Sabaton
| Sabaton | |
|---|---|
 |
|
 Sabaton live 2017 at Hellfest |
|
| General information | |
| origin | Falun , Sweden |
| Genre (s) | Heavy metal |
| founding | 1999 |
| Website | www.sabaton.net |
| Founding members | |
| Joakim Brodén | |
| Oskar Montelius (until 2012) | |
guitar |
Rikard Sundén (until 2012) |
| Par Sundström | |
| Richard Larsson (until 2001) | |
| Current occupation | |
Vocals, keyboard |
Joakim Brodén |
Electric bass |
Par Sundström |
guitar |
Chris Rörland (since 2012) |
guitar |
Tommy Johansson (since 2016) |
Drums |
Hannes Van Dahl (since 2013) |
| former members | |
Drums |
Daniel Mullback (2001-2012) |
Keyboard |
Daniel Mÿhr (2005–2012) |
Drums |
Robban Bäck (2012) |
guitar |
Thobbe Englund (2012-2016) |
| Supplement for live performances | |
Drums |
Snowy Shaw (2012-2013) |
Sabaton is a Swedish heavy metal band from Falun that formed in 1999. The vast majority of Sabaton's songs deal with military-historical topics, many of which are related to the First or Second World War . The name "Sabaton" refers to an iron shoe that was often worn as part of knight armor in the Middle Ages . All of the band's tracks, with the exception of Ruina Imperii (in Swedish), have been released in English, and the entire album Carolus Rex has also been released in Swedish. Furthermore, the band occasionally covers pieces in German and Swedish and occasionally inserts lines of text in other languages, often in Latin.
history
Until the Coat of Arms
Pär Sundström was already playing in a four-piece band at the end of his school days, which only gained momentum when Joakim Brodén joined them. In 1999 they founded the band Aeon with Oskar Montelius, Richard Larsson and Rikard Sundén , which they renamed Sabaton after a short time. In early 2000, the band recorded the demo CD Fist for Fight at Abyss Studios , with which the band received a record deal with the Italian label Underground Symphony . In 2001 Richard Larsson left Sabaton and Daniel Mullback joined the band as the new drummer. In 2003 Underground Symphony released the demo Fist for Fight again to promote the planned debut album Metalizer . However, the band split from Underground Symphony and decided not to release Metalizer for the time being.
Another promo CD titled Panzer Battalion was recorded at Abyss Studios. Negotiations with various record companies followed. The band eventually signed with the Swedish label Black Lodge . The album Primo Victoria was released in March 2005. When Primo Victoria was recording , singer Joakim Brodén played keyboards . After the album was released, this part was taken over by the newly arrived Daniel Mÿhr. In early 2006 Sabaton accompanied the German power metal band Edguy on their Rocket Ride World Tour , which took them across Europe. In July 2006 the next album, Attero Dominatus, was released . A double headliner tour with Custard followed in August through smaller clubs in Germany. Also that year Sabaton played before Shade Empire as part of Popkomm in the Kulturbrauerei Berlin.
As support for Therion and Grave Digger , the band went on a European tour in early 2007. On March 16, 2007, Metalizer, originally planned as a debut album, was finally released as a double CD with the complete demo CD Fist for Fight . The album was completely recorded and mixed in 2002, but was not released until 2007. The songs have been rearranged compared to their spiritual predecessor and the sound has been significantly improved. There were also two new songs, while three old ones were not on the album. At the same time, the band played a headlining tour of Europe.
In December 2007 Sabaton were touring the Czech Republic as the opening act for Helloween and Gamma Ray . On May 30, 2008, the fourth studio album The Art of War was released on the Swedish label Black Lodge . The album immediately reached number 5 in the Swedish charts, and the single Cliffs of Gallipoli even reached number one. From the end of February 2009 to the beginning of May 2009 Sabaton were on tour as the permanent opening act for HammerFall . The live DVD announced for spring 2008, which was to be titled Live at the Front , was only released at a later date due to the poor quality of the recordings. For this purpose, the birthday show, on which Sabaton celebrated their 10th anniversary, was to be recorded elaborately on June 13, 2009 in their hometown of Falun. In late November, Sabaton signed a deal with Nuclear Blast .
The band released their fifth album Coat of Arms on May 21, 2010 and brought out the music video for the piece Uprising on August 1, 2010 . The 2010 World War Tour was announced with the last teaser for this video . In autumn 2010 the band released the first four albums in newly recorded so-called re-armed versions. Each of the four new albums contained additional bonus material in the form of bonus tracks and videos in addition to the normal songs.
