Helloween

This article is about the band. For the EP see Helloween (EP) . For folk custom see Halloween .

Helloween
Helloween performance at Wacken Open Air on August 4th, 2018
General information
Genre (s)	Speed ​​metal , power metal
founding	1984
Website	www.helloween.org
Founding members
Guitar , vocals (until 1986)	Kai Hansen (until 1988, since 2016)
guitar	Michael "Weiki" Weikath
bass	Markus Grosskopf
Drums	Ingo Schwichtenberg † (until 1993)
Current occupation
singing	Michael Kiske (1987–1993, since 2016)
singing	Andi Deris (since 1994)
Guitar / vocals	Kai Hansen (until 1988, since 2016)
guitar	Michael "Weiki" Weikath
guitar	Sascha Gerstner (since 2002)
bass	Markus Grosskopf
Drums	Daniel "Dani" Loeble (since 2005)
former members
guitar	Roland Grapow (1988-2001)
Drums	Ulrich "Uli" Kusch (1994-2001)
Drums	Mark Cross (2001-2003)
Drums	Stefan Schwarzmann (2003-2005)

Helloween is a German speed and power metal band. Helloween was founded in Hamburg in 1984 and is one of the most successful metal bands from Germany.

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.

The band's website is not reliable enough to make such claims

history

Helloween's predecessor bands were Gentry (with Kai Hansen and Piet Sielck as guitarists), Second Hell and Ironfist (in addition to the former with Markus Grosskopf as bassist and Ingo Schwichtenberg as drummer). After Sielck left, guitarist Michael Weikath came from the band Powerfool. The band has now been renamed Helloween.

First publications

The first two Helloween songs were released on the Death Metal sampler distributed by the Noise Records label . Oernst of Life and Metal Invaders got such good reviews that in 1984 this label decided to sign Helloween. In 1985 the band released a mini-LP entitled under the band name, which included five songs. In the same year they released an album with Walls of Jericho , which brought them their first commercial success through titles such as Ride the Sky , Guardians and How Many Tears .

The band had their first problems on the tour that followed. Hansen felt overwhelmed by the double burden as guitarist and singer, so that one considered hiring an additional singer for the Judas short tour in 1986. Michael Kiske , who was 18 years old at the time and was employed by the little-known band Ill Prophecy, was hired.

Commercial breakthrough

Helloween's breakthrough came in 1987 with the new singer. The first part of the Keeper of the Seven Keys , actually intended as a double album , became one of the best-selling metal albums in Germany and is still considered influential today.

A year later, the second part was published, its commercial success was even greater than that of its predecessor. With Dr. Stein contained a top ten hit on the album, which the band performed on the Formula One music video show . However, Hansen left the band due to management problems; he then founded the band Gamma Ray . Roland Grapow from Rampage joined the band for Hansen .

In 1989 Helloween released their first live album, Live in the UK . In addition to Kiske on vocals, you can also hear Hansen on guitar.

crisis

For financial reasons, Helloween has now signed a contract with EMI -Records. Noise Records then sued Helloween for breach of contract, and so it was forced to take a long break from publication. At the end of 1990, the gold records Helloween had received for both Keeper albums were revoked after an audit. The record company had added exports to domestic sales to get the required 250,000 units sold.

After the break, Pink Bubbles Go Ape was released in 1991 . This album was not commercially successful as it could only be bought in Germany via imports. The background for this was a Germany-wide publication ban by Noise Records. Musically, Pink Bubbles Go Ape is, according to many critics, below the quality of the previous albums. In 1993 Helloween released an album called Chameleon , which is often referred to by fans and critics as the weakest of the band. The tensions among the band members came to a head. Ingo Schwichtenberg also had to leave the band before the tour in the same year due to his severe psychological problems. He killed himself on 8 March 1995 even by before a train S-Hamburg jumped bandwagon.

The restructuring continued. In 1993 Michael Kiske also left the band. There was talk of personal and musical differences, but the exact reasons are not known. In an interview on the appearance of Rabbit Don't Come Easy in 2003, Michael Weikath specified that Kiske wanted to go in the direction of his later solo albums with Helloween and that Michael Kiske had to be removed.

