Therion (band)

Therion is a Swedish Symphonic metal band. Its name originates from Greek, where therion (θηρίον) means beast; the name refers to the beast of the Christian Book of Revelation, however the bands name itself originates from the Celtic Frost Album To Mega Therion. Therion was founded by Christofer Johnsson in 1987. Beginning as death metal band they later turned to combining Orchestral elements to their metal music employing heavy use of choirs and classical musicians.

Therion's music takes its themes from different mythologies and are based on concepts ranging from Occultism, Magic and Ancient traditions and writings. The majority of their lyrics are written by Thomas Karlsson, head and founder of the magical order Dragon Rouge of which Johnsson is a member. The band has seen many changes in line-up and style since in its 18 year history.

Contents

1 History

History

Therion were formed originally under the name Blitzkrieg in Upplands Väsby, Sweden. The founder, Christofer Johnsson was originally the bassist and vocalist, he had only played the bass for a few months prior to forming the band. Joining him in this new band were Peter Hansson on guitar and Oskar Forss on drums. Johnsson and Hansson had met in several musical groups, while Forss was an old school friend of Johnsson's.

Blitzkrieg were mainly influenced by the bands Metallica and Slayer, but their sound was similar to the bands Venom and Motörhead. The band however never recorded any proper demos, and only did two concerts together before deciding to split up in 1988, only a few recordings survive today. Johnsson however didn't give up the idea and switched to guitar and began to be influnced by the Swiss band Celtic Frost. The band was reformed under the new name Megatherion with the original line-up returning, the name was shortened to Therion almost instantly. Johnsson decided to concentrate fully on vocals and guitar, so Erik Gustafsson from the death metal band Dismember joined as a bassist.

The band recorded the two demos Paroxysmal Holocaust and Beyond The Darkest Veils Of Inner Wickedness in 1989 with their new death metal sound. The demos were recorded onto cassette only. The first demo was released in 600 copies. They made 100 copies at home of Paroxysmal Holocaust (with a pretty ugly cover) before having them professionally copied. So 1100 copies of the demos where sold all in all.

This got the band enough attention to get their first EP released, Time Shall Tell. It was still technically a demo of the band, as it was only published by a local store in a printing of 1000 (although the store would later bootleg another thousand copies unoffically). The record got the band their first record deal with Deaf Records. Through this company, they released their first full-length album Of Darkness...

Of Darkness... consisted of songs Johnsson had written in the 1980s, despite having newer songs, the band chose to save them for their next full release. Of Darkness... can be seen as a progressive death metal album, it contained mainly influnces that were not standard to death metal at the time. The lyrics were very political, in the vein of Napalm Death and other 80's Hardcore Punk bands. The deal with Deaf Records was only for one album, and the band had never had a good relationship with the label in the first place, so after the release, they moved to Active Records.

The band began to record their second full length album Beyond Sanctorum in 1992. Erik Gustafsson was forced to leave the band to return home to the USA, but the band continued as a trio with Hansson and Johnsson filling in on bass. The record became very popular and got the band their first live show offers in central Europe. The record Beyond Sanctorum shows a more experimental edge to the music, with keyboards and clean vocalists used sparingly, Therion became known as an experimental death metal band from this record.

After this recording, the band ran into a few problems. Forss decided to leave the band as his wife was expecting their second child and the band lifestyle and fiancial situation didn't suit his responsibilties to his family. Hansson also quit the band after health problems. The shows in Holland were played using a new line up. Piotr Wawrzeniuk took up drumming duties, he knew Johnsson from the band Carbonized in which Johnsson also played in. The guitar was taken up by Magnus Barthelsson, an old school friend of Johnsson's while Andreas Wahl took up the bass.

With the new line up, the band recorded the experimental Ho Drakon Ho Megas in 1993. As a death metal record it was very experimental, incorperating elements of jazz, Industrial Music, traditional 80's heavy metal and religous chanting. This new record scared many death metal fans off the band, but the band developed a small following who appreciated the change and innovation the band had created. Active Records at the time decided to scale down their operations and the band was switched to the new owners Megarock Records. This company supported a tour with Therion supporting the bands Grave and Massacra throughout Germany.