In January 2011 it was announced that DragonForce bassist Frédéric Leclercq would step in for guitarist Rikard Sundén for the additional dates of the World War Europe Tour in March . Rikard took a temporary break, as he expected offspring. However, assurances were given that this was only a temporary change and that he would continue to be a full member of their band. For the North American tour in April, which was mostly held together with Accept , Rikard was supposed to take his place on guitar again.
Since Carolus Rex
In the run-up to the release of the sixth studio album Carolus Rex , it was announced that the band members will go their separate ways. Joakim Brodén and Pär Sundström would continue the band, while the other band members in all friendship left the band after twelve years of working together.
On April 2nd, 2012 Chris Rörland , Thobbe Englund as guitarist and Robban Bäck as drummer were confirmed as new band members. Since no new keyboard player has been found so far, all the keyboard tracks that Daniel Mÿhr had played and recorded on the tour left the tape.
The band members who left the band founded the band Civil War with the singer of the Astral Doors , Nils Patrik Johansson . Bass was taken over by Stefan "Pizza" Eriksson, who had previously been a technician at Sabaton and played in his band Volturyon .
Robban Bäck stayed with the band for only two months. On November 16, 2012 he played his last concert with Sabaton in Gothenburg, after which he stopped touring because of his new fatherhood. Snowy Shaw made his first appearance on the same day with Sabaton, for which he was touring drummer for a year.
In 2013 Sabaton played as the opening act in Europe at some concerts on the Iron Maiden “Maiden England 2013” tour.
On November 18, 2013 it was announced via the official website of the band that Hannes Van Dahl will take the place of drummer as a full-time band member and that Robban Bäck will finally leave the band. Van Dahl had previously been a drum technician for Sabaton and a drummer for Evergrey . The album Heroes was released on May 16, 2014 .
On March 4, 2016, the DVD Heroes on Tour was released, which includes a concert at Wacken Open Air and a concert at Sabaton Open Air . Due to technical problems, the sound had to be replayed when recording the Sabaton Open Air in the studio. The publication was promoted by showing the Wacken appearance in selected Cinestar cinemas.
The eighth album, titled The Last Stand , was released on August 19, 2016. Like Carolus Rex and Heroes before, The Last Stand was recorded and produced in Abyss Studio by Peter Tägtgren in Pärlby. On July 25th, the band also announced on their Facebook page that guitarist Thobbe Englund would leave the band in favor of his solo project. Englund played his last show with Sabaton in Falun at the end of 2016 . Tommy Johansson , whom Brodén had wanted in 2012, joined the band for Englund . Johansson previously played in the band ReinXeed .
After two quiet years around the band, the ninth studio album was officially announced at the end of 2018. On April 2 of the following year, the band announced the official name The Great War and the release date, July 19, 2019. It will again be a concept album, this time dealing with the First World War . As a teaser, the piece Fields of Verdun including the music video was prematurely released on May 3rd . This shows the band members playing music in the battle of the eponymous Battle of Verdun . The release was preceded by a cover version by the band Apocalyptica and, on April 22nd, the album-independent single Bismarck , which, according to the band, was the most desired topic for a song. A music video has also been released for this, which shows the band members playing music on the deck of the ship Primo Victoria , while the history and last battle of the Bismarck are shown next to it. For this purpose, the band entered into a cooperation with the action MMO World of Warships .
On May 16, 2019, as part of the YouTube video series Sabaton History , in which the band members go into the background of individual songs, a video was released that deals with a song called The Red Baron and contains a short excerpt. On May 31, it was finally announced that The Red Baron would be released as the second single from the album The Great War and should be released on June 14, 2019. Another song was announced on June 6th with A Ghost in the Trenches . A video was also released via Sabaton History on June 13, 2019, which presents the main song of the latest album The Great War . During the video, 3 excerpts from the song were played.
style
Optically
The musicians generally appear in camouflage pants. Singer Joakim Brodén also wears a checkered sheet vest and aviator glasses as a trademark.
music
Characteristic for the band is the rough voice of the singer Brodén. There are also the typical keyboard tracks that run through Sabaton's songs. On the older release Fist for Fight the sound quality was still poor, but this could be increased significantly with the first label and studio change.
In an interview with loudwire.com , bassist Pär Sundström rejected the occasional categorization of Sabaton as a power metal band: “I don't think Sabaton can only be categorized as power metal, as the two main attributes of power metal are high pitched vocals and fantasy lyrics and Sabaton have neither of those. We simply play our version of heavy metal - what heavy metal is to us. "
As a producer, Peter Tägtgren has had a great influence on the sound of the Sabaton albums. Although he has only been the sole producer of the band since Carolus Rex, the band has been recording their releases in Tägegren's Abyss Studios in Pärlby since their first album. In addition, Tägegren worked on the piece Inmate 4859 as a composer.
