and Sigi Dold, together with an unrelated Jürgen Dold on keyboard. In 1981 they got a steady drummer in Frank Ellringmann and the year after released their only recorded legacy, a really good HR/early melodic HM 7" single, reminiscent of Rainbow and various early Scandinavian acts like Silver Mountain, Glory Bells etc. Beside Khaily the band members were also active in a cover band called Royal Flash, performing mostly dance and chart music, playing several gigs in Freiberg and surrounding areas. Sigi was also involved in a Freiburg non-HR/HM band called T-Bones for a short while. Khaily/Royal Flash broke up in 1986.
Kingdom Come
Lineup:
Lenny Wolf (vocals)
Danny Stag (guitar)
Rick Steier (guitar)
Johnny B. Frank (bass)
James Kottak (drums)
Band-info:
I'm not sure if it's indeed neccessarily needed to introduce the band Kingdom Come, as they should be known to everyone I'm sure. The german born Frank Wöllschlager, better known as Lenny Wolf, who was playing with the US american Hard Rock band Stone Fury in the early 80's and published the albums "Burns like a star" (1984) and "Let them talk" (1986), formed Kingdom Come in 1987 with Danny Stag (guitar, later in Royal Jelly), Rick Steier (guitar, later in Wild Horses/Warrant), Johnny B. Frank (bass) and the future longtime Scorpions drummer James Kottak (later in Wild Horses/Warrant). The debut album "Kingdom Come" released in 1988 turned out to become the band's most successful one, featuring a highly Led Zeppelin influenced 70's Hard Rock sound, whose burnmark the band wouldn't get rid off anymore for the rest of their career. Especially Wolf's vocals sounded so close to Robert Plant's that Led Zep could have had exchanged Plant silently with Lenny Wolf and nobody ever would notice. After the 89'er album "In your face", that adopted more of a classic US american commercial Hard Rock sound, the original band broke up and Lenny Wolf in 1990 was working on the Kingdom Come comeback album "Hands of time", that was recorded with hired musicians like Blues Saraceno (Poison) and ex-Dancer drummer Bam Bamm Shibley. "Hands of time" returned to the point where the debut "Kingdom Come" had stopped and boped up and down once more with the 70's classic Led Zeppelin Hard Rock sound. By 1993 Lenny Wolf relocated to Hamburg and formed the new Kingdom Come with german musicians Kai Fricke (drums), Heiko Radke-Sieb (solo guitar) and ex-Xero Billy Liesegang (solo guitar), while Wolf recorded rhythm guitars and the bass tracks himself. Kingdom Come kept releasing albums throughout the past 25 years and got eventually disbanded by Lenny Wolf in 2016. The band's discography either includes tons of singles, that we seriously waive to list all here.Discography:
"Kingdom Come" LP/CD 1988 (Polydor)
"In your face" LP/CD 1989 (Polydor)
"Hands of time" LP/CD 1991 (Polydor)
"Bad image" LP/CD 1993 (WEA)
Kreischer Gang
Lineup:
Michael Kreischer (guitar, vocals)
Band-info:
No clue where these guys originated from, but there are two obscure vinyl releases remaining from the early 80's. The band was active since the late 70's and the rough rocking "Neongirl" from their debut single was written already in 1978. The Kreischer Gang was experimenting with the late 70's Hard Rock and some NWOBHM influences in form of Motörhead hints, that pop up every now and then on their album "Sex Teufel" from 1982. In the first the lads celebrate a classic Hard Rock, but more than once drifted away into the early NWOBHM sound, like f.e. Reforger. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"Neongirl" 7" EP 1981 (Aarton)
"Sex Teufel" LP 1982 (Rockport)
L.A.S.T.
Lineup:
Roy Last (guitar, vocals)
Gerry Rigg (bass)
Steven Dearman (keyboard)
Max Münch (drums)
Band-info:
Roy Last was the nephew of the famous german Big Band leader James Last. He was born in New York City but his german parents moved back to Germany in early years, so he grew up in Hamburg where he started playing in his first band Amazing Grace in the mid 70's till he formed the Roy Last Group at around 1978. The first single "Born to be wild" still featured with "Land of ladies" a mellow Kraut Rocker, but the Steppenwolf cover version might be one of the best that was ever done, and that song must have been covered quite one million times if not even two. On "Rocks" the sails was already set into Hard Rock direction, though just like on the 7" a bit earlier, the 70's Kraut Rock was playing a big role either. In 1983 he published the "Let's go rock" 12", featuring the 12 min lasting "Rainchild" instrumental from the debut album in a more dynamic version with vocals and also the "Goodtimes ahead" LP, that's fully worshipping the Hard Rock with early Metal hints. After those releases it got silent around the band. Roy Last returned in the mid 80's when he was member of Dirty Money, an melodic AOR/Hard Rock from Hamburg formed by John Boutkam (aka John Ridge, ex-One-O-One/E.F. Band/Picture), who tried without success to find a label for their selfrecorded album (around 1985/86). In the late 80's Roy Last released a more up to date last album "Comin and a'goin'" (as L.A.S.T.) in a quite experienced guitar driven Hard Rock/Metal style with melodic background, that also features a song that was originally composed and performed by Dirty Money - "Ice in the sun". After the album he helped Jutta Weinhold with the "The 4th quest for fantasy" album in 1992 of her Velvet Viper band and made it sounding again like in old Zed Yago times. Roy Last died in 2004 completely unexpectedly at age of only 47 years.Discography:
"Comin and a'going" LP/CD 1989 (Jax Pax)
Lancelot
Lineup:
Albert Jochum (vocals)
Bernd Ferone (guitar)
Volker Herschbach (keyboard)
Jörg Schaufert (bass)
Joachim Hammerschmidt (drums)
Band-info:
Neunkirchen Hardrockers consisting of Bernd Ferone (guitar), Jörg Schaufert (bass), Volker Herschbach (keyboard), Rick de Soto (drums, vocals), who found together already during 1972, by firstly using the name Scrap Manufactory. Known for dressing notoriously in leather already during the late 70’s, these lads drew quite a huge fan crowd to each one of their well visited gigs and quickly established their prominent status in their local area around Neunkirchen/Saarbrücken. After a few changes, the band eventually produced two songs with Ricky King, with the final line up featuring Bernd Ferone (guitar), Albert Jochum (vocals), Volker Herschbach (keyboard) and Jörg Schaufert (bass), for their first single “Little Jane” in 1979, and subsequently would change their name to Lancelot for the single release. A new drummer was found in Joachim Hammerschmidt (ex-Fun), who must have joined after the recordings for the single at around 1980/81 and was firstly introduced on the 81er compilation trax „Danger in sky“ and „You’re so young“, both featured on the "Musik Szene Saar II" LP. After the single “Stop man" on Leico (1982), that delivered a song which also appeared on their '83er debut, the guys got picked up by the Rock untypical label WPL Records and eventually recorded their first album "But I just can't stay behind" with new bassist Frank Rummler, which furthermore led into a deal with Ariola for another single ("Far away") and the 12” “Blinded” in 1984, eventually succeeding into Lancelot getting the spot to open for the Rock titans Queen at their Germany tour in 1984. The LP features quite listenable melodic Heavy Rock, that just missed to adopt a real Heavy Metal sound. But basically the lads knew how to handle their instruments and tried to compose catchy material. On the "Far away" and "Blinded" EP's Lancelot unfortunately dived too much into the Melodic Rock/AOR seas and therefore it's fully ok to only own the "But I just can't stay behind" LP, coz it contains the band's heaviest songs. Joachim „Hammer“ Hammerschmidt then after the „Blinded“ EP left Lancelot and shortly played with local Heavyrockers Natchez, before he ultimately left the music business. The rest of the band with now Wolfgang Schulz on drums during the mid 80’s relocated to Hollywood, where talent scout Steve Verocca had a big career for the guys in mind. They produced about 40 songs in several studios of Los Angeles, recorded between 1987 and 1988, whereof the best of the bunch should be used for another Lancelot album to push their financial breakthrough. On the other hand the band was forced to once again change their name to a much more girls friendly sounding Juicy Lucy, to serve the growing Glam/Sleave wave optically and audible.Discography:
"Little Jane" 7" EP 1979 (M Music)
"Musik Szene Saar II" Comp.-LP Tracks 1981 (Bellaphon)
"Stop man" 7" EP 1982 (Leico)
"But I just can't stay behind" LP 1983 (WPL)
"But I just can't stay behind" 7" EP 1983 (WPL)
"Far away" 7" EP 1984 (Ariola)
"Blinded" 7"/12" EP 1984 (Ariola)
Lanzer
Lineup:
Tilo Winter (vocals)
Ralf Kern (keyboard)
Eric Kern (guitar)
Rainer Kern (guitar)
Chris Hohn (bass)
Bollo Reinhard (drums)
Band-info:
The family business Lanzer from Wörth am Main started as Dirt Road, who's first musical steps originate from 1979 already, before they changed name to Lanzer in 1985 and released the scarce single "Changes" (a ballad), whose B side delivers straight midtempo Metal respectively. The band signed a record contract with the young indie label Perfect Beat and started recording their debut "Use it or loose it" at the D&S studio in 1987, where they already recorded the two commercial Heavy Rockers "Rock to the shock" and "Take your love" for D&S' in-house "Break Out" sampler. Funnily the name on the album sleeve got completely misspelled and the band was introduced as Lancer. "Use it or loose it" was published in different vinyl colors, in blue, splatter and either red if I'm not mistaken. Lanzer performed a very unspectacular Melodic Metal with heavy Hard Rock edge, that was more or less rooted in the commercial corner and the lads didn't either hide that undertaking. But nevertheless, a solid mean could be confirmed for sure. The connected "Ocean of tears" 12" even included with "Never forever" a non album track. 1992 with new members Matthias Böhm (bass) and female vocalist Janie Dixon, as well as the male singer Chris Bay, a MCD was released that featured live trax of the band. Afterwards the lads either started focussing on cover versions to somehow survive the 90's. "Under a different sun" from 1995 would remain the band's last album for a longer period, till 2003 the "Rock Circus" Live CD and in 2011 the compilation "Black crusader" was published on the RE Musik label, that featured songs of different period's of Lanzer's legislating.Discography:
"Changes" 7" EP 1985 (TSB)
"Break Out - German Metal Tracks No 5" Comp.-LP Tracks 1987 (D&S)
"Use it or loose it" LP 1987 (Perfect Beat)
"Ocean of tears" 12" EP 1987 (Perfect Beat)
"Lanzer" MCD 1992 (Metra)
Lavatory (Erlangen)
Lineup:
Wolfgang Krettner (vocals)
Chris Frenzel (guitar)
Jürgen Konrad (guitar)
Roland Reißlandt (bass)
Jürgen Schwinge (drums)
Band-info:
1986 founded Thrashers from Erlangen, who played their first gig in February ‘87, still with only Jürgen Konrad on guitar. A bit later on Chris Frenzel joined as second guitarist and Jürgen Schwinge replaced their original drummer. After the two early Demos "Whacking in the night" and "Victims of the bughouse" (1987), the lads recorded another "Chemical death" tape in late ‘88 (released January '89) and got signed by the label Destiny Records from Berlin, that sent the guys straight into the Music Lab studio to produce Lavatory's debut album "Glasshouse fools" still within the same year. It speaks for itself that a Hardcore label signed the band, as the common Metal labels as usual has been deaf. The demo and album trax offered a straight forward US Thrash style with also slightly almost Death/Thrash hints in the guitar riffing, while the vocals was more or less fancying with the extreme Hardcore business. With the release of the second album "To protect and to serve", Lavatory even more adopted the New York style late 80's Hard/Metalcore influences and delivered an flawless album that was more american sounding than half of the NYC Hardcore scene at that time, reminding of acts like the good Outburst on their excellent "Miles to go" single from 1989. The last Lavatory album "Yes it hurts" was released in 1996 on Tug Records, before they changed name to Rude Awakening. Their privately manufactured "LoFi for the Lowlifes" double CD (2016) contains all of the band's early Demos.(Thanx to Frank/Powerprillipator for additional info)
Discography:
"Whacking in the night" Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
"Victims of the bughouse" Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
"Chemical death" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"Glasshouse fools" LP/CD 1989 (Destiny)
"To protect and to serve" CD 1993 (Massacre)
Lay - Out
Lineup:
Andy Hermanns (vocals, keyboard)
Oliver Claßen (guitar, vocals)
Jürgen Peks (guitar, vocals)
Michael Eidel (bass)
Mathias Uebel (drums)
Band-info:
Obscure local Hard'n'Heavy band from Hammelburg, near Schweinfurt, but categorizing them musically isn't that easy at all. About the band there isn't much known, Lay - Out nevertheless independently produced a 2 track single in the middle of the 80's. Basically a melodic sort of Metal, both of the tracks also merge some typical US Glam Metal influences, especially on the title track, that somehow reminds of an early Cinderella number (when they still sounded alright) minus the Keifer vocals. The basic heaviness is definitely there and both trax do sound extremely listenable. Further band info though is needed.Discography:
"Long live Rock`n Roll" 7" EP 1986 (selfreleased)
Liar
Lineup:
The Duke (vocals)
Dipzy (guitar, bass)
Manu Münzel (guitar)
Bone (keyboards)
Teffe (drums)
Band-info:
A local band from Dortmund that started at around 1988 and debuted with the quite promising Power/Thrash Demo "Nothing is impossible" still within the same year. The Century Media label took 'em under their wings and Liar's first single "It hurts" got produced, whose songs would later appear in re-recorded versions on the band's debut album "Nothing but the truth" again, that was released with gatefold cover in 1989. They received quite good feedback by the press and basically what Nocturnus' debut meant for the back in the day's Death Metal scene, Liar's "Nothing but the truth" meant for the german Metal scene, because both bands was working with keyboards as an equal instrument, which at that timepoint was pretty much uncommon. Liar's style either was influenced by all kinds of Metal, from classic Metal to mainly Power Metal and melodic Thrash tunes, which made the album sounding quite varied, neither to forget to mention The Duke's pretty remarkable vocals. Unfortunately it seems the sales figures wasn't of Century Media's expectations, as Liar's second effort "Cheatin' games" was published on the indie label TRL, but either fully continued the band's melodic Power Metal style with Speed hints, but was missing single "hits" like "It hurts". Nevertheless seen as a whole, "Cheatin' games" must be considered a step forward in Liar's musical progress. But all that didn't matter anymore as Death Metal and Grunge had conquered the market and the band soon disbanded in the early 90's.Discography:
"Nothing is impossible" Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
"It hurts" 7" EP 1989 (Century Media)
"Liar" Promo Tape 1989 (selfreleased)
"D.C.W." Flexi Split 7" EP Track 1989 (with Poltergeist, Century Media)
"Nothing but the truth" LP/CD 1989 (Century Media)
"Cheatin' games" LP/CD 1991 (TRL)
Limerick
Lineup:
Heinz Joas (vocals)
Bernd Heß (guitar)
Michael Prokopeck (guitar)
Gunnar Henges (bass)
Jakel Bossert (drums)
Band-info:
Basically the album of Limerick from Pirmasens some of the readers might have seen already, as it can be found on Ebay problemlessly, though some of you might even don't know that it contains pretty heavier Rock. The 7" of the early 1980 founded group on the other hand is much more difficult to put into paper bags nowadays. After well visited live gigs already in the early phase of the band and even appearing at TV shows, Leico Records produced their debut 7" in October 1980. Both of the trax do feature classic Hard Rock with Kraut Rock edge, while "Hard work" is the song, that makes the single interesting. After a line up change, Roland Lehner (guitar) replaced Michael Prokopeck and keyboarder Joachim Weber joined, the sextet recorded their debut album "on Tour" November '82 in Munich. From the old Kraut Rock there wasn't any influences left anymore, instead Limerick followed their Hard Rock inputs and delivered for 1983 quite modern sounding, german sung Heavy Rock with some NWOBHM leads, plus a dose of melody, that reaches it's peak with the powerful Metal rocker "Gabi". After the album their traces got lost.Discography:
"Hard work" 7" EP 1980 (Leico)
"on Tour" LP 1983 (Steyrer Disco)
Lion Heart
Lineup:
Band-info:
Local Demo stage band from Augsburg offering quite well executed melodic Metal with strong US Metal hints. Seems to be highly influenced by DIO and even the Scorpions (80’s phase) according to their songwriting. Unfortunately they did not print any songtitles on the booklet of their 3 track demo. Possible titles might be “It’s a crime”, “Magic” and “Never again”. I'm not sure if this band was related with the Hard Rock band Lionheart from Augsburg, that released the "Remember all" single in the early 80's.Discography:
"Magic" Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
Lionheart
Lineup:
Manfred Langner (vocals)
Richard Heimerl (guitar)
Heinz Weller (bass)
Claus Tirschmann (drums)
Band-info:
The Augsburg based Lionheart used to write just a very short chapter in the german Hard Rock history between 1981-83, imspired by bands like Whitesnake and UFO. At least they made it to a local single release, that features the 2 tracks "Remember all" and "Walking the dog". The lads made clear on the backsleeve what's their credo, "The 70's Revisited with the hard-rocking sound of Lionheart". There is late 70's influences in form of AC/DC hints audible, but either a bluesy note. The title track still grows and unfolds it's charm with the refrain and the great solo part. The backside track on the other hand doesn't know to attact at all. Manfred Langner came from the local Augsburg 70's Hard Rock legend Mephisto and Bernd Sparhuber replaced Heinz Weller on bass.
Liquid Sky
Lineup:
Matze Aicher (bass, vocals)
Frankie Uhl (guitar, vocals)
Uwe Albrecht (guitar)
Hagen Enderlein (keyboard)
Charly Miller (drums)
Band-info:
Melodic Metal Rockers that originated from Kaiserslautern and only released a 7" in 1987 it seems. Both tracks feature some powerful Hard Rock/Metal that seems pretty much influenced by the Scorpions sound of the early 80's, though the band was rather known for mainly performing cover versions live on stage when they played at the US american clubs in their area. The musicianship truly acted solid, but the material was just standard stuff and didn't stand out of the usual Metal made during that decade. Dirk Bayer replaced Matze Aicher after the single and guitarist Dee Polz joined, but Liquid Sky fell apart during the fall of the 80’s nevertheless. Both Polz and Bayer formed the Hard Rock band Sleazy right away.Discography:
"Mystery" 7" EP 1987 (AVC)
Local Parley
Lineup:
Gregor Steinbrenner (vocals)
Tilo Graf (guitar)
Rene Michel (bass)
Oliver Barthel (keyboard)
Markus Kreutzer (drums)
Band-info:
A Hard Rock band from Wiesloch in the Speyer/Heidelberg area, who had their famous phase around 1990/91, when the guys either produced an own 2 track single, which sadly isn’t that known at all, but indeed should. Both songs deliver quite catchy not too poppy sounding melodic Hard Rock with potential for higher tasks. The keyboards on “Stop me now” either remind a bit of classic mid 80’s Van Halen (“Jump”). Fans of the melodic stuff should definitely keep their eyes open for this little gem.Local Parley formed around the beginning of 1987 after Gregor Steinbrenner (vocals), Rene Michel (bass), Tilo Graf (guitar) and Oliver Barthel (keyboard) got to know each other at grammar school and played together as a "Schülerband". Tilo Graf had previously played in another band and took guitar and bass lessons together with Rene Michel from the same teacher, Wolfgang Schulz. With Markus Kreutzer, a drummer was quickly found for the quintet, which meant that the first gig could take place a short time later on August 29, 1987 in Wiesloch. The latter left the band at the beginning of 1989 and the new drummer Thomas Schubkegel made his live debut on February 3, 1989. After that only the position of keyboarder changed once more in the autumn of 1990, after Oliver Barthel, who had worked on the song "Backseat Juliet", which then appeared on the local sampler "Wiesloch City Smash Down" in 1990, left Local Parley and was replaced by Stefan Zirkel. He played his first concert with the band on 27.9.1990. Local Parley played many different gigs at major festivals and newcomer band competitions, as well as smaller gigs, especially between 1989 and 1990 and also recorded various demo takes in the studio during this time. After the individual members drifted further and further apart at the beginning of the 90's due to their studies, the band gradually came to an end as everyone had to focus on their professional future.The last gig took place on 16.10.1993. Local Parley's singer Gregor Steinbrenner, who also played keyboards in the Hard Rock band Syntax from Karlruhe parallel to his job in Local Parley, later went to become a known TV showmaster by moderating the well known show for kids "1, 2 oder 3", while Tilo Graf immediately joined the band Zelexion within the same year, who later changed name to "we need money".
(Thanx to Dr. Tilo Graf for explicit info and pictures!)
Discography:
“Backseat Juliet" Comp.-LP Track 1990 (Wiesloch City Smash Down)
“On the rocks” 7” EP 1991 (selfreleased)
Loose Connection
Lineup:
Richard Reinhold (guitar, vocals)
Thomas Reinhold (bass)
Mario Koppatz (drums, vocals)
Wolfgang Staudt (guitar)
Band-info:
Loose Connection was a Dormagen based trio that formed in 1977 by Richard Reinhold and Mario Koppartz, to play some heavy music. They only released a sole 7" in 1979, with Richard's brother Mario added on bass, that was sold at their live gigs. The title track reminds me a bit of german Hard Rockers Lucifer, it's a midpaced Heavy Metal hymn with highly NWOBHM influenced sound. On "Midnight passage" it's getting even better, they raised the tempo and now the guys sounded almost a bit similar to Mythra. If you take Accept as standard Heavy Metal of that time, then Loose Connection clearly was a nose ahead. Shortly after the release of the 7", a second guitarist was added in the form of Wolfgang Staudt. The band was planning a full album as it's written on the sleeve ("Time To Fight" was supposed to be the title track) but sadly it never got released, so the Heavy Metal crowd has to please themselves on this lonely single.
Loose Trigger
Lineup:
Teddy (vocals)
Wichi (guitar)
Wehde (bass)
Calle (drums)
Band-info:
A Berlin based Rock band founded in the late 80's, that used to play a R'n'R inspired punky Hard Rock, like f.e. The Honx, on their "At the rhythmgun" single from 1990. The lads either weren't too bad to use a harmonica which almost is giving their material a kinda Southern Rock touch. 1992 Loose Trigger also published a full album on the Magic Toe Nail Records connected label Twang! Records. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"At the rhythmgun" 7" EP 1990 (Magic Toe Nail)
"Against the wind and tide" CD 1992 (Twang!)
Lost Legions
Lineup:
S. Mende (vocals)
A. Zimmermann (guitar)
S. Hack (guitar)
P. May (bass)
S. Wessels (keyboard)
C. Müller (drums)
Band-info:
A quite obscure female fronted local Heavy Rock band from Brake in northern Germany. They recorded the two tracks "On the run again" and "Warbringers" (misspelled on the sleeve as "Warbringess") in October 1988 and the recording studio pressed the singles, which means more or less the single is a private pressing, produced and payed by the band. The title track features common AOR, but "Warbringers" on the other hand was a fine melodic Hard Rock/Metal anthem.