The band, despite being popular with its hardcore fans, was still largly unknown. Sales were poor and the band members were having a hard time making ends meet. Despite the work they put in, there was no financial success for the band. Because of this, Barthelsson and Wahl were forced to quit the band. Fredrik Isaksson was brought into the band as the new bassist. After a few months break, the band got an offer from the famous metal label Nuclear Blast in Germany. Despite the record deal, Megarock Records decided to let Therion go without any strings attatched. This hardly ever happens in the music industry, and it shows the good relationship the band had with the label, they just lacked the resources to promote such a promising band. The band signed to Nuclear Blast in 1994 and remain with them to this day.

The first record published with the new label was Lepaca Kliffoth, though a single titled Beauty in Black was released just before as a promotion for the new record. The record was very experimental, featuring classical sopranos and bass singers. Johnsson took up a new style of singing, almost hardcore in nature. With this record, Therion shook off the last remains of their death metal sound. The band toured in Germany with the band Annihilator and also played their first South American shows. Fredrik Isaksson left the band after some personal problems with Wawrzeniuk, he also had several personal problems outside the band. Lars Rosenberg joined the band from the well known death metal band Entombed.

Naturally the sales were not good. Johnsson had several songs already written that he simply didn't have the budget to realise. Johnsson had grown tired of heavy guitar based music and wanted to experiment even more so. But naturally bands that didn't sell well didn't get the big budgets. But Johnsson was determined. He called the chief of Nuclear Blast, Markus Steiger and said ”No more album based on my vocals and I need two choirs, a better recording studio, two producers and more time in the studio - if not I rather give up the band and stay happy with what I achieved so far”. Johnsson was frustrated at the lack of live shows the band was given, because without live shows, the fans would not see the band, and sales would not increase. Luckily for Therion, Steiger was a dedicated fan and music lover. He agreed to help get the band what they needed to complete their next record. Jonas Mellberg was added to the line up, and Therion went onto record their most experimantal album yet.

The result was titled Theli. Recorded at the Impuls Studio in Hamburg it was a totally new direction for the band. Johnsson considered this his masterpiece, and also his final recording, believeing it to be far too experimental for the metal fans to accept. Wawrzeniuk was a little more optimistic, but netherless began to study a history degree at university. The album featured heavily the vocals of two choirs, along with some vocals from Johnsson and Wawrzeniuk. Dan Swanö also contributed to the vocals on this album. The band used keyboards heavily, so many in fact that it was humerously called ”Barmbek Symphony Orchestra” after the subway station next to the studio, Barmbek being a somewhat delapidated area.

After the recording, the mixing and mastering became a stressful time. Mellberg was having problems with alcohol and literally walked out of the studio, never to return to the band. Rosenberg was also having problems with alcohol, but the band survived these problems to release Theli.

The release was just as troubled as the recording. A single titled Siren Of The Woods was released beforehand to promote the new record, but an error was made in the inital pressing of the album. The first few Theli releases didn't actually contain any Therion music, due to a mix up, the first copies contained the wrong music, it contained music from a German choir singing Christmas carols. The mistake was spotted quickly and the copies recalled, they are now very collecitable among Therion fans.

The records success surprised everyone, the sales were double that of Lepaca Kliffoth and the band was offered to go on tour with the popular band Amorphis. Despite the good fortune the band now had, Johnsson was worried about touring, the songs were so elaborate, it would be very difficult to play them live. Choirs were expensive to hire for recording sessions let alone tours. Johnsson had little money to pay for the tour. Nuclear Blast had paid out 56.000 marks (around 28.000 Euro) to fund the recording of Theli, so Johnsson was conscious not to ask them for even more to fund a full tour. Through several contacts, Johnsson managed to group together a few amateur performers to sing on the tour, it wasn't perfect, but it had to do.

Johnsson also had a problem with the music, Wawrzeniuk was busy with his studies and couldn't leave to tour so Johnsson got a friend of his, Tommy Eriksson best known for the musical project Shadowseed, to fill in on drums. Tobias Sidegard (Now singer/guitarist in Death Metal band Necrophobic) was hired to play guitar, while Kimberly Goss (later in Dimmu Borgir and now in Sinergy) was hired as a keyboard player and vocalist. The tour was a big success, despite Johnsson commenting that ”the band sounded like shit”. With money being very tight at the time, Johnsson made sure everyone got their rents paid for the month, with a little extra on top.