From a musical point of view, the album, The Last Stand , offers most of the innovations, e.g. B. bagpipes and a solo on a Hammond organ .
The band has recorded four duets in total: Gott mit uns , Twilight of the Thundergod , En hjältes väg and All Guns Blazing , the last three pieces being covers and the first two pieces having Peter Tägegren as a singing partner of Brodén.
Texts
The band itself rejects allegations that their lyrics glorify the war , as well as any attempt to interpret them politically. In an interview, Rikard Sundén said: “No, we don't glorify anything, we just tell stories about things that have happened.” This is supported by the fact that Sabaton's songs are on the one hand very complex text structures and on the other hand a high degree historical correctness and depth of field.
The demo Fist for Fight stands for a time when the band still had to find their final style. The later dominant war theme is hardly to be found here, if at all; the lyrics deal with more familiar metal topics like heroes, gods etc. and are less sophisticated than in the follow-up works.
Apart from Metalizer and the demo recording Fist for Fight , all of the band's albums deal with military-historical topics. Only the songs Metal Machine , Metal Crüe and Metal Ripper deviated from this theme on Primo Victoria , Attero Dominatus and Coat of Arms . Joakim Brodén listed either well-known names from metal pieces, bands or quotes from well-known songs. The songs to be regarded as homage were placed at the end of the albums. Live Metal Crüe and Metal Machine were often played one after the other as a metal medley .
The fourth album, The Art of War , continued the conceptual idea most strongly. It is based on the work of the same name, The Art of War by Sūnzǐ . In the limited edition of the album, an English version of the same book was included.
Two albums that are only dedicated to World War II are Coat of Arms and Heroes . Only The Final Solution from Coat of Arms deals with the history of anti-Semitism and the Holocaust in the Third Reich and therefore takes up events prior to 1939. Heroes , however, had an even stronger conceptual character, as it thematized heroes both on the Allied side and on Germany's side . So far it is the only album with a war theme whose name is not also a song name on that album.
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In between these two albums, the band released Carolus Rex , which was released in both English and Swedish. It is about episodes from Swedish history. The band wanted to thematize the history of Sweden with this album, since the previous albums only dealt with stories from foreign countries. The album The Last Stand has just such a strong conceptual character - it deals with the last resistances in military history. The album "The Great War" deals exclusively with the events of the First World War.
Most of the lyrics are based on suggestions from fans who send ideas about song themes to Sabaton.
Events
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Sabaton has been organizing its own festivals since 2008, some of which have over 25 bands performing in front of around 8,000 visitors. This began in 2008 with the release of the album The Art of War , for which the One More Beer Festival was held in Essen . The band has since been working on plans to host similar events on a larger scale in the future.
The Sabaton Cruise event was held for the first time in November 2010 . A festival is held on a cruise ship that sails across the Baltic Sea. Along with Sabaton and fans, there are also some other bands on board.
In the band's hometown, Falun, the Rockstad: Falun festival has been held annually since 2008 , and the band has performed annually since the festival was founded. Since 2014, the festival has been marketed under the name Sabaton Open Air - Rockstad: Falun .
In 2015 - based on the One More Beer Festival - the Sabaton Open Air - Another Beer Festival - took place in the Amphitheater Gelsenkirchen , where not only Sabaton but also Powerwolf , Korpiklaani , Civil War and Bloodbound performed. The festival is an offshoot of the Sabaton Open Air in Falun and is also a competition event for the Rock Hard Festival , which also takes place in the amphitheater. The name of the festival is derived from the 'custom' that the German-speaking audience does not call out “Sabaton, Sabaton” between the songs, but rather asks singer Brodén to have a beer with the sentence “Another beer, another beer” drink. At some concerts even the text line “God with us” in the song of the same name is exchanged with the call. The band has therefore had T-shirts printed with “Another beer” for concerts in German-speaking countries.
Connections with other musicians
As mentioned above, there is an intense connection to Peter Tägegren, who has been involved in the recordings together with his brother since Sabaton's beginnings and has been producing the band since Carolus Rex . In return, the two-time guest singer Tägtgren had Joakim Brodén sing the piece Call Me from the Pain album Coming Home in a duet with him .
