Equilibrium (band)

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Equilibrium
Equilibrium Band Logo 2014 - 1.png

Equilibrium at the Rockharz 2018
Equilibrium at the Rockharz 2018
General information
origin Maisach , Germany
Genre (s) Symphonic Metal , Power Metal , previously: Pagan Metal , Folk Metal
founding 2001
Website www.equilibrium-metal.net
Founding members
singing
Helge Stang (until 2010)
guitar
René Berthiaume
guitar
Andreas Völkl (until 2014)
bass
Sandra van Eldik (born Völkl, until 2014)
Current occupation
Robert "Robse" Dahn (since 2010)
René Berthiaume
guitar
Dominik "Dom" Crey (since 2014)
Bass , vocals
Martin Skar Berger (since 2019)
Jessica "Skadi Rosehurst" Rösch (since 2019)
Tuval "Hati" Refaeli (since 2010)
former members
Keyboard
Michael Heidenreich (2001-2002)
Keyboard
Conny Kaiser (2002-2003)
Keyboard
Armin Dörfler (2005-2006)
Drums
Henning Stein (2001-2003)
Drums
Julius Koblitzek (2003-2004)
Drums
Basti Kriegl (2005)
Drums
Markus Perschke (2005-2006)
Drums
Manuel Di Camillo (2006-2010)
Bass (live)
Jen Majura (2014-2015)
bass
Marcus "Makki" Riewaldt (2016–2019)

Equilibrium is a German metal band from Bavaria . She plays symphonic metal with influences from power metal and melodic death . Their first two albums were assigned to Pagan Metal due to partly pagan themes . The group also describes their music as " Epic Metal ".

history

Equilibrium 2009: The then singer Helge Stang and bassist Sandra Völkl
former band logo (until 2014)

Equilibrium was founded in 2001 by René Berthiaume , Helge Stang , Sandra Völkl and Andreas Völkl in Maisach . The name was chosen spontaneously because they needed a name for their self-designed flyer for their first concert, which took place in a church in Maisach. Originally it was planned to play only one concert and then break up the band again, but that was not done. At first the stylistic direction of the band was not yet clear, as Equilibrium only played cover versions of well-known metal songs. That's why they chose Equilibrium, because this way the band can still move freely musically without having an unsuitable name. The band sometimes jokingly explains it using the term equilibration , which in psychology stands for the "balance between accommodation and assimilation ".

In 2003 the band produced a demo recording through which they received a contract for an album with the record label Black Attakk . The recordings for the debut album Turis Fratyr took place in the Helion Studios in Munich. The album was produced by René Berthiaume himself. The publication was initially scheduled for 2004, but has been postponed several times. On January 31, 2005, Turis Fratyr finally appeared on Black Attakk. In addition to new songs, this album also contains newly mixed recordings from the 2003 demo . In October 2006, Equilibrium signed a multiple album deal with Nuclear Blast . The drummer Manuel Di Camillo has been playing in the Schöngeist formation since 2006 .

In July 2007 the band began recording their new album Sagas , which was released on June 27, 2008 after several postponements and immediately reached number 30 in the German album charts . In February 2010 you could read about “serious restructuring within the band” on their Myspace page. On February 12, it was announced that the band had split up with singer Helge Stang and drummer Manuel Di Camillo. On March 2nd, 2010 it was announced that Robert Dahn, alias Robse, who is also the singer in the band Vrankenvorde, will take over the vocals. He appeared for the first time on March 12th at the Paganfest in Bochum together with Equilibrium.

On April 1, 2010, Equilibrium announced that the new album Rekreatur had been recorded. The album cover was released on April 13th. On April 15th, the first song of the new album, Die Affeninsel , was presented on the band's Myspace page, followed by Der Ewige Sieg on 22nd , and Scorched Earth on May 21st . In addition, 5 more tracks from the 3 albums and the 2003 demo were released in acoustic versions on the digipak version of Rekreatur .

The band's composer and guitarist: René Berthiaume in 2011 at a performance in Strasbourg .

The album was released on June 18, 2010. From June 11th to June 18th, 2010, the entire Rekreatur album (all 9 tracks, excluding the songs on the bonus disc) was available as a stream via Myspace . The band announced in 2012 that they had started recording a fourth album, which is scheduled for release in 2014. On August 11, 2013, the band released a five-track EP entitled Waldschrein .

On March 30, 2014, Andreas Völkl and Sandra van Eldik announced their departure from the band. Finally, Dominik R. Crey ( Wolfchant , Nothgard ) were introduced as the new guitarist on May 21st and Jen Majura ( Knorkator , Rage ) as the new bassist on June 7th, 2014.

On April 25, 2014 Equilibrium released the single Karawane as a foretaste for their new album in the stream. The album Erdentempel was released on June 6, 2014 .

At the beginning of November 2015, the band announced that the live bassist Jen Majura would leave the band in order to be able to concentrate more on her engagement with Evanescence in the future. In August 2016, Marcus “Makki” Riewaldt (formerly at Suidakra ) was announced as his successor , who had also been the tour manager for Equilibrium for several years.