New beginning

With Andi Deris , formerly Pink Cream 69 , Helloween found a new singer to replace Kiske. Within a few years he developed into the main songwriter of the band. The drummer Uli Kusch from Gamma Ray also joined the band to replace Schwichtenberg. With the new line-up, Helloween released Master of the Rings in 1994 . The Time of the Oath followed in 1996 , which received good reviews. In the same year, the band's second live album, High Live, was released. After Better Than Raw , released in 1998 , Helloween went on a world tour with Iron Maiden . To fulfill the contract with the former Castle Communications label, Helloween released a cover album with Metal Jukebox in autumn 1999 with songs from the 60s, 70s and 80s - for example, power metal versions of All My Loving by the Beatles and Lay All Your Love on Me by ABBA .

Shortly after the release of the Metal Jukebox , Helloween signed a contract with Nuclear Blast . The band had been in the same line-up for six years , and after The Dark Ride was released in October 2000 , Helloween went on a world tour. However, Uli Kusch injured his elbow on the tour, which impaired his ability to play. After the tour, the band split from Grapow and Kusch. Mark Cross from Metalium came for Kusch, while Henjo Richter from Gamma Ray was initially wanted for Grapow, but without success. In April 2002 Helloween released a best-of CD called Treasure Chest , and four months later, after almost a year of searching, they found a replacement for Grapow in Sascha Gerstner. In May 2003 a new studio album followed with Rabbit Don't Come Easy . On the album, however, Cross can only be heard on two songs, as he fell ill with Pfeiffer's glandular fever during the recording and had to leave the band. Mikkey Dee from Motörhead completed the drum recordings, but could not make any further contribution due to his involvement with Motörhead. The new drummer was finally Stefan Schwarzmann . The longest tour in the band's history followed in mid-2003; the tour ended in Japan in February 2004. In the summer of 2004 the band played an anniversary concert at the Wacken Open Air in front of over 40,000 people after a few big festivals .

Continuation of the Keeper series

At the Woodstock stop in 2011

At the beginning of 2005 the drummer Stefan Schwarzmann left the band and was replaced by Dani Löble from Rawhead Rexx . At the end of 2004 Helloween began recording for Keeper of the Seven Keys - The Legacy , which was released in October 2005 on Steamhammer / SPV . Mrs. God and Light the Universe were released as singles. For the latter song - a duet with Candice Night - a video was shot at Burg Veldenstein in Franconia.

From November 2005 to April 2006 Helloween played almost 100 shows in over 40 countries. On this tour, the concerts in Sofia , Tokyo and São Paulo were recorded for the live CD Live in Sao Paulo , released in February 2007, and the live DVD Live on 3 Continents . An extensive festival tour followed in the summer.

Post- Keeper albums

After the band completed the Keeper theme , the album Gambling with the Devil was released in October 2007, followed by the 2007/2008 Hellish Rock Tour with Gamma Ray. Gambling with the Devil also shows a deliberate departure from excessively long pieces and a reminiscence of the first albums. After the release of the anniversary album Unarmed - Best of 25th Anniversary , which was only released through Sony Music in 2010 due to financial problems of the insolvent record company Steamhammer / SPV , Helloween went back to the studio to record the thirteenth album. It was published on October 29, 2010 under the title 7 Sinners . Stratovarius was won as support for the following tour .

The band's 14th album, Straight out of Hell , was released on January 18, 2013 . The subsequent tour with Gamma Ray, the band of Helloween co-founder Kai Hansen, was called Hellish Rock Part II. My God-Given Right , the 15th album by Helloween, was released on May 29, 2015

• Helloween, Live at the Backstage Werk, Munich 2016
• 

  Michael Weikath

• 

  Sascha Gerstner

• 

  Markus Grosskopf (left)

• 

  Andi Deris

Reunion

In November 2017 the band went on a selected "Pumpkins United" city tour with old and new members. This is to be expanded and continued in 2018. The veterans Weikath, Kiske, Hansen and Grosskopf are involved in the reunification. "In the coming year there will be festivals, and I'm really looking forward to it. Who knows what will come afterwards, maybe people will ask for more shows, then we will certainly continue", says Markus Grosskopf in Rock Hard Magazine issue no. 361 .