Lucifer Mop
Lineup:
Roland Kuchler (guitar, vocals)
Jürgen Neumann (bass)
Adolf Kuchler (drums)
Band-info:
A local band from the Landshut/Ingolstadt/Nuremberg area. A privately pressed 7" is the band's only remnant it seems, featuring the songs "Smokin" and "Low Down Blues", that both are stylistically equivalent and offer common, handmade Hard Rock with bluesy touch, but without highlights. The single was recorded at the Tonstudio Labertal in Bavaria and marks a quite obscure piece. Further info is needed.Discography:
"Lucifer Mop" 7" EP 1986 (selfreleased)
Mad Max
Lineup:
Andreas Baesler (vocals)
Jürgen Breforth (guitar)
Wilfried Schneider (guitar)
Thomas Hoffmann (bass)
Uwe Starck (drums)
Band-info:
Mad Max originally started as the cover band Way Out in Münster 1980, till Jürgen Breforth, supported by Andreas Baesler, Wilfried Schneider, Thomas Hoffmann and Uwe Starck, suggested to change the band's name to Mad Max in 1981, because he loved the cinematic end time classic "Mad Max". The lads threw all their money into one pot and recorded 4 trax at the Unit Art studio that was probably just planned as Demo I bet, but like Railway and many many other bands either, Unit Art pressed a number of limited 7" vinyls, that nowadays are bitches to find. The early Mad Max sound could be described a highly NWOBHM influenced early Heavy Metal in the vein of bands like Turbo with influences of early Maiden/Priest, while the number "Cry for today" with it's all crushing doublebass part almost entered the Power Metal stage. The guys just one year later produced their debut album "Heavy Metal" independently at the Tonstudio Greven and released the vinyl privately in 1982, which was released one more time in early '83 with different cover on the Indie label Roof Music. Baesler and Hoffmann broke with the music business, so both found substitutes in ex-Hydra Michael Voss (vox) and Jürgen Sander on bass. The album went slightly more melodic ways than the first single, still with NWOBHM hints all along. The band called up interest of Roadrunner Records who would become the band's label partner throughout the following years. "Rollin' thunder" and "Stormchild" got released between 1984 and '85 and introduced a grown up band, that had established within the german Heavy Metal scene. Though their early NWOBHM influences was completely suffocated, Mad Max became trailblazers of the Melodic Metal scene, combining commercial influences with Heavy Metal in the vein of Dokken. On "Stormchild" there was only Jürgen Breforth left of the original line up, Axel Kruse (drums), Christoph Wegmann (guitar) and Roland Bergmann (bass) replaced the 1984 resigned Sander as well as Schneider and Starck, who both founded the band Carrie. After a tour with Steeler in December '85, Mad Max got invited to start a club tour through England in 1986, but Christoph Wegmann due to his studies was hindered to participate, so he fully quit Mad Max. Vocalist Michael Voss took the part of the lead guitarist also and the last album "Night of passion" was recorded in 1986, with the Sweet cover "Fox on the run" being lifted as single, containing with "Can't stop taking" a non album track. "Night of passion" was fully finished and published in March '87 with help of Gerhard Schleifer (Sinner) and Joshua Perahia (Joshua) who both was helping with additional guitar and solo parts. Incited by the rather ambivalent reviews of "Stormchild", especially by german Metal Hammer mag, the Mad Max guys put alot of passion into the compositions on the album and retrospectively viewed "Night of passion" was the best album they ever recorded. The Melodic Metal of "Stormchild" merged with newly found power and either melodic speed elements, that in places Mad Mad sounded close to Helloween or Mania. 1987 Mad Max concluded a contact with american major label RCA, but Roadrunner blocked that contract. As a result of that and fully convinced the international career got torpedoed by Roadrunner, Michael Voss quit in September 1987. He later, after playing in several coverbands in the meanwhile, formed the band What? during late 88/89 and subsequently joined Casanova in 1990. With Ralf Heyne (guitar) and Keith Ellis (vox) to replace songwriter Voss, Breforth started a last attempt and another album was planned to be recorded in 1988 in Los Angeles and published in April '89, but none of these plans got implemented, as Roadrunner let the band fall, thus Mad Max split up in 1989. Breforth and Ralf Heyne subsequently founded the Hard Rock band Tanner. 2005 Breforth and Voss eventually reactivated Mad Max who are active till nowadays.Discography:
"In concert" 7" EP 1981 (Unit Art)
"Heavy Metal" LP 1982 (selfreleased)
"Shake some action" Comp.-LP Track 1982 (Upgefahr'n)
"Mad Max" LP 1983 (Roof Music)
"Rollin' thunder" LP 1984 (Roadrunner)
"Rollin' thunder" (Comp.-LP Track 1984 (100% Pure Metal Sampler)
"Losing you" Comp.-LP Track 1984 (The Metal Machine)
"Stormchild" LP 1985 (Roadrunner)
"Fox on the run" 7"/12"/Pic 12" EP 1986 (Roadrunner)
"Night of passion" LP 1987 (Roadrunner)
Magdeburg
Lineup:
Hans-Joachim Kneis (vocals)
Dietrich Kessler (saxophone, flute, keyboard)
Gisbert Piatkowski (guitar)
Klaus Weigert (bass)
Hans-Peter Dohanetz (keyboard)
Detlef Kessler (drums)
Band-info:
The Hard Rock band Madgeburg was formed in the city of Magdeburg (ex-GDR) 1975, out of the ashes of the band Klosterbrüder who got more and more in trouble with the GDR's authoritys. After first recordings for the national broadcast service of the GDR a first 7" "In meinem Land" was released, and postdoctorate Hans-Peter Dohanetz left in 1976 to get replaced by the later Silly keyboarder Rüdiger Barton. Either Detlef Kessler 1976 quit and emigrated to the western part of Germany 2 years later. He was playing drums on Herbert Grönemeyer's famous "4630 Bochum" album. Waldemar Janicki replaced him and the later founding member of MCB, Bernd Schilanski took his part. A number of several singles was produced from 1978-'79 as well as Magdeburg's debut LP 1980, that featured some of the trax on the early singles either.The album was also re-released as "Verkehrte Welt" in western Germany with a slightly different tracklist. Gisbert Piatkowski and Rüdiger Barton after the album left the band and joined the Rock band City in 1980. Hans Wintoch (violin) and Hans-Jürgen Ludwig (guitar) newly joined and another 7" with the title "Hundsgemein" was produced in the following year 1981, featuring non album trax. When the lads was about to finish their second album "Grand Hand" in 1981, the authoritys started harassing the musicians again, due to the lyrical content and their optical appearance. All of the guys officially requested to leave the GDR, which caused a total stage ban for all of them and the band got officially prohibited. Dietrich Kessler and Hans-Joachim Kneis got jailed for almost 2 years and later left GDR. Hans-Jürgen Ludwig and Bernd Schilanski 1983 formed one of the first GDR's Heavy Metal bands, MCB, together with Mike Demnitz. Hans Wintoch joined Lift in 1984 and later started a solocareer. The sound of Madgeburg on all of their releases was epic 70's Hard Rock in the vein of early Berluc and Prinzip with either Prog Rock influences. 1992 some of the members started a live comeback and since 2000 they are active again under their original monicker Klosterbrüder.Discography:
"In meinem Land" 7" EP 1976 (Amiga)
"Ebbe und Flut" 7" EP 1978 (Amiga)
"Verkehrte Welt" 7" EP 1979 (Amiga)
"Magdeburg" LP 1980 (Amiga)
"Hundsgemein" 7" EP 1981 (Amiga)
"Verkehrte Welt" LP 1981 (Teldec)
Maggie’s Madness
Lineup:
Michael Dudek (vocals)
Franz Zellner (guitar)
Jochen Bleicher (guitar)
Peter C. Tobolla (bass)
Hans Georg von Schuh (drums)
Band-info:
One of Nuremberg's first Hard Rock bands, Maggie's Madness, was originally founded already in 1974 and produced their selftitled debut album independently in 1981. Due to the quite ugly cover artwork that's screaming in yellow Pop music all along, the album could be easily overlooked, but that would be a slight mistake, as especially for the NWOBHM clientele Maggie's Madness' compositions might be of major interest. Though the album was dominated by the Boogie influenced heavy Hard Rock in the vein of Dark Star, there are either songs like f.e. "One more time" that are close to the style that Iron Maiden performed in the late 70's. Mausoleum was responsible for their second album "On fire", that featured Wolfgang Lang (later in Dynasty) on the keyboard and heralded Maggie's Madness new era, by completely diving into the Heavy Metal seas. Just like the debut, the style on "On fire" was highly NWOBHM influenced melodic Heavy Metal with slightly commercial edge, or in other words, the lads was focussed to compose songs with remarkable refrains. 1985, when Maggie's Madness prepared the 3rd album "Love attack" for Roadrunner Records with new members Michael Andrasch (bass) and ex-Revolver/Raindancer Friedel Amon (keyboard), the label simply changed the band's name single-handedly on the cover to Wild Cat, to avoid juridical complications with the band Madness. They constantly carried on where they started with Maggie's Madness and fully focussed on the midpaced Heavy Rock and Heavy Metal, with diverse song parts sounding close to Scorpions, Maiden and either didn't forget to bring some power bangers like "Run for your life" or "Turn on you" (very Maiden-ish). Michael Andrasch left the band shortly after "Love attack" was released and their ex-bass player Peter Tobolla returned. After the band dissolved the contract with Roadrunner, Bleicher and Hans Georg von Schuh left as well and the latter got replaced by ex-Dynasty Daniel Zimmermann (later Gammaray, Freedom Call) and they kept on playing till 1987 when they called it quits.
Mama
Lineup:
Kai Arnold Auhagen (vocals, guitar)
Dirk Fleck (bass)
Martin Köhmstedt (guitar)
Kay Flohr (drums)
Band-info:
A Wuppertal based Hard Rock band, that for some unknown reason got picked up by the Rooceter label, who thought that kind of stuff might be the formula to sell a million records. Dirk Fleck, their bassist, was previously playing in the Hard Rock band Empire in the early 80's and also Kay Flohr was playing in a band called Grandee in the early 80's. Basically all of the guys previously worked as studio or hired musicians, but decided in early '87 to finally start a band to play the music that they do prefer. After a Demo tape, recorded during summer 1987, the next step was their first vinyl "Limited Edition", recorded from 1987-'88, that covers different styles in the Heavy genre. There's mainly the Mainstream AOR/Hard Rock and Heavy Rock prevailing on the album, but the lads with "Take you up" either made it happen to produce a speedy Heavy Metal song. In the total the majority of the trax won't really attract Heavy Metal ears, though "Foolin" offers an Accept-ish beat. It would have been the better choice if Mama would have had focussed on just one of the styles they tried to perfom. 1990 a 2 track Promo tape was mailed out to magazines and 1992 they released a second album "Mama II". 1994 even a third one entitled "Mama III - Mach 'ma' los ey!!!", before the band split up in the mid 90's. The band name Mama refers to the phrase "Mach mal" which is shortened spoken in their local slang "MaMa" and means something like "Get a move on". Dirk Fleck also released the single "Whole lotta love" together with his ex-Empire mates Bernd Kaspers, Roland Lange, Oliver Petry and Fred Otto in 1988 on Rooceter Music.Discography:
"Limited Edition" LP 1988 (Rooceter)
"Stand up" 7" EP 1988 (Rooceter)
"Mama II" CD 1992 (Expander)
Manos
Lineup:
Mike Andrae (guitar, vocals)
Andreas Löhne (guitar)
Thomas Thrun (vocals, bass)
Jan Berendt (drums)
Band-info:
The chaos mongers MANOS originally started as LÖWENHERZ in Querfurt (ex-GDR) back in 1984, albeit with a different line-up at the time. LÖWENHERZ was founded as a trio by Ingo Zach (drums), Torsten (bass) and Mike “Andrew” Andrae (vocals, guitar) in Lodersleben, with their first live performance taking place in 1986. In 1987, Torsten got eventually replaced by Thomas “Tunte” Thrun on bass, while a second guitarist, Thomas Peschke, also joined the band. Peschke was replaced quickly by Andreas “Pils” Löhne (guitar) towards the end of 1987 and Ingo Zach also made space for new drummer Jan Berendt right in the following year. By that time in 1988, however, the guys had long since changed their name to MANOS. On the 1988 demo song “Metal invade”, which was not officially released btw., the guys played a rather raw, speedy, MOTÖRHEAD-inspired, punky Metal with Power Metal influences. In the wake of the political changes in the GDR and the associated personnel changes, MANOS recorded their first Demo “Kranker Tannenbaum” in 1989 as a trio with Mike Andrae (guitar, vox), Andreas Löhne (bass) and Carsten Rothweiler (drums). Another tape entitled “Frust” followed shortly afterwards in 1990. By this time, the band's style had already transformed into raw underground Thrash, so that MANOS had become an insider tip thanks to their sometimes quite insane live shows. In November 1990, the three psychos were able to support Norwegians MAYHEM, who were still unknown over here in Germany at the time, on their short East German tour in Zeitz and Leipzig. The whole madness led to a single on the Poserslaughter Records label in 1991, which contained 5 tracks in an even rougher Death/Thrash style. The band's debut album “La Bumm - Die Fette” was otherwise not released until 1994, but had to be taken off the market again shortly afterwards due to legal problems. Manos are still active today and release albums from time to time.Discography:
"Kranker Tannenbaum" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"Frust" Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
“Thrashing East Attack Vol. I” Comp.-MC Tracks 1991 (selfreleased)
"Manos" 7" EP 1991 (Poserslaughter)
"Deaf Tape Sampler No. 1" Comp.-Tape Tracks 1991 (Morbid Records)
"Trade in the blood" Comp.-MC Track 1992 (Thrashing East Attack Vol. II)
Unreleased recordings:
"Danger"
"You don't let me sleep"
"Terror irradiates terror"
"Metal invade" (1988)
Mash Mallow
Lineup:
Thomas Neuhaus (guitar, vocals)
Bernd Brünninghaus (bass)
Hubert Hopf (guitar)
Daniel Grunwald (keyboard)
Rainer Marquardt (drums)
Band-info:
A mid 80's AOR/Hard Rock act from the Witten area, whose single album "Modern world" got heavily promoted with several singles by Steps Records back in the day. The bands style is hard to categorize as Pop/Rock meets Hard Rock and AOR here. The LP was already recorded in summer '86, but released in early 1987. For the audience it surely hasn't been a real treat as the ones who enjoyed the Hard Rock/AOR material of the band truly would have get into trouble with the poppy Rock stuff and vice versa. The early promotional single "Hungry heart", that features an "Ewig und 3 Tage" cover version, neither knew to attract with it's Pop/Rock style. In the end I'd only suggest the Melodic Rock clientele to maybe check out the album.Discography:
"Hungry heart" Promo 7" EP 1985 (Steps)
"Modern world" LP 1987 (Steps)
"Modern heroes" 7" EP 1987 (Steps)
"In the night" 7" EP 1987 (Steps)
Mason
Lineup:
Thomas Zigann (vocals, guitar, bass)
Marc Alvino (guitar, bass)
Michael Thüringer (drums)
Band-info:
Pforzheim based melodic Hard Rockers who was heavily flirting with the US Glam scene and if you wouldn't know they are Germans you'd say they are american because they did it very well on their 4 track Demo "Three rocks". When the first tunes of "America" echo thru your room you think that Van Halen's "Jump" would start now, but fortunately they deliver a melodic Rocker par excellence. Another killer totally US style sounding Melodic Metal highlight is "Sarah". After the Demo Michael Thüringer left and Rick Simoni (keyboard) and Mike Parson (drums) joined them. In March 1992 they recorded their first album "Big illusion" on the indie label Andric Stanelle Production as well as a CD Single with 3 tracks from the album. Basically they continued the melodic Hard Rock direction from the Demo but unfortunately the sound was now way more polished. On the last album "Inside your head" on Secoyah Records (1995) you'll get the same picture, they even re-recorded "Sarah", "Can't cry anymore" and "America" from the Demo. So all in all 3x 80's style melodic Hard Rock. Mason then did split up right in the following year 1996.Discography:
”Three rocks” Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
"Big illusion" CD 1992 (Andric Stanelle Production)
"Hard life" CD Single 1992 (Andric Stanelle Production)
Mega Grave
Lineup:
Chris Hofmann (vocals)
Uwe Grunert (guitar, drums)
Diana Hofmann (bass)
Band-info:
The Mega Grave single was recorded in February '92 and features some in places weird sounding Thrash, that also surprises with good solo guitars. I can't say what makes this EP sounding like it does, probably the hilarious female vocals. Actually the guitarist is pretty good, but the funny songstructures probably kill the last sparkle of hope here. Uwe Grunert got sandwiched by two females Diana and Chris Hofmann, but if it was the best for him I can't really confirm. The band was greeting from the greater Frankfurt/Main area and just offers average underground Thrash Metal, that due to it's sound reminds me of eastgerman Thrashers Defcon. A really rare piece nevertheless, Woodland was the name of the studio they recorded the songs at. 1995 the guys also released the "Underground graveland" Demo.Discography:
"Grave terror" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"Trauma in blood" 7" EP 1992 (Woodland)
Meilenstein
Lineup:
Helmut Buhl (guitar, voc)
Martin Stang (guitar)
Thomas Emde (bass, vocals)
Carsten Bald (drums, vocals)
Band-info:
I'm not sure what's the correct title of the privately pressed Meilenstein 7". The trax are twisted on sleeve and labels. So wether it's "Firestone fever" as the label says, or "Stone hearted lady" as the backsleeve claims. Probably it's either just called Meilenstein, like the band. The guys hailed from Bremen and delivered an early NWOBHM inspired Hard Rock sound with certain twin leads and the jaunty "Firestone fever" will ecstasize any late 70's NWOBHM lover for sure. According to their style and sound the single should be from around 1980/81 or even from the late 70's.Discography:
"Stone hearted lady” 7” EP 8x (selfreleased)
Metall
Lineup:
Thomas Post (vocals)
Roland Tschech (guitar)
Uwe Lerach (guitar)
Sven Rappold (bass)
Ronald Schulze (drums)
Band-info:
Metall was one of the first Heavy Metal bands ever in the GDR, co-founded already in 1982 by Sven Rappold (ex-Schottenrock) and Dan Uhden (Merlin) in East Berlin (ex-GDR). After several line up changes f.e. with Mario Kurth on guitar and Andreas Vincenhöler (ex-Erdmann) doing vocals (both playing on "Heiße Sprüche"), they formed the classic Metall cast of characters 1986 with Thomas Post (vocals), Roland Tschech (guitar, ex-Mephisto), Uwe Lerach (guitar), Sven Rappold (bass) & Ronald Schulze (drums). Metall was mainly influenced by Saxon, Maiden and Judas Priest, but they was acting in places a bit heavier than their idols. On the November '88 released track "Eisenhart" that made it to rank 15 in the national HM charts, they pretty much offered a lethal dose of doublebass driven Speed and Power Metal with a few Running Wild/Helloween hints. I don't know when the track "Heiße Sprüche" (sounds like a Demo recording) was recorded, but seems before 1986, stylistically they tend into a more US Metal ladden Power Metal with Helloween-ish speed parts. 1987 their song "Rüstungsbosse" was broadcasted in a live version, at the "Tendenz bis Heavy" radio show. But due to the fans permanently asking them at live gigs for Thrash covers, they decided to rename the band to make clear that they aren't any Thrash cover band at all. After recording "Easy rider" and "Vulkane der Erde", two more melodic Heavy Metal trax with "Easy rider" being an attempt to create a powerful little biker hymn, for the national broadcast service in early '89 they finally changed their name to Headless in August and opened another chapter in the history of the band. One interesting note to add, usually the trax from the Split LP should be released as a Quartett Single (just like the one of Biest) in late '89 or early '90 but the national record label Amiga was about being sold so that plan was cancelled. Some songs on the "Heavy News" Split LP was still recorded as Metall, while the band appeared on it under their new name Headless. Sven Rappold reactivated Metall in 2013 and released 2 albums since then.Check out the Easy Rider Clip
Discography:
"Heiße Sprüche" Demo Track 198x
"Easy rider" Comp.-LP Track 1989 (Rockbilanz '89)
"Speed up - Heavy News" Split LP 1990 (Zong)
Broadcast recordings:
"Eisenhart" (1988)
"Easy Rider" (1989)
"Vulkane der Erde" (1989)
Metamorphonis
Lineup:
Thomas David (guitar, vocals)
Günter Lietz (guitar)
Detlef Sebald (bass)
H. Dieter Berg (keyboard)
Jochen Salzmann (drums)
Band-info:
A local Prog Rock band from Hessen, most probably originating from the greater, northern Frankfurt/Main region. The guys independently produced a 2 track single with the title "Caravan" during 1982, that at least on "Caravan" itself offers Hard Rock influences in form of damn heavy distorted guitar parts. "Running out" on the flipside is less of interest for our database. Further info is welcome.(Thanx to emosteel for the suggestion)
Discography:
"Caravan" 7" EP 1982 (Music Farm)
Midnight Darkness
Lineup:
Detlef Poschmann (guitar)
Michael Rollke (guitar)
Jörg Reuter (vocals)
Klaus Petereit (bass)
Rudy Pfeiffer (drums)
Band-info:
Midnight Darkness from Oberhausen has been around since 1980 already before they recorded a self financed single 4 years later, that surprised with 2 trax of very british sounding Metal. The single opened doors to Gama for the band and 1985 the debut album "Holding the night" was ready, though the band was missing a drummer at that time and either Michael Rollke left Midnight Darkness shortly before the recordings of the album. But Peter Garattoni (ex-Rebel, Tox, Veto, ex-Eulenspygel), the Gama boss, jumped in and helped the guys by recording the drum trax himself. The album honestly could be counted to the sidereal hours of the mid 80's German Metal scene. The lads had been in close company with acts like Tyrant or Gravestone with their by power effervescing creations like the driving "LA prisoner" or the Überhit "Mindless". Unfortunately Petereit, Poschmann and Reuter couldn't keep the band alive, but formed the Hard Rock band Bornchild instead.
Minestone
Lineup:
Band-info:
There is not much to tell about this band, because they only released this obscure Promo Single which was manufactured by the Memphis Tonträgerproduktionen GmbH, a company you could hire to press/print your records, covers, Shirts etc.Looks like this band used their service as well and got a characterless 7" with standard labels and standard cover with only the band name handwritten on front and the songtitles on back. On my single they even misspelled "Heart of stone" (a ballad) and it became "Heard of stone". The other track on the flipside is called "Bad woman" (with 70's touch and massive keyboards) and both are offering listenable melodic Heavy Rock which won't surprise me at all coz the band was from Töging am Inn near Landshut/Munich in southern Bavaria. The 7" should be from around 1990/91 I guess. If you have more info please get in touch.
