Avatar (band)

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Avatar
Avatar (Swedish band) logo.png
Avatar Live at the Free & Easy Festival 2015
Avatar Live at the Free & Easy Festival 2015
General information
origin Gothenburg , Sweden
Genre (s) Melodic Death Metal
founding 2001 as Lost Soul
Website www.avatarmetal.com
Current occupation
Johannes Eckerström
Jonas "Kungen" Jarlsby
Tim Öhrström
Henrik Sandelin
John Alfredsson
former members
Christian Rimmi
Kim Egerbo
Albin Dahlquist
Simon Andersson

Avatar is a Swedish band from Gothenburg .

Band history

Avatar live at Rock am Ring 2018

The band was founded in 2001 by John Alfredsson under the name Lost Soul . Shortly afterwards Jonas Jarlsby joined them, but the band name was the main reason for the lack of interest from other potential members, whereupon it was changed to Avatar. Shortly after the name change, more members joined and the band began to cover songs by Cannibal Corpse , In Flames , Iron Maiden , Slayer , Vader and Helloween .

In 2003 Avatar did their first shows. Johannes Eckerström left the band for a short time, but returned a short time later after two potential musicians, Henrik Sandelin and Simon Andersson, had joined the band. In the summer of the same year they wrote their first own songs together, with which, among other things, the first demo Personal Observations was recorded. However, the musicians described these recordings as a disaster, whereupon they bought new guitars and repeated the recordings. After Personal Observations was done, they tried to market them and played their first concerts. During this time they recorded the EP 4 Reasons to Die . They also took part in more and more talent shows, which meant that their fan base around Gothenburg grew steadily. The band played other concerts on the entire west coast of Sweden and for the first time outside of Sweden in Copenhagen . Although the band became more and more successful, they never got a request from a record company. So they paid for the recordings for their first album themselves.

In early 2006 the debut album Thoughts of No Tomorrow was released , after which the band held their first joint concerts in Scandinavia with Hardcore Superstar and Dismember . Then in May they went on a European tour for the first time with Impaled Nazarene . Further concerts and a second European tour with Evergrey followed within this year . In 2007 Avatar toured Scandinavia with Stone Sour and In Flames . In the summer they then played at the Hultsfred Festival, among other things . On October 24, 2007 the band released their second album Schlacht . In contrast to the debut album, it also contained true metal influences for the first time . After the release followed a small tour through Sweden with Soilwork , Death Breath , Volbeat and Pain .

In January 2008 the band toured again across Europe together with Obituary and Holy Moses and played a month later as the opening act at a Megadeth concert . They were also featured in Close-Up magazine. Concerts with Soilwork , Backyard Babies , Danko Jones and Municipal Waste followed . Thereupon Avatar started their first overseas tour to the USA , where they played with bands like Enslaved or Sabaton . This was followed by another appearance at the Sweden Rock Festival .

In 2009 they took a little break and started writing new songs for their third album. After the recordings were finished, they toured Europe one more time with Hardcore Superstar and headlined several shows alongside Within Y and Degradead . This year the self-titled album Avatar followed , which hit the charts in Sweden at # 36 for the first time.

For the summer of 2010 the release of the DVD Blood, Noise, Fire, Metal was also planned, which should contain video material from a concert in Gothenburg . Originally the release was scheduled for June 18th. Due to delays in printing the booklet, the release date was postponed by almost two weeks to the end of June, although the album is still not available in stores.

  • Avatar Live @ Free & Easy Festival 2015

  • Henrik Sandelin

  • Johannes Eckerström

  • John Alfredsson

  • Tim Öhrström

Discography

Chart placements
(preliminary)
Explanation of the data
Albums
Thoughts of No Tomorrow
  SE 47 02/02/2006 (1 week)
battle
  SE 27 11/01/2007 (1 week)
Avatar
  SE 36 02/05/2010 (1 week)
Black Waltz
  SE 25th 02/03/2012 (1 week)
Hail the Apocalypse
  US 97 05/31/2014 (1 week)
Feathers & Flesh
  US 88 06/04/2016 (1 week)
Avatar Country
  CH 87 01/21/2018 (1 week)
  US 132 01/27/2018 (1 week)
Hunter gatherer
  DE 79 08/14/2020 (1 week)
  AT 70 08/21/2020 (... Template: Infobox chart placements / maintenance / provisional / 2020 where.)

Albums

  • 2006: Thoughts of No Tomorrow
  • 2007: battle
  • 2010: Avatar
  • 2012: Black Waltz
  • 2014: Hail the Apocalypse
  • 2016: Feathers & Flesh
  • 2018: Avatar Country
  • 2020: Hunter Gatherer

EPs and demos

  • 2003: Personal Observations (Demo)
  • 2004: 4 Reasons to Die (EP)

Singles

  • 2005: And I Bid You Farewell
  • 2005: My Shining Star
  • 2009: The Great Pretender
  • 2014: Hail the Apocalypse
  • 2016: For the Swarm
  • 2016: The Eagle Has Landed
  • 2018: A Statue of the King
  • 2020: God of Sick Dreams

swell

  1. ↑ a b c d e biography of the band on avatar.net ( Memento from September 21, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  2. ↑ a b Announcement of the release of Avatar's live DVD "Blood, Noise, Fire, Metal" ( Memento from May 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  3. ↑ Delays in the release of Blood, Noise, Fire, Metal ( Memento from April 27, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  4. ↑ Blood, Noise, Fire, Metal still not available , textalk.se, accessed on February 15, 2011
  5. ↑ Chart sources: Sweden Germany Austria Switzerland US

Web links

Commons : Avatar (band)  - collection of images, videos and audio files