Discography

→ Main article : Helloween / discography

Studio albums

year	Title music label	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, music label , placements, weeks, awards, notes)					Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1985	Walls of Jericho Noise Records	-	-	-	-	-	First published: October 1985
1987	Keeper of the Seven Keys Part 1 Noise Records	DE15 (14 weeks) DE	-	CH18 (4 weeks) CH	-	US104 (21 weeks) US	First published: February 23, 1987
1988	Keeper of the Seven Keys Part 2 Noise Records	DE5 gold (16 weeks)DE	AT9 (2 weeks) AT	CH6 (9 weeks) CH	UK24 (5 weeks) UK	US108 (16 weeks) US	First published: August 29, 1988 Sales: + 250,000
1991	Pink Bubbles Go Ape EMI	DE32 (10 weeks) DE	AT28 (2 weeks) AT	CH20 (6 weeks) CH	UK41 (2 weeks) UK	-	First published: March 11, 1991
1993	Chameleon EMI	DE35 (9 weeks) DE	-	CH30 (3 weeks) CH	-	-	First published: May 31, 1993
1994	Master of the Rings Castle Communications	DE23 (11 weeks) DE	AT34 (2 weeks) AT	CH22 (6 weeks) CH	-	-	First published: July 8, 1994 Sales: + 120,000
1996	The Time of the Oath Castle Communications	DE31 (11 weeks) DE	AT33 (4 weeks) AT	CH30 (3 weeks) CH	-	-	First published: February 29, 1996
1998	Better Than Raw Castle Communications	DE19 (6 weeks) DE	AT36 (2 weeks) AT	CH42 (2 weeks) CH	-	-	First published: April 14, 1998
2000	The Dark Ride Nuclear Blast	DE26 (3 weeks) DE	-	CH68 (1 week) CH	-	-	First published: October 30, 2000
2003	Rabbit Don't Come Easy Nuclear Blast	DE26 (3 weeks) DE	-	CH93 (1 week) CH	-	-	First published: May 12, 2003
2005	Keeper of the Seven Keys - The Legacy SPV	DE28 (2 weeks) DE	-	CH61 (2 weeks) CH	-	-	First published: October 28, 2005
2007	Gambling with the Devil SPV	DE38 (1 week) DE	-	CH88 (1 week) CH	-	-	First published: October 26, 2007
2010	7 Sinners Sony Music	DE25 (3 weeks) DE	AT57 (1 week) AT	CH38 (1 week) CH	-	-	First published: October 29, 2010 Sales: + 1,900
2013	Straight out of Hell Sony Music	DE4 (5 weeks) DE	AT22 (2 weeks) AT	CH12 (3 weeks) CH	-	US97 (1 week) US	First published: January 18, 2013
2015	My God-Given Right Nuclear Blast	DE8 (4 weeks) DE	AT30 (2 weeks) AT	CH14 (4 weeks) CH	-	-	First published: May 29, 2015

Membership development

Awards

• Bravo Otto

1988: "Bronze" in the "Hard 'n Heavy" category

See also

• Bands and artists in which pop course graduates play a key role

Individual evidence

1. ^ Deutsche Welle (www.dw.com): The ten most successful German rock bands | DW | 01/12/2017. Accessed June 16, 2019 (German). 
2. ↑ ^{a b} Helloween Official Site. helloween, accessed March 15, 2012 . 
3. ↑ ^{a b c d} Michael Edele: Life in the Post Keeper Era. laut.de, accessed on March 15, 2012 . 
4. ↑ ^{a b} Legacy World Tour. cdstarts, accessed March 15, 2012 . 
5. ↑ Helloween Films Light The Universe Video. metalstorm, August 22, 2006, accessed March 14, 2012 . 
6. ↑ Sales of Master of the Rings
7. ^ Helloween sales

Web links

Commons : Helloween  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Official website
• Helloween at Musik-Sammler.de
• Interview from December 2007
• Interview from 2011 on Youtube
• Reunion 2017