Discography:
"A Sample from Minestone" Promo 7"EP 199x (Memphis Tonträgerproduktionen)
Minotaur
Lineup:
Chris Zenk (bass, vocals)
Ulf Kaiser (guitar)
Jörg Bock (drums)
Band-info:
Minotaur from Halstenbeck near by the city of Hamburg was founded in 1983 originally as Destero but changed name to Minotaur still the same year. After several line up changes, with Chris Zenk (bass, vocals), Ulf Kaiser (guitar) and Jörg Bock (drums) Minotaur got a steady crew together to start recordings for the debut Demo "The oath of blood", that surprisingly didn't gain the boys any album deal, though their style of straight forward Death/Thrash in the vein of "Pleasure to kill" would well have justified it, since the lads already in Demo days could be counted to Germany's Thrash Metal hopefuls of the coming future. When Chris Zenk left in 1986, Andi Richwien (guitar, vocals) and Thomas Witte (bass) joined to record "The slaughter continues" in the fall of 1986, that opened the opportunity for the band to contribute "Plane head" to the Teutonic Invasion sampler, followed by the classic "Power of darkness" tape, recorded 1987 without Ulf Kaiser (who founded Hardcore/Thrashers Erosion), that would one year later get re-released on vinyl by Crazy Records and marks one of the milestones of german Thrash Metal history, sounding like a cross of Kreator and early Sadus on superior level. Though the lads rude Thrash remained unheard by the other labels, Minotaur returned with the "Death Metal" single on Hamburg's own label Remedy Records, that once again underlined the band's scene internal status to be counted amoungst Germany's top 10 Thrash bands, sounding closer to the classic Kreator than Kreator did itself in 1990. And eventhough the "Towards my eternity" EP was announced to be released during March '90 as 12"/Pic 12" and CD, it once again it took a small eternity (due to a break in 1992) till Jörg Bock returned completely unexpected with his newly formed Minotaur in 1993 with the MLP (on red vinyl) "Welcome to..." on Molon Lave Records, introducing new members Thomas Labies (bass), Tomislav Stanic (guitar), Jedinko Petrovic (guitar) and ex-Vice Versa shouter Andreas Babuschkin. Unfortunately their good oldfashioned straight forward Thrash had turned into a much more late 80's typical sort of common Thrash Metal, with for old Minotaur almost totally unknown breaks and either a melodic note due to Babuschkin's completely different voice than his precursor's had. Nevertheless in places the lads kept thrashing ruthlessly like in Minotaur's best days too. Some of these songs recorded in early '93 would also be used for their part on the triple Split CD with other Hamburg Thrash bands Torment and Desert Storm, that featured ex-Minotaur members. The revival didn't last for long, the band split up still in 1993 and it took them till 2003 to start a comeback.Discography:
"The oath of blood" Demo 1986 (selfreleased)
"The slaughter continues" Demo 1986 (selfreleased)
"Total Massacre Vol. 1" Comp.-MC Tracks 1986 (Death Metal Production)
"Power of Darkness" Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
"Planed Head" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Teutonic Invasion Part One)
"Power of Darkness" LP 1988 (Crazy)
"Live + 5" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"Death Metal" 7" EP 1990 (Remedy)
"Welcome to..." MLP 1993 (Molon Lave)
"Torment/Desert Storm/Minotaur" Split CD 1993 (Remedy)
Monkeys With Tools
Lineup:
Grischa Bender (guitar)
Matti Rouse (bass, vocals)
Petrus Fischer (drums)
Band-info:
A Crossover trio from Düsseldorf, that was active since already 1988 there in the local underground scene. We don't seriously expect that anyone of the Metal readers might find this band interesting so let's leave their entry be just a short side note. Monkeys With Tools' style was a mix of Punk, Rap, Funk and Metal, often reminding of stuff like the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. After having a first single on Campary Records, the GUN label released a number of albums during the early 90's when this sort of Crossover got hyped. The band later then dropped the recent name and continued as "Affen Mit Waffen", without further releases.Discography:
"Beats can change" 7" EP 1990 (Campary)
"Sure" LP/CD 1992 (GUN)
"Our secret" CD 1992 (GUN)
"Therein lies the compromise" LP/CD 1993 (GUN)
"How to use Multicore" MCD 1993 (GUN)
Mortal Impact
Lineup:
Michael Schumann (guitar)
Steffen Freyer (guitar)
Thomas Kanigs (bass, vocals)
Rudi (drum)
Band-info:
Originally Mortal Impact from Hohenmölsen, south of Leipzig in the ex-GDR, was formed back in summer of ‘89 as Deathinfection by Michael Schumann (guitar) and Rudi (drums), while Thomas Kanigs joined them just a short time later on bass. Rudi already left the Thrash trio after a while, but instead Andreas Wünsche had the balls to hire as drummer for the young band, that at a certain point changed name to Mortal Impact most probably at around that time during 1990. A vocalist and also a second guitarist joined the guys, but both was fired right away, since their skills haven’t been developed enough to cover their favorite songs of Slayer, Nuclear Assault etc. Thomas took over vocals meanwhile, till during September ’90 Steffen Freyer became their second guitarist. The musical likings of the foursome now had moved towards Death Metal inspired stuff, favorizing a rather Swedish sounding style with hints of Entombed/Dismember/Carnage, that could be heard on the 4 track Demo "Last termination", recorded in July '91. At that point the former Thrash band had completely turned into classic Death Metal. Nevertheless their time was running out quickly, despite the good Demo and several label offers to release a single. Another Demo recording was even though scheduled for spring ’92. Andreas Wünsche later after Mortal Impact's decline around 1992/93 briefly joined Overlord, but didn't remain there for long.Discography:
"Last termination" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"Carbonized" Comp.-Tape Track 1992 (Thrashing East Attack Vol. II)
Mottek
Lineup:
Lobi (vocals)
Stephan Grujic (guitar)
Michi Bothe (bass)
Bernward Klimek (drums)
Band-info:
Mottek was a Crossover band from Hildesheim, that formed as ABC-Alarm in the early 80's out of the ashes of the Punk/NDW band KZ Recorder. Stephan Grujic (guitar) and Bernward Klimek (drums) found a first steady line up in 1983 with Michi Bothe (bass) and Lobi on vocals, who both came from GPC. The quartet recorded the first Demo in August, that featured 6 Hardcore/Punk trax and became bestselling tape on the label, which lead into a record deal with Schrott Records in 1984. Michi Bothe left Mottek before the recordings and would later form the band Suckspeed. He got replaced by Magret (ex-The Fat Five And The Thin One) on bass. Till 1986 when the recorded the next album "Riot" (grey vinyl), vocalist Lobi left and guitarist Stephan handeld vocals also. The material on "Riot" either featured just like the debut LP Hardcore/Punk with early Thrash influences but the trio would progress their style from that point forward and added more and more Metal influences, that didn't only grant them a lot of love from the Punk community. Nevertheless, after 2 more singles they got signed by the Funhouse label and published the respectable "Mottek" Demo in 1988 with second guitarist Matthias Hinze and Magret doing vocals. From the early Hardcore sound there was almost no more traces audible, instead the lads offered archetypical female fronted Thrash Metal sound, close to Metallica on "Master of puppets" and especially Znöwhite. Though Funhouse Records already announced the new Mottek album as "Welcome to depression land" during spring '89, Mottek surprisingly released it as "Fatal violence" on Sucker Records instead. But there had happened a fatal upheaval inside the band already, as only both guitarists Grujic and Hinze remained of the Demo line up and added new members Christian Leithaeuser (vocals), Hartsch (bass) and Sven (drums). The style of the Demo recordings was consequently continued on "Fatal violence", that was produced and engineered by Stephan Grujic himself at the Masterplan Studio in Gießen. Fastpaced US style Thrash Metal with influences of Vio-Lence, Testament, Death Angel and Metallica ruled on "Fatal violence" and made the album a faultless affair for all Thrashers, that also marked the end of Mottek's discography. The band never every released any further albums and just was active in a kinda on/off relationship throughout the 90's and 2000's. The "Countdown 1982-2012" CD compilation features older and newer recordings, even an unreleased album from 2003.Discography:
"Mottek" Demo 1983 (Pissende Kuh Kassetten)
"Hypnose" LP 1984 (Schrott)
"Shout/Wop hour" Split 7" EP 1985 (with Raw Power, Starving Missile)
"Torture" 7" EP 1985 (Starving Missile)
"Riot" LP 1986 (Starving Missile)
"Bun Party" Split Tape 1987 (with Rövsvett & White Flag, Punish)
"Mottek" Demo 1988 (Funhouse)
"Fatal violence" LP/CD 1989 (Sucker)
MSG
Lineup:
Gary Barden (vocals)
Michael Schenker (guitar)
Don Airey (keyboard)
Mo Foster (bass)
Simon Phillips (drums)
Band-info:
To shorten it we'll combine the both MSG band's historical parts as Michael Schenker was main part and member of both incarnations. Originally after leaving the Scorpions and gaining some worldwide success with UFO in the 70's, Michael Schenker in 1979 formed his own band The Michael Schenker Group (MSG). He released several albums till the band was put on ice in 1985 and he'd return with new partner ex-Grand Prix/Far Corporation vocalist Robin McAuley in 1986, so the MSG would stand for McAuley Schenker Group from this day forward. Together the guys recorded the albums "Perfect timing", "Save yourself", "MSG" and "Unplugged" till 1992, before McAuley and Schenker's went separate ways in 1993. During both periods of the MSG history the style of MSG has been melodic Hard and Heavy Rock that was made for the american market and showed similarities to the early 80's Scorpions either. There are tons of singles being available also, but since we do not expect anyone to not know about MSG or Michael Schenker himself, we'd suggest you to check out Wikipedia in case you indeed never heard of him.Discography:
"The Michael Schenker Group" LP 1980 (Chrysalis)
"M S G" LP 1981 (Chrysalis)
"One night at Budokan" LP 1981 (Chrysalis)
"Assault attack" LP 1982 (Chrysalis)
"In Concert-292" LP 1982 (BBC Transcription Services)
"Built to destroy" LP 1983 (Chrysalis)
"Rock will never die" LP 1984 (Chrysalis)
"Perfect timing" LP 1987 (EMI)
"Save yourself" LP/CD 1989 (EMI)
"MSG" LP/CD 1991 (Electrola)
"Unplugged" CD 1992 (EMI)
"BBC Radio One Live in Concert" CD 1993 (Windsong International)
Murphy
Lineup:
Michael Flechsig (vocals)
Detlev Jachzek (guitar)
Thomas Schwarze (bass)
Rainer Przywara (keyboard)
Michael Schröder (drums)
Band-info:
This unknown Hannover outfit started out already in 1975, aiming to play Heavy Rock ‘n' Roll within the growing Disco movement during the 70’s. Despite originating from the same city as the SCORPIONS, their sound wasn't as heavy as theirs and should be be rather grounded in the wider Classic Rock/AOR spectrum, though having enough of Hardrock in their music to be mentioned here for sure. The lads focussed on creating songs that combined melody with harmony and independently produced their “My life/ My Life / Young girl's dream” Single in 1977. During the early 80's, when MURPHY seemed to dive into their most successful phase, they participated on the 4th Talent Festival, happening in Novemer ’81 in the city of Würzburg, where the band could get a rank among the best 6 bands of the festival and got the opportunity to record the song with misleading title ”Reggae Peggy” for the obscure sampler “Jazz-Rock / Nachwuchsfestival Pop 81”. There's no Reggae here, to calm your concearns down, just energetic just archetypical early 80's AOR with quite above average songwriting. 3 more songs had been produced as well, that appeared on the “Rockstudio III” Split LP in 1982 too. While the first track of the bunch “Mona Lisa” still spreads a mellow feeling, the MURPHY guys right with the snappy instrumental number "Daytona", directly followed by "Burning for your love" once again can easily continue where they started with “Reggae Peggy”, catchy hardrocking AOR! Unfortunately it seems that MURPHY had split up just a few years later since their singer Michael Flechsig re-appeared as Michael Flexig in Hannover Hardrockers ZENO during the mid 80’s.Discography:
“My life/ My Life / Young girl's dream” 7” EP 1977 (selfreleased)
“Reggae Peggy” Comp.-LP Track 1982 (Jazz-Rock / Nachwuchsfestival Pop 81)
“Rockstudio III” Comp.-LP Tracks 1982 (Harvest)
Natchez
Lineup:
Uwe Battis (guitar)
Micha Schneider (guitar)
Otto Schmidt (bass)
Johannes Wessels (drums)
Band-info:
The 1983 in Saarbrücken registered band Natchez couldn't really leave an enduring impression with their sole single "TV-Show". Though the lads are posing with leather and rivet adorned bracelets like Heavy Metal superstars on the cover, both their trax "TV-Show" and "Hell on wheels" (the better number of both) are pretty below average sounding Hardrockers with almost a poppy NDW touch. Not the usual Hard Rock that one might expect, so better beware. Micha Schneider was previously in 1978 playing with firstly Raganan and changed over to Fun in 1979, before he formed Natchez with other local Saarbrücken guys. After the single the line up oft he band slightly changed with ex-Sad/Luca Brasi Gerhard Hoff replacing Uwe Battis and Schneider’s mate Joachim Hammerschmidt (ex-Fun/Lancelot) joined on drums as well. But Natchez nevertheless would split up already in 1985 and Micha Schneider instead formed Extasy during 1986.Discography:
"TV-Show" 7" EP 1984 (Zentaur)
Necrophiliacs
Lineup:
Norris (vocals)
Onno (guitar)
Martin (bass)
Florian (drums)
Band-info:
Necrophiliacs was a Grindcore act from Lindewitt in northern Germany, featuring Norris, the drummer of W.B.I., on vocals. The band formed in around 1990 and recorded 2 Split singles and a MLP until 1993, that all featured typical early 90's Death/Grind/Noisecore with either a few doomy parts. Unfortunately the vocal performance wasn't that exciting and marks the weak point of Necrophiliacs sound. After 1993 two more Split EP's was published with the Meat Shits and Incisive plus the "Hardcore psychos" 7" in 1995.Discography:
"Nekromantik-Themes/So!...Das haste nu' davon!" Split 7" EP 1991 (with W.B.I., Schnauf)
"Beyond the darkness/Knusper Knusper Knäuschen" Split 7" EP 1992 (with Leucemie, Rödel)
”Primitive & uncultivated” MLP 1993 (Rödel)
Necropsy
Lineup:
Marc Fehse (vocals, bass)
Unne (guitar)
Matt (guitar)
Michael (drums, vocals)
Band-info:
Necropsy from Braunschweig released a pretty cool Demo tape at the peak of the second Death Metal wave in 1990. "Pay with your life" features 5 trax with influences of Asphyx and Death, that are all carried by a quite gloomy atmoshere. Unfortunately the quartet couldn't reproduce the same dark feeling on the "Some dark impressions" single, that was released on Century Media 2 years later with new guitarist Jens who replaced Unne, and represented Necropsy from just a typically US american style influenced common Death Metal side.Discography:
"Pay with your life" Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
“Pay with your life” Comp.-MC Track 1991 (Extreme Noise - Volume 2 / The Dead Walk!)
"Some dark impressions" 7" EP 1992 (Century Media)
Never Mind
Lineup:
Oliver Roemer (vocals)
Peter Kessler (guitar)
Oliver Hock (guitar)
Christian Scholl (bass)
Thomas Nussbaum (drums)
Band-info:
One more rather blank sheet of paper of the seemingly sheer countless Rock bands originating from Germany during the 80's. These 5 guys that had been originating from the Bremen area and recorded a single during 1990 in Weyhe, that offered 2 mellow songs, belonging secretly to the Classic Rock genre. The number that forwards the biggest kick on their EP is the title track "Barbara", an average AOR rocker, while on the flipside's ballad "Fightin'" there merely prevails pure boredom.Discography:
„Barbara" 7" EP 1990 (Nice)
Nice'n Dirty
Lineup:
Christian Wieser (vocals)
H. Kupke (guitar)
U. Strenger (bass)
S. Angerer (drums)
Band-info:
A Heavy Metal band from Landshut, that was previously active as Reckless in the 80's. The lads produced privately a single in 1992 that features listenable typical 80's midpaced rocking Metal on "Deathride to glory", but sadly just the mellow ballad "Tears never lie" on the flipside.Discography:
"Nice'n Dirty" 7" EP 1992 (selfreleased)
Nightcry
Lineup:
Gunnar Weitz (vocals)
Thorsten Held (bass)
Bernd Sobolewski (guitar)
Bernd Schmuck (guitar)
Bernd Marzahl (drums)
Band-info:
Nightcry was a well known Hard'n'Heavy band of the Hamburg clubscene in the early 80's but never made it big. At least they released a private single in 1983 that features 2 melodic, slightly NWOBHM influenced Hard Rock/Metal trax with good songwriting, which proved that these guys knew what they was doing. The epic B-side track "Darkness in your eyes" strongly reminds me of the superb Lucifer MLP.Discography:
"Green hawk" 7" EP 1983 (selfreleased)
Nightmare (Essen)
Lineup:
Uwe Kirchberg (vocals)
Reiner Eschbach (guitar)
Angela Koch (bass)
Achim Bruckmann (drums)
Band-info:
Take a look at these Nightmare's logo and you know what kind of bands influenced them. I pretty much wonder what Iron Maiden would say, if they'd behold this infamous "borrowing" of their logo font. Nevermind, these 3 guys and 1 girl hailed from Essen and just are still being recalled because they left us a selfproduced obscure single that was recorded in August '81. The lads tried with NWOBHM influenced Hard Rock and "Black angel" in places indeed shows a few very early Iron Maiden hints as well as a littly punky edge during the refrain, that slightly reminds me of the Manimals/Misfits style. The B-side Hardrocker "Mandy" is more or less forgettable. I think the band's main fault was that their guitar sound wasn't heavy enough distorted. I've also seen the single once with a big logo sticker in the upper right corner, though you won't see copies of it that often I can promise.
No Credit Band
Lineup:
Karl-Heinz Franz (vocals, keyboard)
Ralf Calmbach (bass)
Jürgen Palm (guitar)
Andreas Dietz (guitar)
Uli Bau (keyboard)
Stefan Gross (drums)
Band-info:
The No Credit Band was a Melodic Rock band from Heilbronn. All of their releases starting from the first single released in 1985 up to their last effort, the "Interrelated" CD from 1992 (released as "No Credit"), do feature typically 80's first class Melodic Rock/AOR with hit character and cool guitar solos. On the later albums like on "Ready for surprise" (without Uli Bau) and "Interrelated" the lads also adopted melodic Hard Rock influences like f.e. Europe. The earlier works featured a bit more the Melodic Rock thing like Survivor or Starship, but on an above average level. For Melodic Rock/AOR fans highly recommended stuff!Discography:
"Love is a game" 7" EP 1985 (MPS)
"Break my heart again" 12" EP 1987 (selfreleased)
"Ready for surprise" LP/CD 1989 (Output)
"Interrelated" CD 1992 (Rockwerk)
Nuclear Romance
Lineup:
Matthias (vocals)
Andreas (guitar)
Uwe (bass)
Thomas (drums)
Band-info:
This Crossover band from Wulfsen, south of Hamburg recorded a Demo tape in 1990, that featured quite cool, straight forward American oriented Hardcore with massive Speed Metal edge like f. e. THE IDIOTS. Alone the punky vocals won’t fit here so well, seen by the view of a metalhead naturally, so let’s add these guys for reasons of completions only. After the “Systematic suicide” Demo the line-up would change though. Andreas on guitar and drummer Thomas left the guys who added Jens on guitar and Bodo on drums instead and released one more 7” entitled “Mutation of time”, while with the same breath changed the band name to MENTALLY DAMAGED, as noted on the sleeve of the single.Discography:
“Systematic suicide” Demo 1990 (selfreleased)
“Mutation of time” 7” EP 199? (Minimal)
Number Nine
Lineup:
Martin Riegel (vocals)
Giorgio Camese (guitar, vocals)
Jürgen Kühnlein (guitar)
Frank Stimpfig (bass)
Wolfgang Riegel (keyboard)
Massimo Aymone (drums)
Band-info:
Number Nine from Würzburg, with the ex-Revolver/Raindancer guitarist Jürgen Kühnlein, started with a nowadays pretty rare single, that was recorded in January '87. The guy's sound in the beginning (they are still active nowadays as a cover band) was very AOR connected and only the B-side "I'm for bad" could be called a sort of poppy Hard Rock at least. "It's me" pretty much reminds me of Melodic Rock like Toto and noone else. But fortunately on their selfproduced album "Everybody's crazy" from 1990 with ex-Darxon/Cacumen/Bonfire/Kymera Dominic Hülshorst on drums, the lads finally added that portion of missing power and delivered an US influenced Melodic Metal/Hard Rock album, that didn't need to hide behind other german bands like Wishes Burn, Vice, Bonfire, Vamp or similar acts of the late 80's, though the instrumental "Hocus Pocus" is ripping off Blitzkrieg's "Blitzkrieg" in a major way! On the other hand that song's a coverversion of Focus' song "Hocus Pocus" from their 71er album "Moving waves", so ... ehem...(Thanx to Frank/Powerprillipator for additional info)
Discography:
"It's me" 7" EP 1987 (Azurro Musicproduction)
"Everybody's crazy" LP/CD 1990 (selfreleased)
Oakland
Lineup:
Rainer Röder
Gerhard Kittlaus
Frank R.
