Post by Synthinator on May 11, 2008 11:27:30 GMT -5
Sabaton is a power metal band from Sweden formed in 1999. The band's main lyrical theme is that of historical wars. This can be seen on the album Primo Victoria and Attero Dominatus where all of the songs, except the final tracks, take inspiration from a historical battle or war.
It was late 1999 and the earth prepared for a new millenium, people in all corners of the earth prepared for the celebration.
Meanwhile in Sweden, five young men were drawn together because of their common interest in playing the music known in common tongue as “Heavy Metal”.
And in a mansion overlooking the dread landscapes of the old mine of Falun the spirit and sound of Sabaton began to take its form.
In the coldest and darkest days of early 2000 the first songs were immortalized in the legendary Abyss studios by world famous studio-wizard Tommy Tägtgren and as a result of this as well as the outcome of the session the public interest in the band grew rapidly culminating with the victory in the biggest music competition of northern europe.
Only as a test of the market the band printed the first issue of the compilation of demos called “Fist For Fight” in a limited edition of 600 copies.
Within weeks they were sold out and Sabaton finally decided to take the band to the next level.
Riding on the wave of success the band stretched out their hands in search of a record label that was willing to distribute their music to the masses.
Their call was answered from many locations including a distant land far to the south where promises of great fortune and fame attracted the bands interest and the first contract was signed with Italian Underground Symphony.
Sabaton entered the studio Abyss to record the album mostly consisting of re-recordings old demo songs from “Fist For Fight” as well as some completely new tracks.
The expectations were very high from the band to see the reaction of the fans when the debut album was about to be released.
To increase the interest in the band, Underground Symphony decided to release a new version of the old demo-cd “Fist For Fight” to the european audience.
This was done in order to promote the release of the newly recorded debutalbum who was now wearing the name “Metalizer
“Fist For Fight” was released but passed quite silently.
The few persons in media who got the chance to review the album gave it very high points and were using great words of hallow.
The band still had faith in the long awaited debut album, but to the bands and the fans disappointment the album “Metalizer” was never released.
Years passed by and Sabaton was still waiting for the release of their debut album, but to no use.
It seemed like it would actually never be released and the band started to loose hope and faith.
Plans of giving up were starting to awake within the deeply disappointed and angry bandmembers who had spent a long time and much effort in writing, recording and now also waiting for this album.
It is now 2004 and in an age when everything seemed to go straight to hell, Sabaton made the important decision to forget about the past and give the band a new start.
The band returned to the Abyss studios for one weekend and the outcome is a three song Promo-cd titled “Panzer Battalion”.
This CD was now distributed to record labels worldwide and the response came quickly from all corners giving the band confidence in that they had done something very good.
At this time no label was contracted because the band decided to go for a different tactic.
Leaving all offers, the band went back to the Abyss and recorded 9 songs by paying all expenses by themselves.
The outcome of this session was the masterpiece “Primo Victoria”.
This concept album treats the subject of war and bears a latin title with the meaning “the first victory”.
The intention was that this would be Sabatons first victory as well as a tribute to the brave allied soldiers who landed at Normandy some 60 years ago.
The labels who earlier had showed interest in the band received one brand new copy of the fullength album each, and the negotiations were initiated with several international labels for the rights to release the current and upcoming Sabaton albums.
For almost six months the negotiations took place and in the end only two were still in the game and in the final race the Swedish label Black Lodge won the fight simply by giving the band a very honest and simple deal.
Black Lodge started immediately the work to promote their new signing and in March 2005 the first album of Sabaton saw the daylight, operation “Primo Victoria” was initiated.
When the album “Primo Victoria” arrived, it made a substantial impact on the Swedish market and the album were ranked #1 on the hardrock list on Swedens biggest music mailorder company.
The band also toured a lot and did sold out shows in Sweden and Germany including the victorious gigs at the Gates Of Metal festival and the Sweden Rock Festival, of which the latter were released on a DVD.
The reviews for this album proved that media worldwide were also united behind this new Swedish metalband and it was time to shift gears on the warmachine.
The internet was now the next territory to be conquered and within weeks a massive advertising campaign led to victory also here.
On the internets biggest download site the band held the #1 position on the metal charts for most of 2005 and has now reached to top 3 on the most downloaded Swedish acts of all time, all genres (!).
January 2006 were once again spent in the Abyss studios recording the new encyklopedia of war, a follow up to the very successful prequel.
This nine song masterpiece is meant to follow up and complete the era that were initiated with “Primo Victoria” one year earlier.
It was given the title “Attero Dominatus”.
Without even one day of rest the guys in Sabaton packed their bags and set out to conquer Europe with leading powermetal acts Edguy & Dragonforce on a 7 week long sold-out tour, visiting over 10 countries and performing in front of several thousands of Heavy Metal fans.
The tour was a big success and the sales of “Primo Victoria” are once again starting to go very well in several new territories and plans of more touring is now growing.
Meanwhile the work with “Attero Dominatus” is being completed and there are plans for a release in the late summer of 2006.
The album “Attero Dominatus” is now ready to cause whiplash injuries to heavy metal fans worldwide and the first headline-tour of Sabaton is also confirmed to help promote the new release.
Sabaton has also re-released their first album, Metalizer, a double disk special which contains the whole of their original album Fist For Fight remastered on the second disk, as well as a new song, Birds of War. It was released in March 2007.
Official site: www.sabaton.net/
Myspace: www.myspace.com/sabaton