There is also a close connection to the band Raubtier and their singer Pär Hulkoff. Raubtier played in December 2010 in the opening act of the "World War Tour" by Sabaton, which led through several Scandinavian countries. Because the two Sabaton guitarists wanted to leave the band in 2012, Pär Sundström called Hulkoff with the intention of winning him over as a guitarist for Sabaton, but Hulkoff declined because of his work with Predator. A little later, Hulkoff called back to recommend Thorbjörn Englund, who had previously been the bass player for Predator, and to give him his number. In 2014, the predator song En hjältes väg was recorded by Sabaton as a bonus track for the album Heroes . The predator bassist Jonas Kjellgren also played the bagpipes on the Sabaton album The Last Stand .
The Israeli band Desert released the duet Lament For Soldier's Glory with Brodén on their album Star of Delusive Hopes in 2010 . At the album's release party, Desert performed the piece as well as Panzerkampf and Primo Victoria together with Brodén.
Trivia
Sabaton was awarded an honorary membership in the "Scions Of The 17th Division", an association of veterans of the Airborne Division who fought against Germany in the Battle of the Bulge and in Operation Varsity .
On September 21, 2015 it was announced that singer Joakim Brodén had lost a bet against the other band members and therefore had to walk a distance of 550 kilometers to the Trondheim Metal Fest , which took place on October 1 to 3, 2015. He was supported by fans who provided him with accommodation, food and beer along the way.
An expansion for the Europa Universalis IV computer game was released on December 1, 2015, which adds five Sabaton songs to the game: A Lifetime of War, The Art of War, The Lion From the North, Carolus Rex and Karolinens Bön .
In 2017 a collaboration with the video game developer Wargaming.net came about, in which a music video was created for the song Primo Victoria and a tank of the same name in the "Sabaton look" was inserted into the game World of Tanks .
The computer game Hearts of Iron IV , which deals with the Second World War, also has expansions that add songs by Sabaton.
Heroes and Fist for Fight are the only Sabaton albums whose names are not also the name of a song published on them.
Awards
Sales
gold
- 2011 for Coat of Arms
- 2012 for World War Live - Battle of the Baltic Sea
- 2013 for Carolus Rex
platinum
- 2013 for Carolus Rex
Awards
Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards
- 2011 in the "Breakthrough" category
Bandit Rock Awards
- 2012 in the categories "Best Swedish Band" and "Best Live Band"
- 2013 in the categories "Best Swedish Album", "Best Live Band" and "Best Swedish Artist / Group"
- 2012 in the category "Best Live Band"
Membership development
Discography
Studio albums
| year | Title music label |
Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, music label , placements, weeks, awards, notes) |
Remarks | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 SE
|
 DE
|
 AT
|
 CH
|
 UK
|
 US
|
|||
| 2005 |
Primo Victoria Black Lodge Records |
SE43 (3 weeks) SE |
- | - | - | - | - |
First published: March 4, 2005
|
| 2006 |
Attero Dominatus Black Lodge Records |
SE16 (7 weeks) SE |
- | - | - | - | - |
First published: August 3, 2006
|
| 2007 | Metalizer Black Lodge Records |
SE21 (1 week) SE |
- | - | - | - | - |
First published: March 22, 2007
|
| 2008 |
The Art of War Black Lodge Records |
SE5 (12 weeks) SE |
- | - | - | - | - |
First published: June 5, 2008
|
| 2010 |
Coat of Arms Nuclear Blast |
SE2 (13 weeks) SE |
DE19 (2 weeks) DE |
AT71 (1 week) AT |
CH33 (1 week) CH |
- | - |
First published: May 28, 2010
|
| 2012 |
Carolus Rex Nuclear Blast |
SE2  × 4
(96 weeks)SE |
DE7 (6 weeks) DE |
AT23 (1 week) AT |
CH19 (2 weeks) CH |
- | - |
First published: June 1, 2012
|
| 2014 |
Heroes Nuclear Blast |
SE1 (62 weeks)SE |
DE3 (12 weeks) DE |
AT11 (2 weeks) AT |
CH7 (4 weeks) CH |
UK59 (1 week) UK |
US99 (1 week) US |
First published: May 16, 2014