Torsten Becker
Band-info:
More or less being just a typical Krautrock outfit from the Cologne area, the obscure foursome Oakland due to their roughly produced 2 track single managed to at least create a rather Hard Rock feeling, inspired by the classic 70's sound. The B side “Got all I want” may indeed attract Status Quo fans up to a certain point with it’s Boogie edge. The 7" remained their only output it seems, yet all the musicians disappeared afterwards. Just Rainer Röder's name popped up occasionally on the one or another release from the Cologne region as producer. He nowadays runs his own company.Discography:
“Nightmare" 7” EP 1982 (Bunker)
Odin's Hammer
Lineup:
Markus Tiedemann (bass)
A. Schmid (guitar)
Mike Striegel (vocals, guitar)
A. Winnewisser (drums)
Band-info:
The single of Odin's Hammer from Frankenthal is a rarely seen piece, and it's pretty sad in this case as the 2 trax "Crazy woman" and the heavily NWOBHM inspired rocker "Nobody knows" sound more than convincing and did offer 2 nice alternates to the usual Boogie influenced stuff, that the main wave of the early Hard Rock/Metal used to play. The fastpaced energetic title track pretty much sets the standard high, whenalso both songs do still spread a special 70's charm. But as mentioned earlier, the guys combined the german sound with classic NWOBHM tunes and the result could be called a cross of Lucifer and Loose Connection. Odin's Hammer or Odin's Hammer Band, as the group was called too, also recorded a shitload of other songs from 1981 to 1985, probably a whole unreleased album, but went into a much more Hard Rock driven direction later.Discography:
"Crazy woman" 7" EP 1981 (EF)
Odyssay
Lineup:
Fred Starkowski (vocals)
Michael Dressler (guitar)
Gerd Spannknebel (guitar)
Wolfgang Schödel (bass)
Dicky Frost (drums)
Band-info:
Obscure Hard Rock outfit from Kassel, that's widely unknown as usual, despite releasing a privately produced single right at the start of the 80's. Just like to be expected, the band got together during the (late we guess) 70's, at least that’s what their sound is mainly refering to, whenalso there's plenty of NWOBHM twin leads to perforate those 4 songs on the EP. For example the faster opener “Time to leave" totally’s falling under the early NWOBHM scheme, while the other numbers clearly retreat from the heavier genre and are pending between midpaced 70's Rock and Hard Rock only. We couldn't find any other traces of the band yet. They seemed to be a locally limited phenomenon only.Discography:
“Odyssay” 7” EP 1981 (Stall Studio)
Omicidio
Lineup:
Guido Rockert (vocals)
Michael (guitar)
Olle (guitar)
Lars (bass)
Ille (drums)
Band-info:
A local Hamburg Hardcore/Crossover act, quite rough, much like Emils sounding with straight forward thrashing attitude in their sound. They only seem to have released a single Demo during 1987, of which the 3 songs “Sprung ins Leere”, “Finsterer Tag” and “Skeptischer Blues” made it on the local sampler “Hamburg ‘88” the following year. As mentioned above, for those who like the Crossover style that the Emils offered with either hints of Lethal Agggression, Omicidio are highly recommended.Discography:
“Demo Tape” Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
"Hamburg '88" Comp.-LP Tracks 1988 (Bitzcore)
Palm Beach
Lineup:
Frank Rose
Band-info:
Despite Palm Beach had been the "heaviest" sounding band on the local sample "Rock-Szene Mönchengladbach”, their 89’er single "Garden of Eden" says something completely different. If we take their number “Bullits of Bagdad" from 1987, the band around Frank Rose delivered a sort of melodic Hard Rock with poppy drum sound, completely driven by distorted guitars and reminding either slightly of Europe. On the 2 track single then there’s all the guitars completely banished, instead you get presented a Pop band at 100 %! A mystery…Discography:
“Bullits of Bagdad” Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Rock-Szene Mönchengladbach)
"Garden of Eden" 7” EP 1989 (Banana Flip)
Parabol
Lineup:
Gübler
Mallon
Band-info:
An obscure local band from Bad Homburg, that most probably was active in the late 70's and earliest 80's. There isn't any year to find on their sole single, but judging by the look of the musicians and the music they performed, the single should be from around 1980 plus/minus 2 years. The single, made by their management JEE-BEE, is as obscure as the band itself and rarely ever seen for sale. If you think, the reason might be the lads music, then you're bloody wrong. The title track is an AOR/Melodic Rock ballad in typical early 80's manner, but the jewel is the flipside track "The letter", an The Box Tops cover version, that was performed in a superior way and developing into a proggy AOR smasher with epic edge, like these early proggy US Hard Rock bands. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"Show me" 7" EP 19?? (selfreleased)
Pathologie
Lineup:
Band-info:
Pathologie from Eberswalde (ex-GDR) was a Grind/Noisecore outfit that formed and was active only during the beginning of the 90’s. Surprisingly they couldn’t at least record any single, since all these funny Nothingcore troops got caught by underground labels to waste tons of vinyl this way. Nevertheless Pathologie either performed live on stage, supporting acts like Necrophiliacs, W.B.I., B.G.T. Extreme Noise and others in 1991, when they also mentioned plans to record a Demo tape. If it’s indeed released is uncertain yet, the www remains completely silent anyway.Discography:
Peach Sentle
Lineup:
Ralph Knörich (vocals, keyboard)
Hubert (guitar)
Joachim Manlik (guitar)
Bernd (bass)
Reinhold Appel (drums)
Band-info:
Peach Sentle from Fischach in the Augsburg area released 2 singles in the mid 80's, and the first of both was published on their own label and distributed independently in 1985. The guys used to call their style "Sentle Rock for dancing", and seriously both trax "Peach Sentle" and "People beat the world" just featured softer Melodic Rock/AOR with commercial edge. The "Few people" 7" could be more of interest for Hard Rock fans, though it's was featuring (hard) AOR either, but the guitar sound was way more Hard Rock connected than on their previous EP. For testing purposes I therefore recommend to start with the "Few people" 7". During 1988 the band got reduced to just Ralph Knörich remaining who was still playing several playback shows and him only singing live.Discography:
"Peach Sentle" 7" EP 1985 (selfreleased)
"Few people" 7" EP 1987 (Steyrer Disco)
Pink Cream 69
Lineup:
Andy Deris (vocals)
Alfred Koffler (guitar)
Dennis Ward (bass)
Kosta Zafiriou (drums, keyboard)
Band-info:
The Karlsruhe based Pink Cream 69 was founded in 1987 by vocalist Andy Deris, Alfred Koffler, Dennis Ward and Kosta Zafiriou and as far as I remember correctly there should be even a Demo tape available being recorded in 1987 or '88. However, the lads won the Metal Hammer band contest and got signed by Epic Records, who made them a big number. Pink Cream 69 released 2 equal albums with the selftitled debut (1989) and "One size fits all" (1991), that both featured Melodic Metal with US touch, both ruled by Deris good vocal performance. "Games people play" released in 1993 heralded a more modern, typically 90's Metal sound and that's probably the reason why Andy Deris left to join Helloween in the same year. There are several singles and tons of other albums available after 1993, so you might check out Pink Cream 69's Homepage for more info.Discography:
"Pink Cream 69" LP/CD 1989 (Epic)
"One size fits all" LP/CD 1991 (Epic)
"Where the eagles learn to fly" Comp.-CD 1992 (German Rock Project - The Ballad Album)
"Games people play" LP/CD 1993 (Epic)
Platin Bells
Lineup:
Torsten Gluschke (guitar, vocals)
Klaus Gräber (bass, keyboard)
Joachim Hasert (drums)
Band-info:
A Neo-Glam/Hardrock band from Bremen, formed in 1986 with the aim to bring back the 70's Glamrock feeling of acts like Gary Glitter or T. Rex. Originally operating as a fivepiece and later as quartet, their only album "Infinity" was recorded by only Torsten Gluschke, Klaus Gräber and Joachim Hasert. Gluschke came from the Rockabilly band Be Bop Vaseline and the Platin Bells turned into a well known live act in their area, that got supported via massive airplay by local radio stations. After debuting with the "Revolution child" single in 1988, the band was seen live on stage at the 4th Oxmox/Metal Star band contest in Hamburg '89, while they also became one of the winning bands of the local Bremen "Nachwuchsbandwettbewerb" (Newcomer contest) in 1990 and therefore could record the songs "Rock and Roll is here to stay" and "Hey Rock" for the local sampler "City Beat '90". Furthermore the guys toured in Lithuania together with Katedra. After the album "Infinity" from 1992 Rockin'T (Torsten Gluschke) returned to his Rockabilly-roots and formed The Wild Black Jets.Discography:
"Revolution child" 7" EP 1988 (Riff Tide)
"City Beat '90 Sampler" Comp.-LP/CD 1990 (Sound Service Bremen)
"Infinity" LP 1992 (Star End)
Pleasure
Lineup:
Jörg Wolski (vocals)
Jürgen Wolter (guitar)
Jörg Landstorfer (keyboard)
Peter Malik (bass)
Hans Peter Frey (drums)
Band-info:
A melodic Hard Rock band from Duisburg that released a highly underrated private single in 1990. The quality level of both featured trax is extremely high and reminds me of the superb title track of the Trace 7", though Pleasure was acting a bit heavier, mixing Hard Rock and Melodic Metal to a very catchy brew that simply can't fail. Fortunately their single still can be obtained for no money, so don't miss it at all! Late 1990 the band recorded another 4 song Demo with the title "Sometimes life" that was released wether during late '90 or early '91 and featured more melodic material in the vein of their single.Discography:
"Things are confusing" 7" EP 1990 (selfreleased)
"Sometimes life" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
Prinzip
Lineup:
Jürgen Matkowitz (guitar, vocals)
Frank Czerny (bass)
Reinhard Mihatsch (drums)
Band-info:
Jürgen Matkovitz after leaving the Uve-Schikora-Combo in the early 70's teamed up with his ex-bandmate Reinhard Mihatsch and formed his own band Prinzip in 1973 in East Berlin (ex-GDR), which was predestined right from the start to indulge the heavy side of Rock. Frank Czerny became their bassplayer and the lads started writing own songs and covered classics of Steppenwolf or Golden Earring, till the GDR's most important record company Amiga produced a first 7" with the guys entitled "Beschwerde" in 1975. Reinhard Mihatsch in the following year left the republic and went to West Berlin, while Klaus Scharfschwerdt replaced him. 1977 they added keyboarder Rainer Kirchmann and with the line up Scharfschwerdt, Matkovitz, Kirchmann and Czerny their first album "Feuer-Rock" was ready in 1978, featuring a mix of AOR, Rock and Hard'n'Heavy Rock songs, with f.e. the title track or "Sieben Meter Seidenband", that could well hold up early NWOBHM bands standards as well, delivering twin leads like they'd hail from the british isle. Klaus Scharfschwerdt 1979 joined the Puhdys, who’ve been searching for a new drummer and he became one of the GDR's most famous drummers in the following years. His place in Prinzip covered Bernd Haucke and the second album "Der Steher" appeared 1980, crammed with more Hard Rock, led by the heavy incredible epic Prog/Hard Rock hymn "Sonnensage". Rainer Kirchmann left Prinzip after the album was released and went to Berlin Pop/Rockers Pankow. He wasn't replaced, but the ex-Regenbogen vocalist Ralf Bursy was recruited to the play guitar and handle the vocals. 2 singles with him was produced in 1981 and '82, before 1983 the 3rd Prinzip LP "Wir reiten mit dem Sturm" was published, with new bassist Bodo Huth (ex-Elefant). The band's sound became more modern and featured beside a very few Hard Rock songs, mainly rocking and either bluesy old AC/DC influenced stuff with even a few punky hints. After the album there came a long silence, probably the guys stepped on any official's necktie. "Phönix", their last album, was available 1988 with a completely different band and sound. Bursy already had left in 1986 to start a successful solo career as Pop/Rock artist and also Bernd Haucke as well as Bodo Huth wasn't in the band anymore and got replaced by first Ingo Politz (1986, drums) and eventually shortly later by Michael Hoffmann (drums), while Smokings Rockshow bassist Uwe Geisler (ex-PVC) joined 1988. Bursy's part took Wolfgang Franke (ex-PVC, Perl), whom they already recorded an single with ("Halt mich fest") in 1987, that featured a non album track on the flipside, which I remember that it got aired on the national radio stations, while the 7" itself was only released in the Soviet Union, and marks the band's most rare release nowadays. The title track of that single also appeared on the "Phönix" album, which featured several more of equal Heavyrockers ala Berluc or Babylon, with in places either old Bon Jovi touch, that nowadays is called AOR. With the political change Prinzip's star started sinking as well and Franke left to revive his old band PVC once again in spring/summer '89. He got replaced by Michael Barakowski (ex-Perl/Smokings Rockshow) for a very last try in 1990. But Matkowitz disbanded Prinzip the same year and moved to Moscow where he produced russian Hard Rock and Heavy Metal bands at his own studio. One interesting fact, Jürgen Matkowitz either had his own studio in the GDR too and produced several Hard Rock/Metal bands. Since he wasn't a friend of recording drums in the studio, the bands (like Biest, Splitt, Babylon) had to send him their songs before the recording session would start and he programmed the drums on his drum machine. You can easily find out who recorded at his studio, by just listening to the plastic drum sound like it's heard on the "Phönix" album as well.Please note, there are tons of Prinzip singles being pressed in the early years and either the band was featured on countless compilations. We only feature their regular discography here.
Discography:
"Beschwerde" 7" EP 1975 (Amiga)
"Feuer-Rock" LP 1978 (Amiga)
"Supernummer" 7" EP 1978 (Amiga)
"Wir werden immer mehr" Split 7" EP 1978 (with Karat, Amiga)
"Charlie gute Nacht" 7" EP 1978 (Amiga)
"Sonnensage" 7" EP 1979 (Amiga)
"Der Steher" LP 1980 (Amiga)
"Hallo, Mary-Lou" 7" EP 1981 (Amiga)
"Hallo, Mary-Lou" Comp.-LP Track 1981 (Rock Bilanz 1981)
"He, Girl" 7" EP 1982 (Amiga)
"Kommt alle her" Comp.-LP Track 1982 (Rock für den Frieden)
"He, girl" Comp.-LP Track 1982 (Rock Bilanz 1982)
"Wir reiten mit dem Sturm" LP 1983 (Amiga)
"Wir reiten mit dem Sturm" Comp.-LP Track 1983 (Rock Bilanz 1983)
"Halt mich fest" 7"EP 1987 (Melodija)
"Phönix" LP 1988 (Amiga)
"Phönix" Comp.-LP Track 1988 (Rock Bilanz 1988)
Broadcast Recordings:
"Die Eile (1976)
"Nachtgespenst“ (1976)
"Ich hab Dich lieb“ (1977)
"Motorradtraum“ (1977)
"Such ein kleines Gefühl“ (1977)
"Sehnsucht“ (1986)
"Halt mich fest“ (1986)
"Jeden Tag, jede Nacht" (1986)
"Flieg flieg Engel" (1989)
Prinzz
Lineup:
Kerstin Radtke (vocals)
Thomas Feiler (guitar)
Jens Hellmann (bass)
Karl-Heinz Schüller (keyboard)
Gerrit Pennsler (drums)
Band-info:
The band Prinzz was founded late 1982 in Erfurt (ex-GDR) by manager Lutz Mielke who tried to cast a new Pop band. Jens Hellmann (bass), Thomas Feiler (guitar), Kerstin Radtke (vocals), Karl-Heinz Schüller (keyboard) and Gerrit Pennsler (drums) built the first line up at that time. During their early years they also could place a few songs on several compilations till 1985 Thomas Feiler due to health problems had to pause for about a year. When he returned in late 1986, the core of the band decided to play heavier music. Since his former band Macbeth during that time just got prohibited, the drummer Frank Viehbach agreed to join Prinzz as well, so the line up featured Kerstin Radtke (vocals), Thomas Feiler (guitar), Jens Hellmann (bass) and Frank Viehbach (drums). After a short phase that the band spent with covering Mötley Crüe and Van Halen songs at gigs, they started writing own songs like "Es treibt mich die Gier", "Leichte Beute", "Die Titanic sinkt", and could record some songs for the national broadcast service like the Speed Metal hammer "Tarantella" (german version) and the instrumental "EL 34". More and more Prinzz' style got heavier and 1988 their repertoire contained Metallica, Helloween and Anthrax cover versions as well, while the band saw it as neccessary to change the band's name to Blitzz, to avoid confusions with the pop star Prince. A live broadcast of the band during a festival in Berlin 1988 was noticed by Gama Records who got interested to release an album of Blitzz. While the band either was trying to sing only in english and that's been one of the requirements of Gama's offer, the GDR officials agreed and Blitzz recorded their "Money rules the world" album during 1989. After the recordings was finally finished in late '89, Gama wanted the album to be remastered, which caused the GDR officials to ask for more money and that's been the end of the cooperation of both part companies. To defend Gama, indeed the album mix wasn't much compatible for the western market at all, though the album featured a few speedy Power Metal pearls like "Tarantella" or "Lucifer". During the days of the political renewal inside the GDR, Blitzz became friends with Holy Moses and shared the stage together, so it happened when Holy Moses was recording one of their albums at the Horus Sound studio in Hannover, Blitzz had been invited to visit them, which in the end led to Steamhammer signing the band. In April '90 their "Do the Blitz" mini album was recorded at the same Horus Sound studio where they got introduced to Steamhammer. The album featured re-recorded songs of the unreleased album btw, this time with the "correct sound" and sold more than 10000 copies in the western part of Germany and the world, while inside GDR the demand had been "manageable". During 1991 after hiring Kai Tenneberg as second guitarist, the band paused for a while due to the new situation inside the country. They recorded their "Dive" Demo 1992, which was originally meant for their record company as Demo for the "Do the Blitz" follow up album. But instead Steamhammer released them of their running contract and fired the band. Though they still got offers by smaller labels, they declined every single one of them and eventually understandable frustrated called it a day in 1994. The unreleased album was finally released on the label German Democratic Recordings in 2013 under the title "Tarantella" on CD.Please note, none of Prinzz' songs recorded before 1986/87, was connected with Hard Rock or Heavy Metal at all.
Discography:
"Ich steh auf DT 64" Comp.-LP Track 1983 (Auf dem Wege 3)
"Kleeblatt № 11 - Junge Rockbands" Split LP 1984 (Amiga)
"Die Titanic sinkt" Demo Track 1987
"Kill" Demo Track 1987
Broadcast Recordings:
"Es treibt mich die Gier" (1987)
"Leichte Beute" (1987)
"Tarantella" (german version, 1987)
"EL 34" (1987)
Prisoner
Lineup:
Behn
Henze
Wriedt
Band-info:
Just a very recent discovery that was never seen before, marks the obscure selfreleased 7" of a band called Prisoner. I can't say where they hailed from, the labels, except of 3 names, reveal nothing and it seems the single was released without PS either. Musically the band offers typical mid 80's metallic Hard Rock with british touch, like f.e. if AC/DC would decide to play Heavy Metal. The riff of the B-side instrumental "Speed limit" reminds me slightly of Budgie's "Breadfan", though the song develops into a different direction, by adding Prog Rock similar influences due to an atmospheric keyboard part, that also the A-side already featured in the second part of the song.Discography:
"Ride for a fall" 7" EP 198x (selfreleased)
Quasy Modo
Lineup:
Erwin Schmid (guitar, vocals)
Philipp Kurz (guitar)
Gebhardt Schmid (bass)
Reiner Müller (drums)
Band-info:
Quasy Modo from Feldhausen was founded by Erwin and Gebhard Schmid in 1983, together with Reiner Müller and an unknown guitarist. In the fall of 1986 Hubert Türk replaced Reiner Müller and Phillip Kurz (guitar) as well as Ralf Fink (keyboard) joined. A single was planned to be recorded during late '86, but never realized. Finally in March '89 a selftitled 4 track EP was recorded privately, but the band fell apart in April due to most of members being busy with their studies. It took the Schmid brothers more than a year till in November '90 another gig with the old crew could be conducted. 1991 together with old drummer Reiner Müller and the new guitarist Martin Winheim they recorded the "We are the people" 7" in July '91 and the "Here we go" Demo tape (1994), that both once again was published and distributed privately on gigs of the band, till Quasy Modo disbanded in 1999. The band's sound on the 12" was a sort of leightweight Heavy Metal, that on "Pub on wheel" shows some Deep Purple tendencies, but tends to draw influences from the Metal scene, somewhere between Mad Max and the Scorpions. The two highlights are the slow creeping "Quasimodo" and "White dog", a style that they repeated on "We are the people" from the 91er single as well. You can visit Quasy Modo's Homepage here
Railway
Lineup:
Armin Schüler (vocals)
Hermann Janowitz (guitar)
Robert Haslinger (guitar)
Albert Knobel (bass)
Hasi Haslinger (drums)
Band-info:
Railway from Munich belongs to the german Heavy Metal bands with longest history, though these guys always stood kinda in the background, when it comes to discussions about 80's bands from Germany. The band was founded back in 1977 by 5 schoolfriends and the name was chosen due to the fact that their rehearsal room was in the basement of a railroad station. 1979 the lads was ranked second at a local Munich band contest with 250 bands participating and Railway continued playing live shows as much as possible which gained them a large followership in the Munich area. With this success in the back the boys recorded their first 7" "Just imagination" (as the guys themselves call it on their website) in June '81 privately in Lüneburg at the Unit Art Studio who also pressed the vinyls on their own label. The single nowadays is a pretty rarely seen piece, but contains 3x real Heavy Metal with NWOBHM influences plus the Hardrocker "More than enough" and surely must be counted amoungst the top singles of the early german Heavy Metal scene besides the Sin City 7". One interesting fact, the songwriting credits of the title track mention an R. Leuthner and P. Berghammer, so I guess these lads have been members of the band at an earlier stage as well. Nevertheless, the new rising german label Noise featured the 2 trax "Can't stand it" and "Break it up" on their "Rock from Hell" sampler which caught interest of Roadrunner, who offered the guys a 5 album deal. The debut album was recorded September '84 with new members Walter Wicha (vocals) and Werner Thaller (bass) at the Karo Studio in Münster and refined the NWOBHM style Metal known from the single, by offering a Priest/Accept influenced midpaced powerful rocking Heavy Metal. After being on tour with Tokyo Blade in 1985, Railway entered once again the Karo Studio to record the second album "Railway II", that musically was built of the same scheme like the debut and featured with "Lick it, lick it" an outstanding track. Due to the success of both albums, Railway could support some bigger numbers in Metal business like Manowar, Twisted Sister or Motörhead, but Hermann Janowitz quit to join the Munich Glam Metallers The Roxx in 1985 and got replaced by Florian Allgayer. "Climax", the 3rd album on Roadrunner, was available in 1987 and the band once more delivered Accept influenced pounding Metal par excellence on an equal level, but due to financial discrepancies with Roadrunner the guys resigned the contract and published the next EP "Tomorrow" 1989 independently over their management Munich Maintown Project. Interestingly the same EP was re-released again in 1989 or 1990 under the title "Backstage all access" with different sleeve, introducing Alex Havrilla (guitar) and Harry Enzian (bass) to replace Allgayer and Thaller, who both still was being mentioned on the first press. The whole procedure gained them a deal with Gama who produced the album "To be continued" 1991 for Intercord. Walter Wicha and Alex Havrilla both got replaced by new guitarist/vocalist Mike Sperner in the meanwhile and the album featured more melodic Metal sounds now, with Hard/Heavy Rock edge compared to the earlier efforts, influenced by bands like Bonfire, Vice and offered partly even US Glam hints. "To be continued" seems to have sold well, coz Steamhammer pulblished album # 5 "Welcome tonite" 1993, that just like the previous album featured Hard Rock and Glam influenced Metal. After another single 1994 ("I'm a loser") and the last album "Persecution mania" (1995) on the Rockwerk label, the guys decided to take a time out, which took till 2006 when Railway returned with almost the classic line up of the 80's.Please visit Railway's Homepage
Discography:
"Just imagination" 7" EP 1981 (Unit Art)
"Rock from Hell - German Metal Attack" Comp.-LP Tracks 1983 (Noise)
"Railway" LP 1984 (Roadrunner)
"Railway II" LP 1985 (Roadrunner)
"Climax" LP 1987 (Roadrunner)
"Tomorrow" 12" EP 1989 (Munich Maintown Project)
"Backstage all access" 12" EP 1989 (Munich Maintown Project)
"To be continued" LP/CD 1991 (Intercord)
"Welcome tonite" LP/CD 1993 (Steamhammer)
Rain
Lineup:
Ingo Willuweit
Band-info:
There must have been a pretty smart label manager once who thought "Lets fool all the stupid Heavy Metal fans and release a single with only black sleeve and a meaningless logo on it!". And then I wondered what the guy thought if he could sell 1000 of it or not. I guess you know the answer yourself. On the label I see at least the guy who composed the 2 tracks "Green eyed witch queen" and "Fighter" and more info I can't tell you about the band. Musically the "Green eyed witch queen" is a harmless melodic ballad while the "Fighter" offers Dio-ish Hard Rock/Metal with a midtempo drum beat like Accept. I don't need to emphasize how obscure this 7" is, do I? Rarely seen piece...Discography:
"Rain" 7"EP 1989 (Able Label)
Rampage
Lineup:
Band-info:
Hard Rockers from Bremerhaven that was featured on both Rock Cyclus compilations (3 songs in total) playing a sort of Kraut Rock rooted Hard Rock. I wouldn't be much surprised if those songs would appear on any obscure NWOBHM single at all. Their sound was similar to some of the early 80's british Hard Rock bands.Discography:
"Hard road" Comp.-LP Track 1980 (Rock Cyclus)
"Rock Cyclus II" Comp.-LP Tracks 1981 (Rock Cyclus Bremerhaven e. V.)