The tour however, had many problems, Rosenberg's drinking problems got worse, resulting in him collapsing on stage and seriously hindering his musical abilities. The choir had problems adapting to the lifestlye of touring and the lead soprano began taking drugs. Johnsson didn't take kindly to this behavoir and promptly fired Rosenberg from the band. The singers used were never used again. A second tour was planned, with Wawrzeniuk as a tenor and two proffesional Sopranos. The tour took place in 1997 and was very successful. It was this year that the band celebrated their tenth anniversery with the A'arab Zaraq - Lucid Dreaming release. The record contained a few unused songs from Theli, a few cover songs the band had made, plus a full soundtrack Johnsson had made independently for the film called ”The Golden Embrace”.

The tour increased record sales, Therion were becoming well known and popular with the metal community. Nuclear Blast now promised bigger budgets for the band thanks to their success. But the problem was the "band" was essentially Johnsson and the tour musicans. He realised that they would never be up to the standards he had in mind for his next recording.

The next album, Vovin was recorded using professional studio musicians and his friend Tommy Eriksson helping out with some additional guitars. Despite being released under the name "Therion", it was essentally a solo album from Johnsson. It featured for the first time a real string orchestra and a hand picked choir of considerable number. The Austrian singer Martina Hornbacher (now Martina Astner), and Sarah Jezebel Deva (Cradle of Filth) were chosen as the lead sopranos. They would also tour with the band after the release. The recording was considerably more professional and clean, far more accessible to a mass audience. A promo release titled Eye of Shiva was sent out to radio stations before the release and is now a collectors item for Therion fans. Vovin went on to sell twice the amount that Theli did.

The band capatalised on this success and went on tour with the band Moonspell. The tour was extensive reaching from Scotland to Hungary to Portugal and Finland. The hired drummer, Sami Karppinen was offered a permentant place in the band. With this new line up, the Mini album Crowning of Atlantis was recorded. It was a short album fleshed out with several covers and live tracks that the record label and management insisted be placed on it to make it a full length album.

Karppinen was a well known metal drummer in Sweden, and had good contacts in the business. Through him, Kristian Niemann joined the band on Guitar, along with his brother Johan Niemann on Bass. Finally the band seemed to have a steady line-up. Johnsson had already made material for the next release Deggial, so again it was technically a solo album, but played by a full band with proper members. Deggial was far more symphonic, employing far more complex orchestral scores, this time using a full orchestra as opposed to a simple string one. The songs were harder to listen to then on Vovin, because of this it recieved mixed reviews. The record went onto sell more then Theli but never reached the high sales of Vovin. Therion then began a big tour to promote their new record. This was the bands first headline tour as before they had always been support acts to other bands.

On tour they were joined by Voivod and supported by Flowing Tears. Many different singers began to be used for the tour, the most famous being Anders Engberg (ex. Lions Share). Many of the fans did not know his name and he became known as ”The cool bald guy that nobody knows the name of”.

After Deggial, Johnsson began to compose again. He had many new ideas that he wanted to explore. But after writing seven songs, he got a sudden urge to take a new direction. Johnsson felt strongly about making an album based on the Nordic and Pagan religions of old. So the songs he had already composed were put aside for the time being, and using folk influences, he began to write his Nordic concept album. Johnsson had already written two of the songs earlier and it was not intended for the project, it was for a project with the Skyclad singer that never happened. He then played those songs (in demo versions) to the Niemann brothers and they told him They're too good - you cannot waste this on some other project, you must use them with Therion. And shortly after that Johnnson had this idea to make a nordic concept album. The remaining songs were based on the nine worlds of the acient Nordic Mythology, this album would be named Secret of the Runes and was released in 2001.

Johnsson decided to take most of the budget for this album and build Therion's own recording studio. Named "Modern Art" it was built so Therion no longer had to worry about timing and rent of other studios. Karppinen was the brains behind the construction, planning and actually building the majority of the studio. The Secret of the Runes album was recorded here, with Karppinen as sound engineer as well as drummer. Johnsson also personally instructed each musican involved with the recording, as opposed to using a conductor.

