Claymore (band)
| Claymore | |
|---|---|
| General information | |
| Genre (s) | skirt |
| founding | 1987 |
| Website | www.claymore-online.de |
| Founding members | |
Drums |
Robert Butts († 1999) |
Singing, guitar, flute |
Volker Sauer |
Lead guitar, backing vocals |
Hans Homann |
bass |
Michael Göttling (until 2001) |
| Current occupation | |
Vocals, guitar |
Volker Sauer |
Keyboard |
Andy Ironhead (since 1988) |
Pipes (bagpipes), accompanying singing |
Tim Lethen (since 1990) |
Bass, backing vocals |
Gerald Schmiechen (since 2001) |
Sidedrum |
Carel Ooms |
Electric guitar, backing vocals |
Christian Johne (since 2016) |
Drums, backing vocals |
Florian Sauer (since 2016) |
| former members | |
Pipes (bagpipes) |
Mick Maitland (until 1990) |
Drums, backing vocals |
Martin Otte (until 2011) |
Lead guitar, backing vocals |
Hans Homann (until 2011) |
Claymore is a German band from Heiligenhaus and Essen-Kettwig , which combines traditional Scottish music with rock music.
history
The band was founded in 1987 by Robert Butts, who lived in Germany as the son of a Scottish soldier and wanted to combine Scottish music with rock music. Butts met Hans Homann and Volker Sauer in 1986, who then founded the band Sgian dubh with other musicians, including Michael Göttling . Butts, Homann, Sauer and Göttling left the formation a year later to found the Bobby Butts Band in 1987 , which was renamed the same year to the name Claymore, which is still used today.
A year later it was decided to include Andy Ironhead, with whom they had already played with Sgian dubh , as keyboard player. Mick Maitland was also accepted as a bagpiper. However, since he had to return to Scotland at the end of 1990 - he was a Scottish soldier - he recommended that his student Tim Lethen be accepted into the band, who has since played the Scottish Pipes on every album of the band. In 1991 the first album Highlander was released. The music group knew how to combine the traditional sound of the Scottish Highlands with the rock music of the 1980s. In the following year the second album Unblended was recorded, but it could not be released until 1993. In 1995 the album Into the Wind and the group's first live album Live on Deck were released, followed in 1997 by Giants Forever .
Robert Butts, the band's founder, died unexpectedly in June 1999, forcing the band to take an almost two-year hiatus. In 2001 a drummer, Martin Otte, was accepted into the band and the break ended. After this interruption, the live CD Behind the Walls was released in 2001 . After a personnel restructuring in which Gerald Schmiechen replaced Michael Göttling as bassist, the best-of-CD Remember (1988-2002) was released in 2002 .
In 2008, the recordings for a new album began, which were later canceled due to an illness of the guitarist Hans Homann. At the end of 2011 the band announced that guitarist Hans Homann could no longer perform for health reasons and that the band therefore wanted to concentrate on studio recordings in the future. However, new recordings have not been released since then. In the same year, drummer Martin Otte left the band for personal reasons.
In mid-2017, it was announced on a newly created Facebook page that Florian Sauer and Christian Johne would join the band. In 2017 the band ended their six-year break with appearances in Kettwig and Solingen. At the same time, further concerts for 2018 and 2019 were announced.
Discography
- Highlander (1991)
- Unblended (1993)
- Into the Wind (1995)
- Live on Deck (1995)
- Giants Forever (1997)
- Behind the Walls (2001)
- Remember (2002)
- The Northern Call (2004)
- The Northern Call - DVD (2004)
- 20 Years of Claymore (2010)