Rated-X
Lineup:
Carl Rothert (bass)
Mario V. Timme (guitar, vocals)
Ovidio Lipan (drums)
Band-info:
Rated-X was founded in 1982 by ex-Rizzo guitarist Mario V. Timme, Carl Rothert (ex-Tale, Bastard and Fargo) and the drummer of the romanian Prog Rockers Phoenix, Ovidio Lipan. This Hannover based troop got a huge hype back in the day and their debut album got quite good feedback by the press, but seriously, with that kind of goodtime Hard Rock I hardly wanna imagine that they caught interest of the kinds that was longing for Heavy Metal. Their "Rock blooded" LP was the very first Noise Records production ever (apart from the early compilations). The album lacks of hits and ideas, instead the guys was trying to revive some late 70's Hard Rock sounds and combine them with more topical sounds. A last attempt to still get the curve completely failed 1984 with the single "Baby I love you", that featured new vocalist Richie Thurlow and the NDW bass player Frank Neumann (ex-Scarlett Anvil Band and Bernward Büker Bande). Rated-X turned into modern sounds, but completely dropped the Metal influences and sounded on the title track like a cross of Queen ("A kind of magic") and early Billy Idol with some Hard Rock guitars. Mario Timme and Frank Neumann went back to the Bernward Büker Bande and later Timme founded Ellis Island.
Rattlesnake Butcher Shop
Lineup:
Dirk (vocals)
Guido (guitar)
Gregor (guitar)
Uff (bass)
Ralf (drums)
Band-info:
I don't know where the Rattlesnake Butcher Shop guys was hailing from, but I don't think it's so important either, if you heard their 7". The single features the studio track "Toxic" and the live cut "Loser" and it's pretty much clear that live their sound was way more aggressive and raw. Stylistically it's not so easy to put them in any drawer as "Toxic" features R'n'R ladden Hard Rock with 77'er Punk touch, but on "Loser", the guys sounded way more Metal with even thrashy Mosh parts. So they've been any kind of Crossover band...Discography:
”Rattlesnake Butcher Shop” 7” EP 1992 (Playtime)
Reckless
Lineup:
Christian Wieser (vocals)
H. Kupke (guitar)
U. Strenger (bass)
S. Angerer (drums)
Band-info:
A Heavy Metal band from Landshut, that was active in the mid and late 80's and later changed name to Nice'n Dirty. As Nice'n Dirty they produced privately a single in 1992. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
Return
Lineup:
Holger Rohr (guitar)
Uwe Hohn (vocals)
Holger Rabenschlag (keyboard)
Peter Lerch (drums)
Lutz Eckel (guitar)
Heiko Bräuer (guitar, bass)
Band-info:
A Krautrock band from Neuenlande-Roxstedt, south in the surrounding of Bremerhaven that released a self financed 7" in 1980 and appeared on the local compilation “Rock Cyclus II” one year later playing an in places Jimmy Hendrix inspired Kraut Rock with Hard Rock parts and even a few single NWOBHM alike twin leads. On the 7” they already had that Hardrock edge as well, but it seems it’s rather Status Quo, who’ve been the inspiration for the lads, though the B side number is quite a lively rock number here, both german sung.Discography:
"Teeny/Raus Aus Der Stadt" 7" EP 1980 (selfreleased)
"Rock Cyclus II" Comp.-LP Tracks 1981 (Rock Cyclus Bremerhaven e. V.)
Revenge
Lineup:
Band-info:
A female fronted Hard Rock band with an early independent single from I dunno where, as the sleeve reveals just still more secrets. If we take a look at the labelcode (8060), then Raubbau Records seems to be involved here, which might be a hint, that the band came most probably from northern Germany. The title track shows similarities to "Hells bells", but just on the surface as the lads acted way heavier than AC/DC. A really strong Heavyrocker. Unfortunately the level sinks lower on the flipside track "No Mercy", that has got a R'n'R edge which is pushing the song back to the late 70's again. Nevertheless, the girls voice was incredible powerful, pretty much giving "Upside down" a special note for sure.Discography:
"Upside down" 7" EP 1981 (Mojo)
Ricochet
Lineup:
Karl-Rene Jobig (vocals)
Sören Hückel (bass)
Markus Karrer (guitar)
Björn Tiemann (keyboard)
Jan Keimer (drum)
Band-info:
The Ricochet guys to the left do look like a Pop band, but seriously their less known 7" features a highly professional sounding melodic AOR/Hard Rock mix with cool guitar work. Sadly the single features no further info, but the guys published 2 more CD's in 1995 ("Among the elements") and 2005 ("Zarah - A teartown story").Discography:
"The edge" 7" EP 1992 (selfreleased)
Rising
Lineup:
Reinhold Penno
Krecklenberg
Herold
Dahlhaus
Band-info:
A band from Duisburg that produced a single back in 1981, which was released on the Unit Art label, so there might be about 500-1000 copies available. The band's style was a mix of roughly sounding Hard and Kraut Rock with still late 70's touch.Discography:
”Free to be free” 7” EP 1981 (Unit Art)
Ritchie V.
Lineup:
Harald Ernst Vogt (vocals)
Christian Baier (guitar)
Thomas Dietweger (guitar)
Thomas Wohlhaupter (bass)
Markus Hobmeier (drums)
Band-info:
Ritchie V. was a Hard Rock act from Straubing/Bavaria featuring the last singer Ritchie Newton (or Harald Ernst Vogt, as the guy was originally called) of the Heavy Metal band Mass shortly before they disbanded in 1987. Newton either was vocalist of the Regensburg based Hard Rock/Metal act Monsters, whom he recorded some songs with in 1988 that remained unreleased. The first one of Ritchie V.'s two 7 inches was released in January '86 in a limited edition of 1000 copies with fold out cover, while his supporting act was the band Tyrax. Both of the songs featured quite well done melodic Hard Rock (B-side's a dreamy ballad), and especially the title track kinda reminds me of Van Halen, due to the keyboard parts. Two other singles followed, "When children cry" in 1989 and the last one "Saxanna" recorded in January 1992 features just 3 turgid Melodic (Hard) Rock ballads, with other musicians being Fred Schröttinger (keyboard), Christian Baier (guitar), Thomas Wohlhaupter (bass) and Peng Sau Hi (drums). In 1994 Ritchie Newton also appeared on the "Bad to the bone" EP of the Heavy Metal band Warreck, released on Rockwerk Records. Ritchie also did vocals for the band Pussy Lover on their sole single from 1989.(Thanx to emosteel for additional info)
Discography:
"Pleasure of live" 7" EP 1986 (selfreleased)
"When children cry" 7" EP 1989 (selfreleased)
”Saxanna” 7” EP 1992 (selfreleased)
Robin
Lineup:
Andy Sedlmaier (vocals, guitar)
Klaus Sedlmaier (keyboard)
Captain Stärk (bass)
Ralf Usadel (drums)
Band-info:
Behind the Berlin band Robin are Andy Sedlmaier, Klaus Sedlmaier and Ralf Usadel, ex-musicians from Prowler, a band from the south of West Berlin who made the local Heavy Metal scene in the city unsafe back in early '81. After Prowler recorded various tapes, but then became increasingly melodic towards 1984 and finally broke up completely in November '86, the Sedlmaier brothers finally began to put their American Hard Rock ambitions into practice in 1987 and first changed their surname to “Robin”. They were joined by a certain Captain Stärk on bass and off they went. We don't know whether the Berliners made as many demos as Prowler, but during 1989 they recorded 12 pompous Hard Rock/AOR numbers at the Hansa Studios and Cup Of Tea Studios, which were able to maintain a certain standard, yet do sound very catchy. So it doesn't matter that their “hit” “Go for gold” sounds very suspiciously like mid 80's Bon Jovi trying to remake Belinda Carlisle's super hit “Heaven is a place on earth”. The album was only released as a CD, which is rarely seen today, but there is also a single release of “Go for gold”, both released on AMP Records in 1990.1992 was the end for Robin, the musicians went their own ways until Prowler reunited in 2006.Klaus Sedlmaier is now a sought after pianist, but also plays with Rock Twice.Discography:
"Over all seven seas" CD 1990 (AMP)
"Go for gold" 7" EP 1990 (AMP)
Rock Four
Lineup:
Wolfgang Schütz (vocals)
Adax Dörsam (guitar)
Matthias Scheid (bass)
Hans-Jürgen Götz (drums)
Band-info:
A Blues Rock band from the Mannheim/Heidelberg area, that was active during the 80's till the early 90's and was founded 1984, when they started covering songs of ZZ Top, Bad Company or Jimi Hendrix. The sound of Rock Four could be interesting for fans of the typical 80's Classic Rock spectrum and the range of their material includes mid/late 80's AC/DC, Status Quo Boogie tunes and other Hard/Blues Rock influences from the 70's as well. Marimba Records was responsible for Rock Four's only outputs, being a selftitled MLP from 1988, a single and the CD "Noise & Whiskey", released 1990. 2011 an Anthology CD with the title "Everything - The complete Rock Four recordings" was published by that label as well, featuring all their studio material of the previous records.Discography:
"Rock Four" MLP 1988 (Marimba)
"Noise & Whiskey" 7" EP 1989 (Marimba)
"Noise & Whiskey" CD 1990 (Marimba)
Rosy Vista
Lineup:
Andrea Schwarz (vocals)
Anca Graterol (guitar)
Regine Hellmann (bass)
Gerda Maus (drums)
Band-info:
Rosy Vista was an all female Heavy Rock band from Hannover, got picked up by Noise Records in the mid 80's. The ladies originally started 1983 with Gerda Maus on drums but Marina Hlubek replaced her in 1984. After a 6 track Demo 1985 Noise tried to promote the girls with a MLP entitled "You better believe it", that featured slightly Scorpions influenced midpaced melodic Hard Rock and Heavy Metal. Andrea Schwarz' vocals in places slightly remind me of a softer Doro Pesch, but the album wasn't blessed with much success at all, so Noise let the girls fall again. With ex-Viva Barbara Schenker (keyboard), who joined in 1986 and the former Juliet vocalist Susanne Schätzle on micro Rosy Vista tried to score another record deal, but eventually called it a day in around 1988/89. Two separate singles that was featuring different songs from the MLP was also published in the CSSR and France. Rosy Vista reunited in 2002 and published their debut album "Unbelievable" in 2019.Discography:
"Demo 1985" (selfreleased)
"You better believe it" MLP 1985 (Noise)
"Tables are turned" 7" EP 1986 (Supraphon)
"Sound of your love" 7" EP 1986 (Accord)
Rouge
Lineup:
Shorty (vocals)
Tommy (guitar)
Abdul (guitar)
Rainer (keyboard)
Reini (bass)
Dave (drums)
Band-info:
Rouge was a Kraut Rock band from Menden, who published an independent single in 1982. Both of the songs belong to these typical early 80's german Kraut Rock tunes with Hard Rock edge and the B-side "Free" additionally clearly delivers some NWOBHM twin leads and illustrates the harder of the both trax, by constantly dwelling in Hard Rock realms. A bit annoying, especially on the title track, are the keyboard/piano elements.Discography:
"Got no time" 7" EP 1982 (selfreleased)
Roxxon
Lineup:
Jürgen Eidt (drums)
Richie Thurlow (vocals)
Max Paus (guitars)
Paul le Butt (bass)
Werner Chabowski (guitar)
Band-info:
Hannover Heavy Rock unknowns with NWOBHM inspired sound, formed by drummer Jürgen Eidt in early 1980 as RUBBISH. In early '81 they tried their luck in Berlin, doing a few local radio interviews and trying to sort out a proper studio recording, but they quickly discovered their name worked against them as everyone though they were a punk band. A renaming to Roxxon came about, and in February 1982 their first demo was recorded, produced by none other than Scorpions bassist Francis Buchholz, which also led to an unlikely opening-spot for for the Scorp's in march 1982.Founding member Jürgen Eidt later ran the Roxxon Studio (Glory Anthem, Crack Buster etc..) and after that the Roxxon ACB CD pressing plant. Richie Thurlow also had a short stint with Rated-X, appearing on the band's last single. Roxxon recorded 2 Demos within the years 1982-83. The first one featured the 2 songs "Little schoolgirls" and "Cover girls", while Demo 2 had "Hard as a rock", "Cover girls" and "Can't get enough" on the agenda. If you have more info, please get in contact.
(Thanx to Rumblefist for the additional info)
Discography:
Demo 1982 (selfreleased)
Demo 1983 (selfreleased)
Roy Last Group
Lineup:
Roy Last (guitar, vocals)
Wolfgang Beisel (bass)
Claus Reinholdt (drums)
Band-info:
Roy Last was the nephew of the famous german Big Band leader James Last. He was born in New York City but his german parents moved back to Germany in early years, so he grew up in Hamburg where he started playing in his first band Amazing Grace in the mid 70's till he formed the Roy Last Group at around 1978. The first single "Born to be wild" still featured with "Land of ladies" a mellow Kraut Rocker, but the Steppenwolf cover version might be one of the best that was ever done, and that song must have been covered quite one million times if not even two. On "Rocks" the sails was already set into Hard Rock direction, though just like on the 7" a bit earlier, the 70's Kraut Rock was playing a big role either. In 1983 he published the "Let's go rock" 12", featuring the 12 min lasting "Rainchild" instrumental from the debut album in a more dynamic version with vocals and also the "Goodtimes ahead" LP, that's fully worshipping the Hard Rock with early Metal hints. After those releases it got silent around the band. In autumn '84 an official message announced the end of the Roy Last Group. Roy Last returned in the mid 80's when he was member of Dirty Money, an melodic AOR/Hard Rock from Hamburg formed by the last Roy Last Group singer John Boutkam (aka John Ridge, ex-One-O-One, E.F. Band, Picture, Hot Property), who tried without success to find a label for their selfrecorded album (around 1985/86). In the late 80's Roy Last released a more up to date last album "Comin and a'goin'" (as L.A.S.T.) in a quite experienced guitar driven Hard Rock/Metal style with melodic background, till he helped Jutta Weinhold with the "The 4th quest for fantasy" album in 1992 of her Velvet Viper band. Roy Last died in 2004 completely unexpectedly at age of only 47 years.Discography:
"Born to be wild" 7" EP 1980 (Jax Pax)
"Rocks" LP 1981 (Jax Pax)
"Let's go rock" 12" EP 1983 (Jax Pax)
”Goodtimes ahead” LP 1983 (Jax Pax)
"Rainchild" Comp.-CD 1989 (Jax Pax)
Ruscut
Lineup:
Olaf Dietzel (vocals)
Thorsten Weber (guitar)
Clemens Goth (bass)
Ulli Quaiser (drums)
Band-info:
Progressive Power/Speed Metallers originating from the Lahn/Dill Kreis (between Gießen and Siegen), who combined the german Speed with some proggy US Power Metal, while the Speed parts remind me of Angel Dust on their debut LP. A pretty much playful acting band with even a few Running Wild hints showing up here and there. Ruscut existed since summer '86 and released 2 Demos all in all. After the first tape recorded in November '87, Mekin Gürson joined as second guitarist and Peter Berger replaced Olaf Dietzel in late April '88. After 2 successful participations on local newcomer festivals and a small tour through Germany, Ruscut announced to release a Maxi single during spring '89, that was never released though. Joe Mizzi (ex-Rain 'n' Steel) and Gino Micallef (both ex-High'n Dry) was found in their line up as well.Discography:
"...the war drags ever on!!" Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
"Time waits for no one" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
Rustlers
Lineup:
Volker Siebenburg
Cordes
Stobrawe
Band-info:
Actually, it's always interesting to see that even after 40 years, things like this hitherto completely unknown single by the Bremen band Rustlers still turn up. Visually you wouldn't associate this record, which was produced in January '84, with Hardrock at all, as you would probably rather put these 5 shaggy beards in the Krautrock drawer. But that would be doing this band a total injustice, as both songs were 100 % rooted in the Hardrock scene. The A-side rocker “Blame it on...” immediately shows the way and offers quite appealing, energetic AOR/Hard Rock with refreshing good songwriting. The B-side drifts more into the Status Quo department with “Woman and wine”, but still has enough drive to recommend this obscure single to fans of this genre. Of course, there is hardly any information about the band itself to find nowadays.Discography:
“Blame it on.../Woman and wine” 7” EP 1984 (Rockfarm Bremen)
Rusty Nail (Frechen)
Lineup:
Zeta Nierhoff (vocals, guitar)
Olaf Heine (bass)
Bobo Kubovski (drums)
Band-info:
From Frechen/Cologne came this mysterious band that sounds like an incarnation of AC/DC on every single one of their 3 EP's. Unfortunately there is no year mentioned on any of them, but we've found enough info to say the band existed since 1983 and besides a Livetape (90 min), the lads released their first single "Girls get older" during 1985. Early 1986 the trio even took a selfproduced LP into consideration, but instead another single with the title "Empty bottles" was published, with Uwe Belz on additional guitar. Single number three, and the best of all, "In the claws of Rock 'n' Roll" was produced probably around 1988/89 then. Olly Blahak had replaced Uwe Belz on guitar and Martin Scheferhoff was to hear on the bass guitar. On the earlier singles Rusty Nail's music featured exactly the old 70's AC/DC sound, while on "In the claws of Rock 'n' Roll" the fourpiece offers a slightly more modern style and doesn't sound too much like from the 70's as on the previous EP's, though the AC/DC worship is prevailing here too. We are speaking of an 1:1 copy, just that you get the picture.Discography:
"Girls get older" 7" EP 1985 (Spider)
"Empty bottles" 7" EP 198x (Spider)
"In the claws of Rock 'n' Roll" 7" EP 198x (Spider)
Sabre
Lineup:
Kenny Browder (vocals)
Kevin Marshall (bass)
Pat Murphy (guitar)
Snoop Tyler (drums)
Band-info:
One more of these bands that originally doesn't feature a single german musician, but the band itself was only active in Germany. Founded by 4 US soldiers who was stationed in Karlsruhe from 1983-1986, the guys started playing together in a Hard Rock band, doing live gigs in the Karlsruhe area and in 1985 recorded the "Keepers of the sword" album at the Katapult Studios in Karlsruhe, that was published in a limited edition of 500 copies, from which almost no copy can be found nowadays anymore. If they took the main amount of copies back to the US of A after their miltary service is most likely the case. The sound of the soldier boys was midpaced average Hard Rock with Metal influences here and there like on the title track. But the majority of the material featured nothing groundbreaking at all and sometimes I tend to smell AC/DC influences. But in the total "Keepers of the sword" was just another one these private common local US Hard Rock/Metal pressings.
Sam
Lineup:
Christian Dürr (vocals)
Hans-Peter Herbel (guitar)
Thomas Matthes (bass)
Hermann Hofmann (keyboard)
Klaus Stumpf (drums)
Band-info:
Sam's vocalist Christian Dürr already recorded a single with the crazy sounding band Second P. in the early 80's and sung on Second P.'s Peter Zöller's solo LP "Paradise" (1984). With Sam then back in 1990 he recorded a quite nice single at the Face Music Studio, who also pressed the singles for the band. Sam was originating from the Mannheim area and not surprisingly performed a pretty melodic sort of Heavy Rock. Due to the keyboards both songs got a slightly radio friendly touch, but nevertheless they are both catchy and well done, like most of the private bavarian bands (Lifeline, Minestone, 2nd East, Dirty Laine and stuff like that) at that time. The good guitar work is bringing Sam back on the heavy side of melodic Hard Rock. Further info is required.Discography:
"Mary Anne" 7" EP 1990 (Face Music)
Samain
Lineup:
Peter Vorwerk (vocals)
Ralf Wiethoff (guitar)
Manfred Bayer (guitar)
Bernd Emsermann (bass)
Peter Henning (drums)
Band-info:
A Hard Rock/Heavy Metal act from the Iserlohn area, that starting back in November 1982. The band was formed by Pete Ancaster (Peter Vorwerk, vocals), Dave Herold (guitar) and Peter Henning (drums) and already a couple of weeks late in the mid December Bernard Eams (Bernd Emsermann) joined on bass. During the next year in March '83 Ralph Vecty (Ralf Wiethoff) got the job for the second guitar and Samain could play their first gig in June 1983. After Peter Henning wasn't much fond with the current musical direction of the band, he simply got replaced in October '83 by new drummer Mark Newman (Holger Neumann). During their support for Trance in November '83 the band became friends with Trance’s manager and soon released the first Demo "Thunderbolt giants" in March 1984 and with the help of Karl-Heinz Osche direcly got signed by the young Roadrunner label in April. The recordings for the debut album "Vibrations of doom" started shortly afterwards, still with Dave Herold on guitar, who had to leave the band after the recordings had been finished due to a serious injury. Fred McKinnell (Manfred Bayer) replaced him. The LP was available in September the same year already, featuring a for that time typical Hard Rock influenced midpaced Heavy Metal, that seemed to adopt several Accept approaches whenalso Samain indeed had an own identity due to Vorwerk's unique sounding voice, that mainly reminds to certain dutch bands of that decade. But sadly "Vibrations of doom" couldn't really set own standards in the still young Metal business and therefore got dropped quickly by Roadrunner. Samain tried with 2 more professional Demo tapes in February and September 1985 but remained unnoticed by labels. The band split up 2006 without any further releases. Just for info, Fred McKinnell/Fred Bertram and Manfred Bayer are the same person. Please note, that "Thor" 7" EP 1985 (Roadrunner), that is listed on certain sites without pictures/release nr. seems to be a hoax, as we yet don't know ANYONE who's ever seen a single copy.Discography:
"Thunderbolt giants" Demo 1984 (selfreleased)
"Vibrations of doom" LP 1984 (Roadrunner)
"Vibrations of doom" Comp.-LP Track 1984 (100 % Pure Metal Sampler)
"From now till doomsday" Live Tape 1985 (selfreleased)
"Today you're a lion" Demo 1985 (selfreleased)
"Vicious circles" Demo 1985 (selfreleased)
Scarecrow
Lineup:
Thomas Haller (vocals)
Jens Ribow (guitar)
Joe (guitar)
Andi (bass)
Chris Steinhoff (drums)
Band-info:
Freiburgs Crossover/Thrashers Scarecrow was founded in April '87 by ex-Beatifix members Thomas Haller, Jens Ribow, Andi and Stoffel (Chris Steinhoff) plus an additional new guy called Joe. Already in July they recorded the first 4 track Demo "Satyr" and one song of it was published on the "German Metal Fighters No. II" compilation, but basically Scarecrow wasn't much happy about that decision as they didn't really label themselves a Metal band at all. Ofc the selfproduced "Condemned to be doomed" vinyl album proved the contrary. In December '87 Stoffel and Andi left and Scarecrow found replacements in Christoph Pevec (bass) and Nico (drums), who both would record the album in February '88 with the guys. The LP was available in April '88 and limited to 500 copies. But already in July another edition of 500 copies was released since the first edition was sold quickly. Both editions do have different sleeves. One with black background and one with magenta coloured background. Basically I think the one with black is the first edition as this one turns up quite seldomly, but there was nowhere info to be found to say exactly. The album features well executed Thrash Metal with many technical breaks and Mosh parts, but got a kinda Crossover touch due to the annoying Punk vocals. In July '88 the 2 new trax "Never again" and "Pack of lies" was recorded, while the first one was used for several compilation tapes, and in fall '88 Scarecrow recorded "No reason to be sad" for the "Screaming for a better future" compilation on Campari Records. Right in January/February '89 the "No reason to be sad" 7" was recorded, that was produced for the band's own label Weed Productions, released in May in blue and green vinyl. Nick left Scarecrow after the 7", but returned 3 months later and the lads recorded together in December the second single "Scarecrow" (released in March '90) plus the track "Nuclear target" for the second part of the "Screaming for a better future" compilation. Originally in May 1990 Scarecrow planned to record their second album, but obviously, those plans wasn't realized at all, as no more releases turned up after 1990. Chris Steinhoff was founding member of Bethlehem in 1991, while Jens Ribow joined Lazzer after 1993 and recorded guitars for their "Tales of the Cosmoverse" CD 1995.Discography:
"Satyr" Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
"Repression" Comp.-LP Track 1988 (German Metal Fighters No. II)
”Condemned to be doomed” LP 1988 (selfreleased)
"No reason to be sad" Comp.-LP Track 1989 (Screaming for a better future)
"No reason to be sad" 7" EP 1989 (Weed)
"Scarecrow" 7" EP 1990 (Weed)
"Nuclear target" Comp.-LP Track 1990 (Screaming for a better future - Vol. 2)
Scarlet Rose
Lineup:
Kurt Harley (vocals)
Frank Bulling (guitar)
Andy Keller (bass)
Michael Dorsch (drums)
Band-info:
A band from Mannheim/Heidelberg, that was founded in December 1988 by Frank Bulling and Andy Keller subsequently after their former band Scavenger just had called it quits. They found american singer Kurt Harley and the drummer Michael Dorsch to start working on their new vision of a melodic Heavy Rock band and recorded Scarlet Rose's debut Demo in April '89, plus a second tape already in October. In December '89 then Edgar Schmidt replaced Michael Dorsch on drums, while in July 1990 female keyboarder/singer Coco Augustin joined and female vocalist Steffi Brill joined for the departed Kurt Harley, who went back to the US of A. With the new line up the quintet produced Demo # 3 in February 1991, that gained the band first successful moments while being 2nd winner of a local band contest in September and also 2nd of the Metal Hammer newcomer festival in October '91. The Demo received overwhelming press in Germany, praising the songwriting and sound of Scarlet Rose and either the musical spectrum of the material ranging from Melodic Rock to Heavy Rock. Right in November the band could support the Sony Music recording act The Slags, while in May '92 played at a bigger festival with other german top acts Bonfire, Thunderhead, and Roko. During October that year the 3rd Demo then got re-released as "Second edition" with additional 5 live trax. 1993 Scarlet Rose could participate at a TV show and started their first tour through northern Germany, before they independently started recordings for their debut album "Prime" in November, which was finally released on House Master Records in 1995. Scarlet Rose furthermore released the CD single "The Sun in your eyes" in 1997 and was featured on a number of compilations during the 90's, before the band eventually was put on eyes during 2004.Discography:
"Some kind of Rock" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"Demo II" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"Demo '91" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"Second edition" Demo 1992 (selfreleased)
Schnoogehooge
Lineup:
Michael Kroll (vocals)
Robert Seefeldt (guitar)
Michel Widmer (guitar)
Stefan Fabian (bass)
Peter Lersch (drums)
Band-info:
Schnoogehooge a Rock band from Rüsselsheim in the Frankfurt/Mayence area, picked a quite odd name respectively to their very own style, which was a sort of hardrocking Punk or punky Hardrock. Skillwise the protagonists neither convinced on any of the three featured tracks on the wide line with their DIY sound, so their self produced german sung single “Supermarkt” from the mid 80’s could be stored in the Crossover drawer easily and would receive the mark “least of all memorable”.Discography:
“Supermarkt” 7" EP 1986 (selfreleased)
Scrap Manufactory
Lineup:
Bernd Ferone (guitar)
Volker Herschbach (keyboard)
Jörg Schaufert (bass)
Rick de Soto (drums, vocals)
Band-info:
Neunkirchen Hardrockers, known for dressing notoriously in leather during the late 70’s, while the first steps of these guys are dating back to already 1972. The lads drew quite a huge fan crowd to each one of their gigs and quickly established their prominent status in their local area around Neunkirchen/Saarbrücken. After a few changes, the band eventually produced two songs with the final line up featuring Bernd Ferone (guitar), Albert Jochum (vocals), Volker Herschbach (keyboard) and Jörg Schaufert (bass), for their first single “Little Jane” with Ricky King in 1979, and subsequently would change their name to Lancelot for the single release, while a bit later on during the early 80’s the guys could support superstars Queen in Germany.Discography:
Scum
Lineup:
Martin Seefried (vocals)
Johnny Hanke (bass)
Chris Huber (drums)
Burkhart Weiss (guitar)
Band-info:
A shortlived Death Metal band from Donauwörth. Scum at least could record a 7" EP during the early 90's Death Metal wave that features raw Death/Grind with some slower gloomy parts and vocals in the vein of Carcass or Prophecy of Doom. One track of the single was also used for the german underground compilation CD "Deathophobia".Discography:
”Gargoyle” 7” EP 1992 (Brickhouse Music)
"Infanticide" Comp.-CD Track 1993 (Deathophobia)
Separate Reality
Lineup:
Holger Timm (bass, vocals)
Michael Gliese (guitar)
Thorsten Ritter (guitar)
Rainer Struck (keyboard)
Jürgen Schlotter (drums)
Band-info:
The already 1981 founded SEPARATE REALITY from Hamburg released a nice 7" on the Pirol label in 1988 that features the cool Heavy Rocker "Metal skies" and the more or less rather AORish "Enough", who's refrain could be compared to a heavier form of BACHMANN TURNER OVERDRIVE's "You ain't seen nothing yet" in a way. The guys also recorded a 6 track Demo tape in 1991, who's drum parts was all done by still Jürgen Schlottau, but the booklet already mentions Michael Link (ex-TRON/LADY/INFERNO/MP) as new drummer. Additionally David Roth (keyboard) and Goetz Sucke (vocals) had joined the band while Struck and Gliese left SEPARATE REALITY after the single. That tape featured their wellknown blend of Prog Metal and Hard Rock sounds, offering either occasional FATES WARNING hints. The guys later changed name to ENTRY and released a CD in 1999. Further info is needed.