The album Armageddon , released on August 12, 2016, entered the German album charts at number 5 on August 19, 2016. The sixth album Renegades was announced on May 22, 2019 and is due to be released on August 16. At the same time, the new were Norwegian bassist Skar aka Martin Berger (Zerozonic) and the new keyboardist Skadi Rosehurst aka Jessica Roesch (Berthiaumes wife, model and since 2013 Artwork - & Merchandise - designer of the band) presented. Skar will also be responsible for the clear vocals in the future.

style

The texts on the first recordings partly dealt with Nordic / Scandinavian mythology and are almost exclusively written in German. Later, on the album Sagas , almost all of the lyrics are fictitious. An exception is Des Sängers Fluch , an interpretation of the ballad by Ludwig Uhland . The music has undergone a change of style over time: the first two albums are mainly assigned to the genre Pagan Metal, with strong influences from Folk Metal. Since the album Rekreatur , the music has been arranged in a much more orchestral manner and is more likely to be assigned to power metal. Overall, the band is very experimental and versatile in the choice of instruments for the melodies. Despite the guttural singing , the music is very melodic, with the primarily folkloric melodies being carried by keyboards and guitars. Most of the pieces on the third album, Rekreatur, are accompanied by an orchestra. The tempo is very fast throughout, the guitar riffs contain elements of Power Metal . The drums are typically dominated by blast beats and double bass . In the album Erdentempel the band uses guttural vocals as well as partly male clear vocals, which - apart from the song Prolog auf Erden on the album Sagas - is a novelty in the band's history. Erdentempel also contains the band's first song in English, The Unknown Episode . Since the album Armageddon , the remaining folk elements have also been largely displaced by modern- technoid keyboard sounds and effects. The current album Renegades is dominated by the clear vocals of the new bass player Skar, which is typical for Power Metal and the lyrics are now (with one exception) in English. In addition, the songs now mostly move in a catchy mid-tempo rhythm.

gallery

Discography

Studio albums

year Title
music label
Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placementsTemplate: chart table / maintenance / without sources
(Year, title, music label , placements, weeks, awards, notes)
Remarks
DE DE AT AT CH CH
2005 Turis Fratyr
Black Attakk
- - -
First published: February 14, 2005
2008 Sagas
Nuclear Blast
DE30 (3 weeks)
DE
- CH99 (1 week)
CH
First published: June 27, 2008
2010 Nuclear Blast recreation
DE20 (3 weeks)
DE
AT58 (1 week)
AT
CH58 (1 week)
CH
First published: June 18, 2010
2014 Earth Temple
Nuclear Blast
DE16 (3 weeks)
DE
AT40 (1 week)
AT
CH43 (1 week)
CH
First published: June 6, 2014
2016 Armageddon
Nuclear Blast
DE5 (3 weeks)
DE
AT20 (2 weeks)
AT
CH12 (4 weeks)
CH
First published: August 12, 2016
2019 Renegades
Nuclear Blast
DE17 (1 week)
DE
- CH20 (1 week)
CH
First published: August 23, 2019

more publishments

  • 2003: Demo 2003 (demo, CD, self-distribution)
  • 2013: Waldschrein (EP, CD, Nuclear Blast)

Music videos

  • 2008: blood in the eye
  • 2010: The Eternal Victory (Director: Florian Puchert)
  • 2014: Wirtshaus Gaudi (Director: Christian Lim)
  • 2016: Prey
  • 2016: Born to Be Epic
  • 2016: Eternal Destination
  • 2019: Renegades - A Lost Generation

Web links

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

Individual evidence

  1. Album trailer. youtube.com
  2. Band biography on rockharz.com; Retrieved October 25, 2010
  3. a b Video interview by Helge Stang and Chrigel Glanzmann (Eluveitie) , youtube.com, accessed on December 1, 2010
  4. ^ Henri Kramer: Interview with René Berthiaume on Powermetal.de , January 2005
  5. SIRG: Equilibrium interview 13 October, 2006
  6. Interview with René, Sandra, Helge von Equilibrium, February 2005. ( Memento of the original from May 15, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. metalnews.de @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / metalnews.de
  7. ^ Cd review Turis Fratyr . ( Memento of the original from March 31, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. metalnews.de @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / metalnews.de
  8. ^ Equilibrium - Big Deal. ( Memento of the original from May 15, 2009 in the web archive archive.today ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. metalnews.de @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / metalnews.de
  9. Equilibrium - storm the German charts at number 30! nuclearblast.de, July 8, 2008; Retrieved March 16, 2009
  10. Equilibrium have to cancel their performance at Winterfire Festival . myspace.com, February 9, 2010
  11. Equilibrium split up with singer and drummer . myspace.com, February 12, 2010
  12. New album is finished! ( Memento of the original from February 7, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. myspace.com @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / blogs.myspace.com
  13. ^ Equilibrium - album artwork. metalnews.de
  14. ^ Equilibrium - Tracklist, Song and Competition. metalnews.de
  15. Equilibrium - Album in the Stream ( Memento of the original from July 7, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / metalnews.de
  16. Are you guys ...
  17. Equilibrium - will publish new EP ( Memento from August 23, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  18. facebook.com
  19. facebook.com
  20. Equilibrium - new single caravan in the stream! stormbringer.at
  21. Equilibrium - New song “Karawane” in the stream ( Memento of the original from September 3, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.metal4.de
  22. Equilibrium - new single "Karawane" available now!
  23. Equilibrium - introduce new bass player! In: Nuclear Blast . August 3, 2016 ( nuclearblast.de [accessed August 6, 2017]).
  24. Official German Charts - Official German Charts. Retrieved on August 6, 2017 (German).
  25. model-kartei.de
  26. facebook.com