Therion were finally a band again with this record, with Kristian Niemann helping out on some composition and the arrangements being organised and discussed as a band. Through their contacts as a group, they were able to get the best musicans to perform on this record. Again the reviews were mixed, being the most complex and majestic music Therion had ever written. It was not metal, yet it was not classical, but a hybrid. This appealed to many people, but also equally scared off several others. Therion followed this up with a tour with Evergrey and My Insanity as support acts. After this tour, Karppinen decided to leave the band to work full time in the Modern Art studio. This was indeed a blow to the band, but Karppinen was responsible enough to find a good replacement drummer for the band - Richard Evensand.

In 2001, the Fan Club CD Bells of Doom was released exclusivly to paying Fan Club (Now called Therion Society) members. Johnsson began this society to bring together dedicated Therion fans from all over the world. The Fan Club membership has several benifits, including direct communication with the band, an active forum (in which the band also takes an active role), An exclusive store in which the band sign and dedicate everything, and audio and video section featuring music from the members side projects and other bands, and much more. The fanclub CD Bells of Doom contained many rare tracks, including some original recordings from 1987 when the band was still called "Blizkrieg". It also contained a few songs from the cassette demos, and many other rarities not found on other Therion records.

2002 came around, and so did Therion's 15th anniversery. To celebrate the band released a two disc Live album entitled Live in Midgård.

After the tour, the band decided to take stock and sort out what they had in terms of music. The seven songs that Johnsson had made had grown to a considerable number, and along with the Niemann brothers contributions the band discovered they had 55 new songs. Some were not entirly complete, but after sorting through all the material, they decided they had enough for three new albums. The band decided to record and release two of the albums simultaneously, over 170 musicans were used in the recording of the new albums, a 32 member choir was recorded in Prague along with many lead vocalists. The results were the albums Sirius B and Lemuria, released together in a special twin pack in 2004. Since that time the records have been released seperatly. The albums are far more guitar driven then previous Therion records, they are far more melodic and listenable, featuring skilled guitar work along with complex classical arrangements. Wawrzeniuk returned on this album to provide vocals, along with the singer Mats Leven. The relationship with Richard Evensand, the drummer became a problem for the band during the recording. He did one live show with Therion in the summer of 2002 and then in the middle of the recordings of Lemuria and Sirius B (2003) they mutally agreed that he would not proceed with the band. The reason was that he got offered to play with Soilwork and while he wanted to do both, Johnsson couldn't accept having a drummer that had a conflict of interests, so he told him he must choose or guarantee that Therion will always be his first priority. Evensand promised to give Therion priority, but some months later it turned out he could not keep this as Soilwork had a tour that could be colliding with a Therion tour. The Theiron tour actually never took place, but it showed that the situation with two famous bands wouldn't work and he had to choose. He then took the choice to continue with Soilwork, who (besides being one of Richard's favourite bands) had tours to be offered almost straight away, while Therion would still remain in the studio for several months (more than 10 months after Richard left it turned out to be) and after that have at least another 6 months of promoting the albums before there would be any tour or festivals. Petter Karlsson was made the new drummer in 2004 and did the complete Lemuria/Sirius B world tour with Therion.

As for the future of Therion, there may be plans to release the third album from the Sirius B/Lemuria trilogy. Therion continue to be a very creative and experimental metal band.

Current members

Christofer Johnsson - Guitar
Kristian Niemann - Guitar
Johan Niemann - Bass
Petter Karlsson - Drums

Former Members

Peter Hansson - Guitar - 1987-1993
Oskar Forss - Drums - 1987-1993
Erik Gustafsson - Bass - 1987-1992
Piotr Wawrzeniuk - Drums/Vocals 1992-1996 (Guest vocalist on Sirius B/Lemuria)
Magnus Barthelsson - Guitar - 1993-1994
Andreas Wahl - Bass - 1993-1994
Fredrik Isaksson - Bass - 1994
Lars Rosenberg - Bass - 1994-1996
Jonas Mellberg - Guitar - 1995-1996
Sami Karppinen - Drums - 1998-2001
Richard Evensand - Drums - 2001-2004