Silent Scream
Lineup:
Jan (vocals, bass, guitar)
Steini (guitar)
Meik (drums)
Band-info:
The best way to describe Silent Scream's style would be probably punky Hard Rock in the vein of The Honx. Their only 7" was released on Satyricon Records and the trio was probably coming from the Düsseldorf area. Though the single was a handnumbered limited edition of 500 copies in violet vinyl, it's seriously not a very recommended piece at all.Discography:
"Silent Scream" 7" EP 1990 (Satyricon)
Sin City
Lineup:
Philipp (vocals)
Band-info:
Early Heavy Metal with Accept touch was offering Sin City from Düsseldorf. Their "Call me a rebel" belongs to the earliest Heavy Metal singles in german history and even their style was targeted to the future, by throwing off the usual 70's Kraut Rock influences that most bands of that time had to struggle with. These guys probably have been there a bit too early, as there wasn't really labels willing to promote that new power sound. Especially the flipside "No mercy for outlaws" is a timeless classic with aggressive high pitched screams. The single was selfproduced and came in orange vinyl. A groundbreaking landmark...Vocalist Philipp later re-appeared as Philipp Magoo in Bad Steve.
Sinner
Lineup:
Matthias Lasch (vocals, bass)
Calogero Rappalo (guitar)
Frank Mittelbach (guitar)
Edgar Patrik (drums)
Band-info:
To fully introduce Sinner from Stuttgart I guess isn't neccessary at all anymore. The band started late in 1980 and already in autumn ’81 made a larger tour through smaller concert halls throughout Germany, while quickly after that tour the band started recordings for the first album "Wild 'n' evil" still within the year 1981, which could be eventually finished in spring’82. The first steady line up was built by Matthias "Matt Sinner" Lasch (vocals, bass) and ex-Stuttgart guitarist Calogero Rappalo, Frank Mittelbach (guitar), Edgar Patrik (drums), who would all found Tyran' Pace a few years later. Support gigs for Accept, Samson, Whitesnake or Wishbone Ash would follow quickly, before the “Fast decision” album was recorded during Dec. ’82 and June ‘83. On the first 2 albums Sinner's sound was still Hard Rock and primarily NWOBHM inspired, especially on "Fast decision" the Judas Priest influences are undeniable. Tensions in the band caused a completely line up change since the most of the guys wanted to create softer rather AOR inspired material. But Mat Sinner, founder of the band, decided to rearrange the whole line up. Helmo Stoner and Frank Mittelbach had been hired as guitarists and Edgar Patrik on drums (ex-Powerhouse/Supermax/Lee Cooper Group), who was playing with Mat Sinner already in the “David Hanselmann Band”. After "Fast decision" the new Sinner produced a Demo tape and this way achieved a contract with Noise Records. By changing band members over and over again, the band's style changed too and this way on "Danger zone" (with Ralf Schulz on drums, who got replaced shortly afterwards by ex-Fargo/Fandango Bernie van der Graaf) and "Touch of sin", with ex-Accept axeman Hermann Frank, their sound turned quite up to date into typical powerful german Heavy Metal with slightly Accept-ish touch. On "Comin' out fighting" the Sinners (again with new team) started playing the sound they got later known for, Melodic Metal, though there was still Heavy Metal prevailing, but on "Dangerous charm" with Andreas Susemihl (guitar, later in Lazy/U.D.O./Ape), Bernie van der Graaf (drums), Armin Mücke (guitar) and Matt Sinner on bass, they developed their new melodic style to the maximum. From 1987 to 1992 a short break happened from Sinner as Mat Sinner was concentrating on his solo career, but then with the "No more alibis" CD subsequently returned 1992 to release countless of albums throughout the following years. Please note, we only list the albums of this band, there was numerous other singles and stuff available.Discography:
"Wild 'n' evil" LP 1982 (SL)
"Fast decision" LP 1983 (SL)
"Danger zone" LP 1984 (Noise)
"Touch of sin" LP 1985 (Noise)
"Comin' out fighting" LP/CD 1986 (Noise)
"Dangerous charm" LP/CD 1987 (Noise)
"No more alibis" CD 1992 (Mausoleum)
"Respect" CD 1993 (GSE)
Snakebite (Ensdorf)
Lineup:
Norbert Güthler (vocals)
Michael Vogelsang (guitar)
Ferdi Ferber (guitar)
Andreas Wolf (bass)
Stefan Moor (drums)
Band-info:
Snakebite from Saarlouis in the Saarbrücken region, who formed during the beginning of the 80’s, recorded their "Nightdriver" single in January '83 and the guys have been active at least till 1987. The title track features just average Heavy Rock, but the song that makes this 7" a little gem is the B-side ballad "Layla", where the guys fired up an epic Hard Rock anthem with a lot of emotions put into heavy music.
Soilent Green
Lineup:
Michael Kalks (vocals)
Jürgen Meincke (guitar)
Thomas Mirainski (bass)
Uwe Främcke (drums)
Band-info:
Hamburg's Rocker Soilent Green started back in 1985 and right from the start was known to be a live band, who tried to play any venue that allowed it. Very unusual in the Metal business the guys used to perform their songs in native german language and that's what you can hear on their debut LP, that was recorded in August '86. Soilent Green's style was a kind of Hard Rock/Metal mix with huge Rock'n'Roll dose, that could be compared best to certain midpaced Motörhead songs. The single "Bruno" contains 2 tracks of the album, before Soilent Green's last strike, the "TV Rocker" 12", was available in 1988, introducing new bass player Sven Pfaffenberger and Dirk Kludaß on 2nd guitar. The material got a better much more powerful production than the debut, but stylistically nothing had changed. They played their R'n'R ladden Hard Rock to the end, sounding like a mix of AC/DC and Motörhead.Discography:
"Soilent Green" LP 1986 (Kult)
"Bruno" 7" EP 1986 (Kult)
"TV Rocker" 12" EP 1988 (BMR)
Source, The
Lineup:
Winfried Machon (guitar, vocals)
Ralf Simon (bass)
Reinhard Joner (drums)
Band-info:
This quite unknown Bremen Hard Rock outfit produced their obscure single independently sometime during the early 80's, according to the sound of the trio. The NWOBHM alike sounding Hardrocker "Big black car" will certainly attract fans of that special genre. It's just the harp parts, that could appear slightly annoying for Metal ears. On the flipside a different picture of the band unfolds with the much more bluesy sounding number "Time", still rooted in the late 70's Hard Rock though. We need more band info.Discography:
"The Source" 7" EP 198x (selfreleased)
Speedball
Lineup:
Eddie McGrogan (vocals)
Ulrich Alte-Tiemann (bass)
Heiner Gastmann (guitar)
Richard Preinbergs (guitar)
Hanns Hanneken (drums)
Band-info:
Speedball should be a german band, though their only single was pressed in Switzerland. Both tracks feature 70's Hard Rock with naturally in places Boogie edge, but "5th Avenue" must be counted to the NWOBHM influenced songs, coz it's dominated by sweet twin lead parts, right the same sound that early british NWOBHM bands used to play during the late 70's. If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
"Busted/5th Avenue" 7" EP 1980 (Inter)
Squadron
Lineup:
Achim Mühlhaus (bass)
Ralf Weiß (vocals)
Judith Küssner (vocals)
Peter Ludes (guitar)
Klaus Prudlo (drums)
Band-info:
One of those bands that didn't mention any info on their releases. Although the band name and title sounds somewhat promising, Squadron was just a Boogie/Hard Rock band, whenalso with a pretty heavy guitar sound. But more or less imagine Status Quo would try some Heavy Metal and you'll get the picture. The girl on the band pic has sung the B-side track "Squadron Blues" that just like the title says includes an extremely bluesy guitar solo. Their single might be obscure as hell, but it's nothing essential at all.Discography:
"Nightmare" 7"EP 1984 (selfreleased)
Staff
Lineup:
Band-info:
Continuing with unknown local singles that none has ever heard of yet, though they wouldn’t suggest any Hard Rock association at all by just looking at the sleeve. Still Aachen’s own Staff clearly belong in here, eventhough their sound features a rather Blues ladden Hard Rock with a little 70’s feeling. Their obscure “Empty house” entitled single must have been recorded during the mid 80’s as most of the Semper Idem label’s outputs originate from that time range.Discography:
“Empty house” 7” EP 198x (Semper Idem)
Stampede (Kassel)
Lineup:
Martin Nethercutt (vocals)
Thomas Stolkmann (guitar)
Frank Spohr (guitar)
Ralph Spohr (bass)
Martin Großkurth (keys)
Steve Freitag (drums)
Band-info:
A Melodic Rock band from Kassel, not to be confused with the Stampede who released an album 1981. These guys only released two singles, while the "Morning comes" 7" features just poppy AOR, but needs to be mentioned here nevertheless. "Radio" the flipside track sounds quite listenable though. On the second single released the following year the Stampede guys added some more Hard Rock influences at least on the title track (bluesy B-side sucks though), but still of the same kind you could hear on the radio back in the day.Discography:
"Morning comes" 7" EP 1984 (Zun)
"35 Kassel" 7" EP 1985 (Iron Curtain)
Stargazer
Lineup:
Armin Fendl (vocals)
Paul Krieger (guitar)
Werner Eigner (bass)
Oliver Wulff (keyboard)
Peter Kei (drums)
Band-info:
Stargazer from Munich was founded by Paul Krieger and Werner Eigner in early 1986, while Peter Kei was quickly recruited as drummer. The band name was chosen due to the same titled Rainbow song. After Armin Fendl and Oliver Wulff completed them, they got signed by the Munich Maintown Project management and label who produced Stargazer's first 7", the outstanding "We start to play now", which was pressed in a very small edition only. Both songs feature above standard powerful Heavy Metal with virtuoso guitar playing and atmospheric keyboards and must be counted amoung the top 3 of all german Metal singles ever released. In summer '87 the guys started recordings for the debut album "Back on the street!", that was again produced by the Munich Maintown Project label and showcased Stargazer from a different, more melodic side. Nevertheless songs like "Break out" also showed parallels to old Rainbow, but the main material featured midpaced, hardrocking Metal with heavy use of keyboards and commercial edge. Oliver Wulff left the band after the recordings and Gerald Sailer replaced him. For the second album "Commercial gods" Johannes Bleibrunner did the keyboard parts. Stargazer recorded and produced this CD privately and turned way heavier again than the previous one, almost returning to "We start to play now" times. Some of the solos seriously could be compared to Yngwie Malmsteen's style and also the vocal performance of Fendl was on it's zenith. For the last album "Dinomania" the line up changed again. Long time fellow drummer Peter Klei was replaced by Klaus Leichtl and again a new keyboarder in person of Rainer Thanner was introduced. But sadly the recordings on "Dinomania" went way to modern, adopting Hard Rock roots once again and either Fendl's vocals focussed on that new style of singing that killed Heavy Metal in the early 90's. The "Stargazer" entitled CD from 1994 features the "Back on the street!" album plus other extra tracks.Discography:
"We start to play now" 7" EP 1986 (Munich Maintown Project)
"Back on the street!" LP 1988 (Munich Maintown Project)
"Commercial gods" CD 1991 (selfreleased)
"Dinomania" CD 1993 (Walk Music)
Steelwood
Lineup:
Band-info:
The band Steelwood is just known for a track on the "Schwarz auf weiß" compilation released on CBR Records. Though the band pic doesn't might really reveal that impression, but "Dark clouds" had a strong NWOBHM background. In general the kind of NWOBHM/Hard Rock from around 1980 or earlier with nice twin leads. That song could well have been on any of the early singles and noone would notice the difference. If you got more info of this band, please get in touch.Discography:
"Dark woods" Comp.-LP Track 1986 (Schwarz auf weiß)
Stingway
Lineup:
Martin Meyo (vocals)
Wolf Zenk (guitar)
Peter Fink (bass)
Peter Asang (drums)
Band-info:
Stingway's Metal legacy sadly are 3 tracks. This band must be from the Munich area, but for sure was a bavarian band. Their rare "Lost in a nightmare" single belongs to the creme de la creme of the german indie singles, though the guys didn't celebrate an excessively german sounding style at all. "Lost in a nightmare" offers strong US american influences with glammy note and "We pray for rock" is the smash hit on that 7". A fresh sounding well composed Heavy Rocker with great refrain and cool vocals parts. They could contribute another exclusive track on Outlet Music's compilation "Sunab 196" that was of the same quality like the single trax. Martin Meyo shortly later joined White Falcon.Discography:
”Lost in a nightmare” 7” EP 1987 (Outlet Music)
"Come and go" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Sunab 196)
Stormbringer
Lineup:
Fabian Scheliga (bass, vocals)
Ben Scheliga (guitar)
Johnny Scheliga (drums)
Band-info:
A Witten based family business Hard Rock band that was playing a completely unspectacular sort of 70's influenced Hard Rock with R'n'Roll edge. The vocals on the flipside ballad "Woman" are completely out of tune. Even the A-side rocker "Rock'n'Roll" for 1984 sounds totally outdated, like the guys was still living in the 70's. The single is also known under the title "Rock'n'Roll".Discography:
"Stormbringer" 7"EP 1984 (selfreleased)
Stormwitch
Lineup:
Andreas Mück (vocals)
Harald Spengler (guitar)
Stefan Kauffmann (guitar)
Jürgen Wannenwetsch (bass)
Peter Langer (drums)
Band-info:
Stormwitch from Gerstetten (near Ulm) was originally founded by Harald Spengler, Andreas Mück and Stefan Kauffmann 1979 as Lemon Sylvan. Jürgen Wannenwetsch and Peter Langer joined them a bit later and the band changed name to Stormwitch in March 1981. Wannenwetsch left in fall of 1983 and got replaced by Ronny Gleisberg. 1984 the guys visited Peter Garratoni's studio with selfrecorded songs in order to produce a Demo, but Garratoni offered them to produce an album for his label Gama Records. "Walpurgs night" was recorded live 1984 in his studio and featured quite powerfull occult touched powerful Heavy Metal in the Iron Maiden/Grave Digger vein, but with obviously better musicianship than the ladder. Gama extended their contract and Stormwitch recorded the equal "Tales of terror" album (1985), before with "Stronger than heaven" (1986) the lads created a german Power Metal milestone at the peak of their creative being, that made them entering the elite of the german Heavy Metal bands, with a mix of Running Wild and early Tyrant/Grave Digger sounds, creating a kinda dramatic Metal album, pearced with breaks and powerriffing on highest technical level. With "The beauty and the beast" 1988, Stormwitch made a little step backwards, dropping the power and went more melodic, just like on "Eye of the storm" that was recorded without long time member Ronny Gleisberg and featured Andreas Jäger on bass, who got replaced by ex-Rough Martin Albrecht in 1990 already. With the latest albums offering a more commercially influenced style, it became silent around the band, Harald Spengler quit and Wolfgang Schludi (ex-Manalishi) took his part in 1989. But he left too with Stefan Kauffmann in 1991, so the concept album "War of the wizards" had to be recorded 1992 with Damir Uzunovic (ex-Agent Orange) and Joachim Gassmann (ex-Sudden Darkness, ex-Sheer Greed, ex-Sanvoisen, ex-Letter X) on guitars. Due to the new axemen responsible for the musical line, nothing reminded of the classic Stormwitch style anymore, though the new sound was rather melodious progressive. After the heavier, but still melodic sounding Power Metal album "Shogun", recorded without Gassmann, the single musicians went their own ways in 1996, but Andreas Mück revived Stormwitch with new members in 2002 and is releasing albums starting from that year again.Discography:
"Walpurgis night" LP 1984 (Scratch)
"1. Rock-Fabrik Festival '84" Comp.-LP Tracks 1984 (Gama)
"Tales of terror" LP 1985 (Scratch)
"Heavy Metal Live in Germany Vol. I" Comp.-LP Tracks 1985 (Scratch)
"Stronger than heaven" LP 1986 (Scratch)
"The beauty and the beast" LP/CD 1988 (Scratch)
"Eye of the storm" LP/CD 1989 (Hot Blood)
"Heart of ice" 7" EP 1989 (Hot Blood)
"Magyarországon" LP/CD 1989 (T-34)
"War of the wizards" CD 1992 (Steamhammer)
"The Best of Stormwitch" CD 1992 (Polyband)
Straight Line
Lineup:
Wolfgang Schanda (vocals)
Erhard Dornreiter (guitar)
Klaus Michel (bass)
Martin Hausmann (keyboard)
Peter Ritter (drums)
Band-info:
Just a typical “bavarian band” judging by their AORish sound and indeed this fivepiece came from Fostinning in the wider eastern Munich-area. Their scarce single “Dreamin’" doesn't pop up often, so it seems those copies had been spread mainly in their local area back in the day. For fans of poppy Hard Rock in the vein of Kingdom, A’s & B's Project, Boysvoice, Burning Heat, Dominoe etc. surely a nice find since musically, like all the other Munich Pop Metal acts, Straight Line offered rather solid and catchy material.Discography:
"Dreamin'/Give me a sign 7" EP 1989 (Scrabb)
Straight Shooter
Lineup:
Georg Buschmann (vocals)
Roland Haase (bass)
Günther Striepling (guitar)
Hans Plankert (keyboard)
Peter Kegler (drums)
Band-info:
Straight Shooter from Düsseldorf was formed by ex-Streetmark vocalist Georg Buschmann in the late 70's and released 5 albums on Sky Records plus numerous singles that we refuse to list here all. The guys sound was combining the classic 70's Hard Rock with AOR tunes and created a listenable sort of Pomp Rock with also progressive influences on all their albums. Friedhelm Misiejuk (ex-Prosper) replaced drummer Peter Kegler on the second album "My time - your time" already and on "Flyin' straight" Frank Kobe came for Roland Haase. Also Mark Wulf joined on guitars to support Günther Striebling, who got replaced by Peter Rabowski (ex-Sinclair) on "Rough 'n tough", but straight returned 1983 for Straight Shooter's a bit more melodic last album "5", that was just recorded by himself on guitar/bass, Buschmann on vocals and Hans Plankert on keyboards. Frank Kobe in the mid 80's returned with the band Brutus, that later became Tanis.Discography:
"Get straight" LP 1978 (Sky)
"My time - your time" LP 1980 (Sky)
"Flyin' straight" LP 1981 (Sky)
"Rough 'n tough" LP 1982 (Sky)
"5" LP 1983 (Sky)
Stroker
Lineup:
Andy Timmes (vocals)
Jörg Gleba (guitar)
Bernd Nollenberg (bass)
Ulli Becker (drums)
Band-info:
The Hard Rockers Stroker from Borken/Bochum are rockin' since 1987 and published a nowadays rare indie 7" on the Confido label (a recording studio) that features strongly AC/DC influenced but unspectacular Hard Rock on "Follow me" but the B-side rocker "This love will rise again" at least spreads a good party flair and makes their single purchasable. 1991 Stroker also recorded a 5 track Demo tape at the D&S studio with new bassist Martin Balzer, that constantly continued the 7" Hard Rock style and sound and addionally adopted in places influences of the US Glam Metal scene.