|
| 2016 |
The Last Stand Nuclear Blast |
SE1  (31 weeks)SE |
DE2 (9 weeks) DE |
AT2 (5 weeks) AT |
CH1 (9 weeks) CH |
UK17 (1 week) UK |
US63 (1 week) US |
First published: August 26, 2016
|
| 2019 |
The Great War Nuclear Blast |
SE1 (11 weeks) SE |
DE1 (12 weeks) DE |
AT3 (7 weeks) AT |
CH1 (11 weeks) CH |
UK11 (1 week) UK |
US42 (1 week) US |
First published: July 19, 2019
|
Web links
- Official Website of Sabaton (English)
- Sabaton at Nuclear Blast
- Sabaton in the Encyclopaedia Metallum
- Sabaton at laut.de
- Sabaton at SoundCloud
Sources and Notes
- ↑ a b Metalspheres.de: Metalspheres Fanzine - Interview, Sabaton , last downloaded 8 April 2015
- ↑ free fire! , Forever , En Hjältes Väg , Långa Bollar På Bengt
- ↑ as happened with Primo Victoria , Attero Dominatus , The Lion from the North , Resist and Bite , (all Latin) The Lion from the North , Gott mit uns , Hearts of Iron (all German), Smoking Snakes (pt.) , The Carolean's Prayer , A Lifetime of War (both Swedish. Also in the English version), Uprising (Polish)
- ↑ Interview: Pär Sundström and Chris Rörland of Sabaton (London, 10th March 2016) , in: The Moshville Times , March 22, 2016, accessed July 10, 2017
- ↑ Facebook.com: Sabaton goes separate ways (English), last accessed on April 8, 2015
- ↑ Sabaton.net: This is the new Sabaton (English), last accessed on April 8, 2015
- ^ RockHard: Ex-Sabaton Members Carry On As Civil War , Retrieved April 8, 2015
- ↑ Snowy Shaw: "I'm Far From Done, And I Like To Think The Best Years Are Still Ahead ..." , in: metalunderground.com , accessed on July 30, 2017
- ↑ Sabaton.net: Sabaton supports Iron Maiden (English), accessed on April 8, 2015
- ↑ Metal Hammer.de: Sabaton: Tracklist, cover and date of the new album HEROES , accessed on April 8, 2015
- ↑ SABATON - release their new studio album »The Last Stand« on August 19th! In: Nuclear Blast . April 29, 2016. Retrieved May 9, 2016 .
- ↑ https://www.metal-hammer.de/sabaton-kuendigen-album-fuer-2019-an-1116682/
- ↑ https://www.sabaton.net/sabaton-annouce-new-album-the-great-war/
- ↑ https://loudwire.com/sabaton-world-of-warships-bismarck-music-video/
- ↑ Sabaton.net: New single - The Red Baron - Out June 14th , accessed June 14, 2019
- ^ Sabaton History: Great War - World War One - Sabaton History 019 [Official]. June 13, 2019, accessed June 20, 2019 .
- ↑ Joe DiVita: Sabaton's Par Sundstrom: History Is a Passion, But Metal Still Comes First (Exclusive Interview) , in: loudwire.com , April 26, 2017
- ↑ Dean Martin, Jessica Howkins: INTERVIEW: Pär Sundström - Sabaton , in: Distorted Sound , March 3, 2016, accessed July 12, 2017
- ↑ Rockstadfalun.se: Rockstad: Falun - Sabaton Open Air 2015 (Swedish), accessed April 8, 2015
- ↑ Festivalguide.de: Rockstad: Falun , accessed April 8, 2015
- ↑ Sabaton.net: One More Beer Festival - Essen , accessed on April 8, 2015
- ↑ a b Metal Hammer .de: Sabaton organize 'Sabaton Open Air Germany / Noch ein Bier Fest' , accessed on April 8, 2015
- ↑ Facebook.com: Sabaton Cruise , accessed April 8, 2015
- ↑ Swedish Wikipedia: Rockstad: Falun
- ↑ Festivalticker.de: Sabaton Open Air - Rockstad: Falun , accessed on April 8, 2015
- ↑ Stern.de: What is the heavy metal band Sabaton drinking? , accessed April 8, 2015
- ↑ Metalnews.de: Interview: Sabaton - Joakim Brodén ( Memento of the original from April 14, 2015 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. , accessed April 8, 2015
- ^ Sabaton - World War Tour
- ↑ Maria Voutiriadou, Dimitris Kontogeorgakos: Sabaton - Pär Sundström, Thobbe Englund , in: metalkaoz.com , accessed on July 10, 2017
- ↑ Official videos from the release ceremony [1] , [2]
- ↑ Sabaton.net: Sabaton comments on Russia entry ban due to Nazi allegations , last accessed on December 17, 2015
- ↑ Sabaton.net: High-resolution image of the certificate of honor , last accessed on December 19, 2015
- ↑ RockHard: Sabaton: Joakim Broden has to walk 550 km to the next concert after losing the bet , accessed on September 21, 2015
- ↑ Chart sources: SE DE AT CH UK US