Subway
Lineup:
Pepe Wolthoff (vocals)
Bemy Bitzer (guitar)
Dany Beiersdorfer (bass)
Henry Sauter (keyboard)
Andy Weber (saxophon)
Tommy Strobel (drums)
Band-info:
A local Hard Rock/Metal band from Balingen, south of Stuttgart, that was formed in 1986 by Pepe Wolthoff (vocals), Bemy Bitzer (guitar), Dany Beiersdorfer (bass), Henry Sauter (keyboard), Andy Weber (saxophon) and Tommy Strobel (drums). Please don't get scared by the saxophone player in their line up, Subway was a just typical late 80's Melodic Metal band with commercial edge similar to Bonfire, Aidean, Vera Cruz, Mydra and other bands of the upper league. During spring '89 the guys recorded a first Demo, that opened doors for them, though not in Germany. The swiss label Pink 7 Music subsequently produced an album with the band, recorded in Switzerland and released there as well under the title "Dangerous games", while eventualy Subway played a big number of gigs to promote it in and outside of Germany. Afterwards during 1991 vocalist Pepe Wolthoff and bassist Dany Beiersdorfer had enough and got replaced by Martin Arnold and swiss vocalist Peter "Peach" Stöckli, who's been previously singing for the swiss bands Desaster and Danger. With this new line up the second album "Hold on to your dreams", again on a swiss label (Phonag), was published in 1992, offering the same melodic Hard Rock/Metal style known from the debut, produced by Fernando Garcia (Victory). While reaching the swiss charts, the album finally opened german backdoors and the new label GSE Records signed the guys and released the "Hear you cry" single. Then first Andy Weber left during 1993 and in 1995 also drummer Thomas Strobel, who both got replaced by Boris Matakovic (sax) and Björn Hodler (drums). When Peter Stöckli quit a short while later, Francis Soto took the vocals. They also recorded the albums "Taste the difference" (1994) and "Subway" (1998) and split up in Spetember 2003. The last singer of the band Francis Soto reactivated Subway during 2009 once again with different line up and another album "Lola's Themes" was released 2010 on Fastball Music.(Thanx to emosteel for the hint)
Discography:
"Dangerous games" LP/CD 1990 (Pink 7 Music)
"Hold on to your dreams" CD 1992 (Phonag)
"Hear you cry" MCD 1993 (GSE)
Sunburst
Lineup:
Thomas Hils (vocals, guitar)
Joe Elzer (bass)
Santo Galuzzo (keyboard)
Ludwig Mayer (drums)
Band-info:
Not to be confused with the Hamburg band Sunburst from the mid 80's, these lads was hailing from Kempten and released an independent Heavy Rock single in 1990. If you got more info, please get in touch.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"The price you pay" 7" EP 1990 (selfreleased)
Super Angel
Lineup:
Charles van Rijder
Harold Mac Wonderlea
Pudding B. Stanley
Band-info:
Super Angel was founded in 1978, but Stanley, van Rijder and Mac Wonderlea met already earlier in Amsterdam. Originally the guys are Dutch, but since they lived as Super Angel in Cologne, I'm tempted to list the band as a german one here too. After a few demo recordings the trio started working with a german team of producers and the result was the "Welcome to my Rock'n Roll" single 1979 that featured typical mid 70's style Glam Hard Rock. After a Split 7" with canadian band Promises and the "Roller-Skate-Rockin'" 7" 1980, Aladin Records (a label that's known for mainly german Schlager music) produced the, in the meanwhile increased to a quartet, Super Angel's debut album in 1982. The LP starts pretty powerful with Hardrocker "Ridin' on a hurricane", but then decreases in quality by using all the previous 70's glammy Hard Rock roots again. The quality goes up and down, "She's an angel" features good Hard Rock again, but that game repeats on the whole album. Basically the album is just interesting for people into the 70's Hard Rock stuff, it was released years too late for that kind of sound.Discography:
"Welcome to my Rock'n Roll" 7"EP 1979 (Crystal)
"Baby it's you/Welcome to my Rock'n Roll" Split 7" EP 1979 (with Promises, EMI)
"Roller-Skate-Rockin'" 7" EP 1980 (Strand)
”Super Angel” LP 1982 (Aladin)
Super Cargo
Lineup:
Carmen Dräger (vocals)
Thomas Heckmann (guitar)
Volker Maack (guitar)
Manfred Karger (bass)
Michael Bilgenroth (drums)
Band-info:
A traditional female fronted Hard Rock band of the mid 80's originating from the wider Hamburg/Bremen area. Their independently released single "The famous theme" was recorded in Hollenstedt (south of Hamburg) back in October '84 and features a very solid A side, rocking in typical AC/DC manner with Boogie edge and pretty good vocals. The flipside "Never more" got a more melodic touch and sounds slightly softer. They also had "Famous theme" in a powerful live version on the “NDR Hörfest Live 1” complilation. If you got more info of this local band, please get in touch.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"The famous theme" 7" EP 1984 (Supersongs)
"Famous theme" Comp.-LP 1985 (NDR Hörfest Live 1)
Surprises
Lineup:
Thomas Wellnowksi (vocals, guitar)
Hans Joachim Müller (guitar)
Walter Philippi (guitar)
Dieter Weber (bass)
Sven Thiedecke (keyboard)
Stefan Reinicke (drums)
Band-info:
A Melodic Rock band from Quierschied/Saarbrücken, that after a first single on BEE Records recorded their debut album 1986 "Together we are strong" for Mombi Records, but it wasn't released before 1987. Both vinyls featured that commercial sort of pompish Melodic Rock/AOR (like Starship f.e.), having too many poppy keyboards merged with their Rock sound to produce radio compatible material. There are songs featured as well that I'd rate quite listenable, and on creative base these guys indeed proved that Surprises was able to easily keep the international standards, but imo I'd say the Hard Rock songs really fit them better. Unfortunately Surprises, on their second album "Longing for the daylight", went the other way, dived even deeper into commercial depths and delivered, whenalso the vocal performance was top notch, just plain Melodic Rock.Discography:
"This time I'm sure" 7" EP 1986 (BEE)
"Together we are strong" LP 1987 (Mombi)
"Longing for the daylight" LP/CD 1989 (Musicolor)
"Pierre" 7" EP 1989 (Musicolor)
Survival
Lineup:
Rainer (keyboard, vocals)
Dittmar Clar (guitar)
Manfred Lobuscher (guitar)
Alfred (bass)
Ingo (drums)
Band-info:
Another unknown Prog Rock/AOR band from Seeheim, south of Darmstadt, that firmed under the KJS Records label. Means their sole 7" was privately produced and KJS Records pressed the vinyls for the band. The single isn't that uninteresting, despite the Prog Rock touch. Especially the track "Motion" develops a quite energetic feeling, offering that typical AOR-ish Hard Rock (also called Arena Rock in the States) of the early 80's and neither the rather proggish "Salvation army" on the flipside hides certain Hard Rock influences. We do not have any info of the band itself though.Discography:
"Survival" 7" EP 1983 (KJS)
Systematic Marsmurder
Lineup:
Die Arschnase (vocals)
XXX (bass)
N.T. (drums)
The Posiforce (guitar)
Band-info:
Originally Systematic Marsmurder started as Systematic Massmurder 1987 in Osnabrück and after 2 Demos and diverse compilation appearances changed name in about 1989. Stylistically the guys also turned from the early days more Crossover style Hardcore/Thrash/whatever into first a strange sort of Hardcore/Grindcore on their "Nachgeburtgemahlt" 7" from 1990 and from that point adopted more Thrash influences, starting already on the "See the nun under the poison mask!" single and fully celebrating it excessively on their only album "Neuroziel", that was released on Disgraceland Records in 1992 as vinyl only. The lads right from the start had a sick taste, not just in music, but also their lyrics and songtitles was falling out the usual scheme. On "Neuroziel" their morbid material at least appears the most listenable, and SM showed that they was able to write actually songs. Dunno if progressive Thrash would be the right term, but in a way the songstructures appear quite complicated with lotsa breaks, a bit like Malhavoc on their "Shrine" session, but totally different also, mixing Thrash and Death Metal influences. If anyone wants to try Systematic Marsmurder, then "Neuroziel" would be the best choice for sure.Discography:
"Nachgeburtgemahlt" 7" EP 1990 (Shithouse)
"See the nun under the poison mask!" 7" EP 1991 (Disgraceland)
"Neuroziel" LP 1992 (Disgraceland)
Systematic Massmurder
Lineup:
Die Arschnase (vocals)
XXX (bass)
N.T. (drums)
The Posiforce (guitar)
Band-info:
Systematic Massmurder was a Crossover band from Osnabrück who started in 1987 and released their first Demo the same year, which features a sort of Hardcore mixed with Thrash, though musicwise a classic Hardcore band these guys haven't been at all. After the "Nazi Goreng" Demo they got featured on several compilations, including the local Osnabrück Punk/HC vinyl sampler "Sämpla City Os". Due to controversities coz of their name they changed it to Systematic Marsmurder in 1989 and recorded 2 more singles plus an album.Discography:
"Systematic Massmurder" Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
"Sämpla City Os" Comp.-LP Tracks 1988 (Durchbruch)
"Nazi Goreng" Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
"Break silence" Comp.-Tape Track 1988 (Speed Air Play 01-12-1988)
"Free" Comp.-Tape Track 1989 (Hardcore Hour - 5th. Anniversary Farewell Issue)
"Time is running out!" Comp.-Tape Tracks 1989 (no Label)
T Dice Band
Lineup:
Achim Möser (guitar)
Donald Weimer (vocals, guitar)
Martin Keks-Weber (bass)
Jochen Hirschberg (drums)
Band-info:
Wiesbaden based Hard Rockers, who started with a selfproduced single in 1981, before Pascal Gürtner (drums) and Cliff Wagner (bass) replaced Joachim Hirschberg and Martin Keks-Weber two years later, when they recorded their debut album for their own label Dice Records. The 10 tracks are well produced but lack a bit in originality. Stylistically they are still too much rooted in the Boogie Hard Rock style, but a few AC/DC hints are shown as well. Due to the good mix the songs do not sound that antiquated, although their music truly was at that time.Discography:
"A friend/Remember my love" 7" EP 1981 (selfreleased)
"Not good - but loud" LP 1983 (selfreleased)
Thunderhead
Lineup:
Ted Bullet (vocals, guitar)
Henny Wolter (guitar)
Ole Hempelmann (bass)
Alex Scotti (drums)
Band-info:
A Hard Rock/Metal act from Hannover founded by the native US american Ted Bullet back in 1988 and featuring both ex-Talon's Henny Wolter and Ole Hempelmann, plus Sargant Fury drummer Alex Scotti. The band lasted till 1995 and released 4 albums, that more or less contained the same original Hard Rock driven powerful Heavy Metal style with strong R'n'R edge. There are also several singles available, that we don't think of that's neccessary to list them all here. Thunderhead's sound wasn't everyone's cup of tea. In 1995 they released another album ("Were you told the truth about hell?") before they disbanded, to re-unite shortly again in 1999.Discography:
"Behind the eight-ball" LP/CD 1989 (Intercord)
"Take it to the highway" Split 7" EP Track 1989 (Heavy Xmas)
"Busted at the border" LP/CD 1990 (Music For Nations)
"Crime pays" LP/CD 1991 (Music For Nations)
"The darker side of yesterday" Comp.-CD 1992 (German Rock Project - The Ballad Album)
"Killing with style" LP/CD 1993 (GUN, BMG)
Thunderstorm
Lineup:
Kai Schmitz (vocals)
Barry Murray (bass)
Nigel Glockler (drums)
Simon Sobkowiak (guitar)
Matthias Raue (keyboard)
Band-info:
Dunno how Ingo Nowotny got Nigel Glockner (ex-Saxon) to participate in this project, but for sure alot of cash was in the game. Thunderstorm indirectly was one of Metal Enterprises "casted" bands, featuring Simon Sobkowiak (ex-Expect No Mercy, Simon, Kalashnikov, Breakpoint, Mallet) and Matthias Rauhe (ex-Breakpoint, ex-Godzilla), known from other Metal Enterprises fake bands. All songs was written by the two native US Americans Barry Murray (who lived in Gedern, between Frankfurt and Fulda, at that time) and Russ Burnsworth and the single musicians just played their parts inside the studio, but in different sessions. Originally a demo tape was sent out to Metal mags first during dummer '89, while later Nowotny made an LP of the same recording. For that fact, "S.N.A.F.U." features some in places quite excellent sounding melodic Heavy Metal with good vocal parts of Bootleg's vocalist Kai Schmitz and Simon Sobkowiak doing a pretty great job on the guitar as usual. Unfortunately not every casted ME boygroup sounded like Thunderstorm. Interestingly the Demo of the in 1989 yet anonymous Thunderstorm got much better reviews with highest ratings like the vinyl version with the ME tag later. So much for independent reviews...Discography:
"Systems normally all fucked up" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
”S.N.A.F.U.” LP 1990 (Metal Enterprises)
Tokyo
Lineup:
Klaus Luley (vocals, guitar)
Lothar Krell (keyboard)
Robert Musenbichler (guitar)
Ken Taylor (bass)
Fritz Matzka (drums)
Band-info:
Tokyo was founded in Frankfurt/Main in 1979 by Ken Taylor (ex-Supermax) and austrian musicians Fritz Matzka and Robert Musenbichler. Lothar Krell (ex-Supermax) and Klaus Luley (ex-Schloss) later joined them to complete the classic line up and they got signed by Telefunken and the selftitled debut was available 1981. After their second album "Fasten seat belts" Lothar Krell left and got replaced by Volker Barber and album # 3 "San" was recorded in 1983. Fritz Matzka as well as Klaus Luley quit in 1983 to follow own musical plans and the latter formed Craaft. Tokyo's last effort "The Westworld encounter" was released in 1985 and the band was shrunk to a trio with only Holker Schmidt (=Tiger B. Smith - guitar, vocals), Volker Barber (keyboards) and Ken Taylor (bass) left, who quit Tokyo already in 1984. Robert Musenbichler and Lothar Krell formed Jojo. Tokyo's sound was quite enjoyable Hard Rock/AOR of international standard with even a few hits, basically in the vein of bands such as Survivor, Journey and partly even Van Halen. There are also several singles available that we do not list here, though a "Best of"-type CD called "Back To The Fire" from 1995 is featured in the Corroseum's regular reviews section.Discography:
"Tokyo" LP 1981 (Telefunken)
"Fasten seat belts" LP 1981 (Ariola)
"San" LP 1983 (RCA Victor)
"The Westworld encounter" LP 1985 (Metronome)
Touch
Lineup:
Mary B. Thompson (vocals)
Dieter Roth (guitar, bass)
Wilfried Schneiker (drums)
Band-info:
Seems like Dieter Roth (ex-Skin) didn’t really wanted to throw in the towel at all after Revolver and Raindancer’s attempts to produce a number 1 album lead to nothing. He simply returned with another band entitled Touch in the local Nuremberg area and reactivated some of his old Revolver mates to record a nowadays utterly obscure and unknown 2 track single. Raindancer’s album already wasn’t sounding so bad at all and either with Touch Roth proved his feel for good Hard Rock. The title track features singalong pounding oldschool Hard Rock and “Turnin’ me on” on the flipside either hit a rougher notch and turned into a speedy heavyrocker. That track was co-written by two more of Roth’s ex-Revolver band mates namely Friedel Amon and Jürgen Kühnlein (later in Number Nine), who either followed him on to Raindancer after Revolver’s end. That makes it well possible that “Turnin’ me on” could be either an old Raindancer number.Discography:
“Light my fire” 7” EP 198? (selfreleased)
Toxin (Stuttgart)
Lineup:
Hartmut Rhinow (vocals)
Stefan Schmidt (guitar)
Frank Bittermann (bass)
Holly Drambar (drums)
Band-info:
A local band from the Stuttgart area (Leonberg), that was active since 1986 and already released their "The biker" 7" in that year as well. In contrary to their later releases, on “The biker" with Stefan Schmidt on guitar, Toxin delivered a pretty nice uptempo Heavy Metal number. That changed right on the second single "Burning", which should be from the later 80's. Stefan Schmidt now wasn’t in the band any longer and instead Cliff Riff took his place. That’s probably why the style of the band changed. The guys was playing common Hard Rock in the vein of Kiss on the title track and the B-side "Dirty dolls" offered slightly heavier stuff. After those 2 singles female vocalist Ellen Ritz joined the band, who changed name to Wild Excess during 1989. Seems like at a later point they withdraw that decision coz the third and last single "Can't find me on the radio" from 1991 was released again under their original name of Toxin. The musicians on that one being Stefan Schmidt (guitar) again, as well as Matz Ulmer (keyboard), Uwe Fechle (bass), Armin Mücke (guitar) and band leader Holly Drambar (drums). But in contrary to their "Burning" single, the "Can't find me on the radio" material was way more poppy, though still Hard Rock/AOR but using annoying keyboards that made them sounding like a band for the charts.Discography:
"The biker" 7" EP 1986 (Alibi)
"Burning" 7" EP 198x (Roxon)
"Can't find me on the radio" 7"EP 1991 (Phono Tape)
Trace
Lineup:
Alex
Cozy
Charlie
Mac
Band-info:
Trace was a promising Hard Rock band from Kempten, playing their melodic songs in the good bavarian tradition like Lifeline, Burning Heat or Firefox. Away from the cheesy ballad "He don't cry" that I don't wanna use as sound example here, the title track of the single spreads a good vibe like Europe in their famous days, though the keyboard plays a big role in Trace's sound. On the advance tape that was sent to magazines, "He don't cry" was featured too plus "Take another dream", that's more in the "Beat of your heart" vein.
Trademark
Lineup:
Rena Teubner (vocals)
Eckhardt Lukarsch (bass)
Kai Röttger (drums)
Ace Hilgenberg (guitar)
Mik Wiemers (guitar)
Band-info:
A female fronted early Metal act from Kassel with still a little Hard Rock edge, but good driving beat. As far as it's known, the "Demon's gate" single was their only effort, but for that early time surely a ray of hope. The title track soundwise in places shows lightly similarities to US rockers Demon Flight, but the epic "Magic touch" is the real gem on this vinyl. The female vocals belong to the better executed of the female fronted german bands. Bass player Ecki Lukarsch some years later would produce Reaper's "Fairies return" recordings.
Trivales
Lineup:
Marita Gloger (vocals)
Klaus Bolz (guitar)
Bernd Hotau (guitar)
Matthias Gassmann (bass)
Claudius Hempelmann (drums)
Band-info:
A female fronted powerful Hard Rock band from Hannover with some quite entertaining songs that's not copying the Scorpions, but rather using some twin leads and offers certain NWOBHM hints. The single features 3 tracks that are rooted somewhere between powerful Hard Rock and even early Metal tunes ("Down to underground"). Just like the Fame single a real little jewel and comes with gatefold sleeve. Certain band members already released vinyl prior to their appearance in Trivales. Klaus Bolz came from the 1971 founded Pancake, who already recorded 3 albums until 1979. Claudius Hempelmann either has been a very busy man, while he recorded singles and other NDW crap with Iron Duke, Der Moderne Mann and Kosmonautentraum, he also synchronistic worked with Trivales and during the mid 80's resurfaced with the 39 Clocks. Their vocalist Marita in 1990 contributed vocals on Chris Becker's EP "Is this love?", that on the other hand belongs to rather the Jazz/Pop genre.
Turbo Red
Lineup:
Sig Weber (vocals)
Pete Rupprecht (vocals)
Pete Mayhew (guitar)
Andy Hoyler (drums)
Jochen Rassow (bass)
Oliver Gabay (keyboard)
Band-info:
A talented female fronted AOR/Hard Rock band from Fürth (near Nuremberg), that Pete Mayhew formed during 1984. Originally Pete came from England, where he played since 1980 in the NWOBHM legend Turbo, who released 2 nice singles. After Turbo's split, Pete Mayhew went to Germany and found drummer Andy Hoyler. Both started working on own material and soon recruited Jochen Rassow (bass), Pete Rupprecht (vocals) and Till Sommer (keyboard). Together they recorded a Demo and either won the local newcomer contest "Chance 88" in the same year (1988). Afterwards the band added female singer Sig Weber as well. Sommer then left Turbo Red due to personal reasons and Oliver Gabay had to replace him also for the recordings of the band's debut album, simply entitled "Turbo Red", that could sound probably a bit heavier if the keyboards wouldn't dominate their songs in such a penetrating way. The opener "Hold on" has hit character seriously. All of the trax featured on the album are well arranged, with the material easily holding international standards. For fans of Europe, Firehouse, early Bon Jovi, Vera Cruz etc. truly a tasty matter. The band got the spot for the support act of the reformed Sweet, who toured through Germany, but later not much happened anymore.Discography:
”Turbo Red” LP/CD 1991 (Momo)
Ulcerous Phlegm
Lineup:
Bernd Spring (vocals, bass)
Kreso (guitar)
Thomas Brinkmann (drums)
Band-info:
A grinding Death Metal band from Hochstädt, north of Augsburg, that was just shortlived, but within these few years released a Demo and 2 singles. Bernd Spring (ex-Savage Fun/Shrettled Illusions) and Thomas “Blinki” Brinkmann in August ‘89 felt the urge to form a Noisecore band and found Kreso on guitar after a short while. The Demo was recorded in their practise room already 2 weeks after Ulcerous Phlegm had formed. Their style was still early Napalm Death/Bolt Thrower influenced and got often compared to Pungent Stench, pretty much standard stuff, but nonetheless Shithouse Records (sublabel of Turbo Music) offered the band to produce a 7” in December ’89. So the guys went to the studio already in January 1990 and recorded 12 songs, while a bit later on already became much annoyed with the label, that always delayed the release of the single, which was enthusiastically announced for already March 1990, entitled "International problems can't be solved by intern nationalism", but actually wasn’t available before June. Also their early Noise/Grind style submerged with classic Death Metal influences during 1990/91, while Soulstorm’s Zong shortly joind the band on the second guitar, but went soon back to his original band again. Brinkmann later got replaced in February ’91 by Max, who would play on Ulcerous Phlegm’s selftitled second single, recorded in June 1991. The announced album, scheduled for 1992 on Bodonski Records like the second EP as well, was never released though. In March ‘93 the band played their last gig and vanished shortly later. The "International problems can't be solved by intern nationalism" 7" was re-released with different cover.Discography:
"...it's inside your guts" Demo 1989 (selfreleased)
"International problems can't be solved by intern nationalism" 7" EP 1990 (Shithouse)
"Ulcerous Phlegm" 7" EP 1991 (Bodonski)
V.I.P.
Lineup:
Tom Wilke (vocals)
Siggi Schwarz (guitar)
Frank wilke (guitar)
Achim Zscheile (bass)
Christoph Rosen (keyboard)
Jürgen Schlachter (drums)
Band-info:
The Stuttgart AOR hopefuls V.I.P. won the 1. Marlboro Music Rock Festival for newcomer bands in 1988 and as a prize got sponsored the production of an own single, connected with TV appearances and a promo tour. The title track of the single "Factory girl" impressively confirms this local band's ability to compose thrilling AOR-ish Hard Rockers of international class, though the band completely vanished off the screens afterwards. But people who like stuff like Dominoe, Craaft or similar Melodic Rock crosser, might get impressed by their powerful style, whenalso the B-side number "My friend" sadly is just a mellow ballad.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"Factory girl" 7"/12" EP 1988 (Marlboro Music)
Valentine
Lineup:
Ritchie Vinelli
Chris Hate
Jay Jay Monroe
Marc Wild
Band-info:
Since Valentine's sole single "I can't get enough" was recorded at Munich's Charisma Studio, we might expect this band was originating from Bavaria, most probably even from the Munich area. Because their 7" belongs to the more obscure german Metal singles, it offers a qualitative quite damn good pounding late 80's Metal with little glammy edge, not unlike some swedish or american bands of that era. Both of the songs feature rough edged but still catchy Melodic Metal with croaky vocals. A gem that's worth searching for! Further band info are desired.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"I can't get enough" 7" EP 1990 (Egal)
Vamp (Bonn)
Lineup:
Tom Bellini (vocals)
Ricolf Cross (guitar)
Oliver Scholz (bass)
Dicki Fliszar (drums)
Band-info:
One of the 2 german Vamp bands, and funnily both started in the same year (1985), but these guys was from Bonn. Originally the band was formed in October 1985 as Roxx, by ex-members Harry Amthor, O. Lee Scholz and Dicki Fliszar of the local band Shining. Ricolf Krückel, formerly in Cross, completed the line-up. In late 1986 Harry Amthor left the band and was replaced by american vocalist Tom Bellini (Harry continued his singing career in bands like Forced Entry, Energy and the Berlin-based Tarot). After recording 2 Demos, featuring song titles like f.e. "Waysted time", "Down and dirty" on the first and "Love games, don't bite" plus "Talk is cheap" from the second 4 track Demo in 1987, described as a mix of Europe and Dokken, they got signed by the Major label Atlantic Records to record their debut LP "The rich don't rock" which was available in September '89 with the title track being released as separate single already in April. When you listen to the album, it's hard to believe that Vamp should be a german band. Their sound was somewhat american style Party/Glam Metal that they sounded even more american than other american bands with having a huge advantage, Tom Bellini. His vocals pretty much made "The rich don't rock" a piece of gold, though not financially. The album was a flop, even though the critics of the Metal press was exuberant. Nevertheless, "The rich don't rock" still remains a high class Melodic Metal album in US american manner that nowadays still stands out of the mass. Unfortunately the planned second album "One smack killer" was never finished since Atlantic Records dropped the band soon after. And for your info, the album was available with 2 different covers, the US version showing the band and the german one as seen below. Drummer Dicki Fliszar later wound up playing with Bruce Dickinson in the early 90's and therefore had to leave Vamp early 1990, who immediately engaged Shawn Szowe from New York. There is also a Demo recording being made with ex-Warlock Peter Szigeti right after the debut was available, since the band was looking for a second guitarist, but he left right after the recordings again due to musical differences and the guys had to test other guitarists.Discography:
"The rich don't rock" 7"/12" EP 1989 (Atlantic)
”The rich don’t rock” LP/CD 1989 (Atlantic)
Van Teichmann
Lineup:
Peter Teichmann (vocals)
Ralf Teichmann (guitar)
Klaus Kistner (bass)
Klaus Leppert (drums)
Band-info:
Van Teichmann was formed by brothers Ralf and Peter Teichmann together with their friend Luki (we guess it's Klaus Leppert who's meant here) during x-mas 1981, while Klaus Kistner was informed right the next day and enthusiastically joined the bunch, who all had been playing in different bands of the Baden Baden area (south of Karlsruhe) at that time, but none of them was indeed happy with it. The foursome started rehearsing in Peter Teichmann's living room, but despite many of the other bands wasted their time with mainly playing cover versions, Van Teichmann fully concentrated on composing own material right from day one. The name apparently refers to Van Halen, a nice little gimmick. May 1st 1982 was the day of their first gig ever, happening at the Schützenhaus in Lichtenau, that started it all for the band, who at that time still used to sing in german. More gigs soon followed and the desire for an own vinyl rose up, resulting in the production of the 2 track single "Warum?", recorded at the Aleph Studion in Rastatt, which was released in June '83. Van Teichmann's style featured quite aggressive Heavy Rock, sort of pre-stage to Heavy Metal. Later in the same year a second guitarist joined, namely Peter Lasch, who already played together with Peter Teichmann previously in Acid Proof. Van Teichmann's music now went heavier, but around 1984 Peter Teichmann left the band to start something new at Munich's scene. French vocalist Robert Locatelli came instead and by now the once german lyrics changed into english. A 6 track Demo was produced in 1985, but either Locatelli couldn't stay for long in Van Teichmann and had to quit due to private reasons within that year, so the next vocalist Michael took his part until the band's temporary end in 1986, when they decided to change their name to Big 'n Juicy, due to many changes, wether optically and musically. Late 1992 Big 'n Juicy decided to play on under their old monicker Van Teichmann and eventually did that in February '93 with now Harry Meier on bass. 1994 the guys recorded another Demo and then created the "Rosenmontagsrock", a sort of Anti-Carnival-Gig, that Van Teichmann since 1994 celebrate regulary. The band was active still at least 2017.(Thanx to Rumblefist for the suggestion)
Discography:
"Warum?" 7" EP 1983 (selfreleased)
"Demo 1985" (selfreleased)
Vanden Plas
Lineup:
Andy Kuntz (vocals)
Markus Ziegler (guitar)
Stephan Lill (guitar)
Holger Münz (bass)
Ulrich Knapp (keyboard)
Andreas Lill (drums)
Band-info:
Vanden Plas from Kottweiler-Schwanden/Kaiserslautern belongs to the german bands that can look back to a career, lasting already from the mid 80's without being even finished yet. The band was founded by Andreas Lill, who was playing in the band Exodus, but at a certain point recognized that there's already an US Thrash band of that name, so the guys changed name in 1986 to Vanden Plas. Andreas' brother Stephan joined the band at age 15, while Andreas also recruited vocalist Andy Kuntz (ex-Rock Zock) and with Markus Ziegler (guitar), Holger Münz (bass) and Ulrich Knapp (keyboard) Vanden Plas could produce their nowadays very rare first single "Double A side" for the indie label BEE Records from Saarbrücken, featuring the sentimental ballad "Raining in my heart" and the heavier melodic Hardrocker "Going round in circles". After the single there's a big black hole in the band's history, as the next Vanden Plas release was the "Days of thunder" 1 track Demo, that the band recorded in June 1991 at the Roko Soundstudio with new line up featuring both Lill brothers on guitar and drums, Andy Kuntz on vocals, Torsten Reichert (bass) and Günter Werno (ex-Blies Blues Band, Romeo and Juliet) on keyboards, who would stay together until nowadays. The lads sound got slightly heavier, but yet was still pending between melodic US Hard Rock and Metal. With the additional two songs "Fire" and "Ridin' with the wind" from the same recording session, a MCD was published together with "Days of thunder" under the title "Fire" on the label Mons Records 1992, that was later in 1995 re-released on CNR Music in France with "Ridin' with the wind" missing. Stimulated by that Vanden Plas produced their debut album "Colour temple" privately during 1994, that was the kickstart for their future career, while the guys in the meanwhile added a neat portion of power and could be seen somewhere between Prog Rock and Heavy Metal with melodic edge. 12 albums followed so far.Discography:
"Double A side" 7" EP 1986 (BEE)
"Days of thunder" Demo 1991 (selfreleased)
"Fire" MCD 1992 (Mons)
Virgin
Lineup:
Band-info:
Sadly no info is printed wether on sleeve nor the labels of this obscure band Virgin, that has nothing in common with the Wuppertal edition of the same name. A pretty solid acting Hard Rock act on both of the featured tracks with some serious NWOBHM twin leads, which automatically would throw the single into the first half of the decade. Either the melodic Hard Rock with slightly 70's edge would second that assumption. The heavier of both songs is the B-side rocker "Misunderstanding", galopping Metal guitars paired with classic AOR pretty much can sound very comfortable. The austrian Virgin already proved that with their single that musically sounds close to these Virgin. Further info is welcome.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"Standing in the rain" 7" EP 198? (selfreleased)
Viva
Lineup:
Andreas Kawaldt (bass, guitar)
Shaban Yavuz (drums)
Kai Reuter (guitar)
Ralph Murthy (guitar)
Barbara Schenker (keyboard)
Frank Algermissen (vocals, guitar)
Band-info:
Sometimes it's easier to have a sister of 2 famous brothers in your band as this way you'll get opened doors way quicker than other bands. At least for the debut album of Viva it's not really justified that these lame Hard Rockers got pressed on vinyl. The guys was still teenagers when the group formed in 1978. As most of you probably already knew, Barbara was the sister of Rudolf and Michael Schenker. So it's not much of a surprise that some of the Viva songs could be sung by Klaus Meine or Udo Dirkschneider too. At least with "What the hell is going on" Viva started getting heavier, though the trax still got a Hard Rock edge. But the songwriting had improved alot with new vocalist Marco Paganini and Andy Fach as replacement for Kai Reuter, who would later play together with Jutta Weinhold. "Dealers of the night" continued the same Metal style than the previous album, concentrating on midpaced Hard Rock/Metal numbers with some nice atmospheric keyboard parts, mostly keeping on the Scorpions track but without the same quality that "What the hell is going on" delivered. On the fourth album "Apocalypse" the line up changed again, Marco Paganini left to start a solo career and Barbara Schenker was out too, replaced by Michael Lauer. Chris Thow did vocals on the last album and the band completely changed direction now. The songs became way more commercial, US influenced like Van Halen and all these radio Hard Rock bands. In 1985 Viva split up to get shortly revived in 1988 and 1996 (with a new album) without success. And the last try happened in 2007 till 2012. Additionally to mention, there was few singles pressed to promote each album, but we don't list them here.Discography:
"Born to rock" LP 1980 (Aves)
"What the hell is going on" LP 1981 (CBS)
"Dealers of the night" LP 1982 (Brain)
"Apocalypse" LP 1984 (Macho)
Warlock (Hannover)
Lineup:
Jon Symon (vocals)
Charly Maucher (bass)
Detlef Klamann (guitar)
Werner Nadolny (synthesizer)
Peter Panka (drums)
Band-info:
Though I'm not sure if this "band" Warlock (later called Jon Symon's Warlock) was indeed a real band or just a project, we have to add it to the database neverthless because it clearly belongs to the Hard Rock spectrum. Jon Symon was a natural born britishman who came to Germany within the 60's and stayed here in Hannover. In the early 70's he was on stage as a one-man-show and either released several singles (which are not of interest here). 1978 he started working on the album "Warlock - Memories of a white magician" with Klaus Peter Matziol (bass), Eloy member Detlev Schmidtchen (keyboard), Epitaph drummer Jim McGillivray and Hajo Hoffmann (violin). In the early 80's Symon and the director of the Hannover ballet ensemble met each other and started working on two Rock ballets which for two albums was produced either. On the first one "Warlock" from 1983, Symon got supported by Charly Maucher (bass), ex-Mountain Ash Detlef Klamann (guitar), ex-Jane Werner Nadolny (synthesizer) and Peter Panka (drums). For "Lady Macbeth" ex-Mountain Ash Eckhard Wahlmann (keyboard) replaced Werner Nadolny and Bernd Klamann (drums) joined for Peter Panka. Due to both albums are more or less Rock ballet soundtracks, the musical width is different, but songs like "Eye of the witch", "Forever and a day" or "Banquet" will catch every epic Hard and Prog Rock fan's heart, as these are prime examples of how medieval pompish Hard Rock must sound like. For openminded guys worth a try...Discography:
"Warlock - Soundtrack zum Rockballet" LP 1983 (Lava)
“Lady Macbeth“ LP 1984 (Lava, as Jon Symon's Warlock)
Waving Tan
Lineup:
Thomas Engel
Band-info:
Despite the quite Metal fooling artwork, this unknown trio called Waving Tan, prefered a rather melodic sort of Hard Rock, though really straight forward rocking, with AOR-ish hints. Guess the keyboards hindered these guys to enter Metal territory in the end. Despite those, these fashion interested (the single was sponsored by a fashion boutique) rockheads sounded quite convincing after all. Both songs, especially the heavier “The bill", know to attract fans of the melodic faction! No additional info could sadly be found on the 7" at all.Discography:
”Condemned to die/The bill" 7” EP 1984 (selfreleased)
Wells Fargo
Lineup:
Peter Diehl (vocals)
Thomas Walch (guitar)
Kalle Hartwig (guitar)
Horst Matheis (bass)
Jörg Hilzensauer (keyboard)
Stefan Graf (drums)
Band-info:
A Southern/Hard Rock band from Bexbach in the Homburg area, who already formed in 1980 and guitarist Kalle Hartwig being one of the founding members. Wells Fargo was mainly a Southern Rock cover band who played the clubs of the US army bases with a repertoire of about 200 songs, ranging from Black Foot up to ZZ Top. Either the classic Mainstream Rock caught their interest and that’s what you get to hear on their 7" “I’ll be the one”, released on the indie label Blue Cue Records in 1989, which also exists in Cassette form. Both songs was composed by Peter Diehl and feature a very pleasant sort of melodic Hard Rock with AOR edge. Quite a neat single for fans of that style. The guys also supported the GDR’s nr. 1 rock band Die Puhdys during one of their concerts in the western part of Germany and got a feature on the private TV channel EPF, as well as radio airplay. A bit later on in the early 90’s Wells Fargo released another tape, that featured amoung others also a cover of Black Foot's "Highway Song".(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation and especially their ex-roadie Sven Stübinger for the band info)
Discography:
"I'll be the one" MC/7" EP 1989 (Blue Cue)
White Haze
Lineup:
Gerhard Rudloff (guitar, vocals)
Christian Kurz (bass)
Andreas Gerlich (drums)
Band-info:
Less known hardrockers from southern Germany’s Landau, between Karlsruhe and Mannheim. It won't bother anyone at all if he doesn't owns their privately produced single, recorded on Easter 1985 in the Face Music Studio, who also took care of the vinyl pressing and published it under their own banner. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad piece, but for the year 1985 quite unspectacular sounding. Due to their undoubtable favour for the 70’s sound, both of the tracks appear relatively outdated, especially "The night in front of the mirror" on the B side, which pretends a heavy STATUS QUO Boogie edge and is only slipping into slightly more metallic sounds during the guitar solo part. The midpaced, slow title track “White Haze” on the contrary comes down with a rather melodic approach and should represent the early 80’s Hard Rock sound a bit more detailed, though you won't get rid off that Krautrock feel here either.Discography:
“White Haze” 7" EP 1985 (Face Music)
Wildest Excess
Lineup:
Ellen Ritz (vocals)
Stefan Schmidt (guitar)
Armin Mücke (guitar)
Uwe Fechle (bass)
Matz Ulmer (keyboard)
Holly Drambar (drums)
Band-info:
A local band from the Stuttgart area (Leonberg), that was active since 1986 as Toxin and already released their "The biker" 7" in that year as well. In contrary to their later releases, on “The biker" with Stefan Schmidt on guitar, Toxin delivered a pretty nice uptempo Heavy Metal number. That changed right on the second single "Burning", which should be from the later 80's. Stefan Schmidt now wasn’t in the band any longer and instead Cliff Riff took his place. That’s probably why the style of the band changed. The guys was playing common Hard Rock in the vein of Kiss on the title track and the B-side "Dirty dolls" offered slightly heavier stuff. After those 2 singles female vocalist Ellen Ritz joined the band, who changed name to Wild Excess during 1989. Seems like at a later point they withdraw that decision coz the third and last single "Can't find me on the radio" from 1991 was released again under their original name of Toxin. The musicians on that one being Stefan Schmidt (guitar) again, as well as Matz Ulmer (keyboard), Uwe Fechle (bass), Armin Mücke (guitar) and band leader Holly Drambar (drums). But in contrary to their "Burning" single, the "Can't find me on the radio" material was way more poppy, though still Hard Rock/AOR but using annoying keyboards that made them sounding like a band for the charts.Discography:
Witch
Lineup:
Uwe Schwenkglenks (vocals)
Uli Wittber (guitar)
Oli Frick (guitar)
Kay Roller (bass)
Mario Hackstätter (drums)
Band-info:
A band from Weingarten/Bad Waldsee, near Ravensburg, who produced a quite obscure single with the title "Longing for freedom" in August 1984. Apparently strong Iron Maiden influences accompany the track "Longing for freedom" in form of massive NWOBHM-ish twin leads. "Living your own life" on the flipside either offers that classic NWOBHM sound of the early 80's on the island, paired with Lucifer alike sounding epic Hard Rock backbone. A nice addition to any collection, though we got no real clue what happened later to Witch.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"Longing for freedom" 7" EP 1984 (selfreleased)
Witchboard
Lineup:
Bernhard Eber
Ralph Küchle
Band-info:
A melodic Heavy Metal band from I dunno where coz as usual the sleeve of their only single doesn't mention anything. Both trax are quite solid Metal with melodic Hard Rock influences and keyboards used as well. Nevertheless the sound appears raw enough but unfortunately they had a little problem with the vocalist. He sounds typically german and wants to sing parts that his voice spectrum doesn't always allowed.
Workmachine
Lineup:
Oliver Hinze (vocals, guitar)
Gerrit Brockmann (guitar)
Patrick Kölsch (bass)
Jens Kemper (keyboard)
Michael Eineche (drums)
Band-info:
Not sure where these lads came from, but they nevertheless left us a widely unknown AOR single as heritage, that's quite hard to locate a copy of nowadays. The rather poppy flipside track “Differentiate" doesn’t know to attract heavier ears at all. The better and "heavier" "I love this woman" on the A side on the other hand’s an well sounding AOR-ish Heavy Rocker in the vein of bands like Dominoe with even hit potential, though we’re still speaking of radio friendly sound.Discography:
“Workmachine" 7" EP 1989 (selfreleased)
Xandril
Lineup:
Daffy (vocals)
Stephan Philipp (guitar)
Jörg Schrör (guitar)
André Philipp (bass)
Christian Choleva (drums)
Band-info:
Xandril was a Speed Metal band from Hamburg active since late 1982, but at this time still being called Alien. 2 Demo's was recorded in early 1983 under that monicker with Daffy on vocals and Christian Choleva behind the drums who later got replaced by Marlon Erdman (drums) and Mathias Lemcke (vox) on the Reh/Demo '85. They changed name to Xandril in April '83 and recorded 2 more Demos in June and December '83, that both originally was planned to be released as singles back in the day, but the idea was dropped, till High Roller Records finally realized the project in 2018. On these first early recordings the band adopted a style that was very close to the NWOBHM, particular to Iron Maiden with Paul Di'Anno on the debut. 2 years passed by till they released the next tape and the style changed in a way into a more speedy yet melodic direction. On the "Rotting paradise" Demo 1986. the in April '86 joined Bettina Paschen first time was to hear in full action and refined their melodic Speed Metal style, while Paschen finally gave the band an own identity. They could place the track "Terminal breath" on the Teutonic Invasion compilation and right in the same year released another Speed Metal Demo "The vision". Their final effort "Perfect darkness" released one year later presented Xandril a bit more thrashy, yet still rooted in the Speed Metal. It's bee their best Demo tape so far, offering a riff inferno par excellence, with Bettina Paschen sounding similar to Nicole Lee of Znöwhite. But their best demonstration also remained their last one. The band split up in 1989 with members joining other acts like Megace, Torment and Medusa. All official Demos got re-released by HMH Records in 2018 as DLP and CD entitled as "The Vision of Rotting Darkness: The Demos 1985-1988".Discography:
"Demo I '83" 7" EP 2018 (HMH)
"Demo II '83" 7" EP 2018 (HMH)
"Rehearsal '85" Demo 1985 (selfreleased)
"Rotting paradise" Demo 1986 (selfreleased)
"Total Massacre Vol. 1" Comp.-MC Tracks 1986 (Death Metal Production)
"Terminal breath" Comp.-LP Track 1987 (Teutonic Invasion Part One)
"The vision" Demo 1987 (selfreleased)
"Perfect darkness" Demo 1988 (selfreleased)
Xenon
Lineup:
Stefan Buchner (guitar)
Reinhard Schmidt (guitar)
Klaus Kronen (bass)
Wolfgang Mucha (keyboard)
Gerhard Eichner (keyboard)
Hans Förg (saxophone)
Andy Hiermeyer (drums)
Band-info:
A progressive Hard Rock "orchestra" from Miesbach, south of Munich, that used to sing in their native local slang, which is quite abnormally within the german Hard Rock spectrum, as most of the bands tried to reach an international audience. Nevertheless Xenon's style wasn't uninteresting at all, having a slightly heavier sound than band's like Toto with huge Prog Rock edge. Their selfproduced debut single with the 2 songs "Der Wächter" and "Die Wölfin" got finally released with huge delay during early 1989. The original recordings was done already in January '88, but a few things had to be added in the following months. When they entered the studio in April '88 again, all the analogue technique got converted to digitally PC controlled which caused more problems than advantages. When they finally had every missing part recorded and the songs was finally finished, the lads wasn't happy with the too sterile sounding result at all and simply re-recorded both tracks once again within 2 nights. November 3rd 1988 Xenon's single recordings was finally finished. 1992 the guys once more released a fullenght album on the label Ample Records, featuring almost the same proggy Hard Rock with bavarian slang like on their first single, but this time explicitly more Hard Rock guided. After "Fuartfahrn" (means "To drive away") the band didn't release further stuff anymore it seems.(Thanx to emosteel for the recommendation)
Discography:
"Der Wächter/Die Wölfin" 7" EP 1989 (Press Stress)
"Fuatfahrn" LP 1992 (Ample)
Ygramur
Lineup:
Stefan Raithel (bass, vocals)
Helmut Steger
Band-info:
Ygramur was a band from the late 80's, originating from Sulzbach-Rosenberg, east of Nuremberg, that recorded just a single Demo during 1989, containing ordinary and due to certain info, less interesting Heavy Metal (poor vocals was only one flaw mentined). If you got more info, please get in touch.Discography:
No Corroseum-feature would be complete without some proper sampler CDRs!
Straight from Prowler's personal archive we present thee...
download ~Volume West~
download ~Volume East~
(For more obscure German goodies, check out "Teutonic Evasion", the German edition of the Veterans Of The Various-Wars samplers...)
Straight from Prowler's personal archive we present thee...
download ~Volume West~
download ~Volume East~
(For more obscure German goodies, check out "Teutonic Evasion", the German edition of the Veterans Of The Various-Wars samplers...)
Keep exploring the olde German Metal scene on these other sections of The Corroseum:
