In 1994 they broke up with their formal producer and chose Flemming Rasmussen, the guy behind some of the best Metallica albums. With this album they followed lots of other bands who chose Tokyo as the location of a live album. With the success of this album they got a world-wide recognition. Every self-respecting Blind Guardian fan should know these by heart. On this album we should remark 'The Bard's Song' (originally a single but never got the chance), with two awesome parts: 'In The Forest' and 'The Hobbit'. It also has speed songs like the cover 'Trial By Fire' and their own song 'Journey Through The Dark'. The sound on their fourth album was pretty much the same as the sound on their previous one: it successfully blends epic ballads with metal resolving to a magnificent outcome. In 1992 they released 'Somewhere Far Beyond'. In September 1991 the band signed with Virgin (which was - according to many - responsible for the broad success of their next album). This album opened a new chapter in the Guardian story.įor the first time they also had the cover painting done by Andreas Marshall, a veteran in designing covers for popular German metal groups.Īfter the third album their records were distributed in Japan, which had become a major fan base for Blind Guardian. This time they had, according to Hansi Kürsch, also spent more time on the lyrics. The 'speed', however, was still there (just listen to songs like 'Goodbye My Friend' or 'Welcome To Dying'). An album that combines epic and melodic metal with such success, creating an unique style of music. They had gone from raw speed-metal to a sound more melodic. It made their music known to all other continents. With the third album (1990), 'Tales from the Twilight World', they made some drastic changes in their music.

Up to this point, there music was still very like Helloween. He did some guitar-work and some singing on 'Valhalla' and 'Hall of the King'. The next year (1989) they released their second album, 'Follow The Blind', featuring appearances by formal Helloween-guitarist and present Gamma Ray-vocalist Kai Hansen. Some months later, they signed a contract with 'No Remorse', and in 1988 they released their debut album 'Battallions of Fear' which resembled early Helloween, with the production of Kalle Trapp.

They were quite successful in German underground and lateron they changed their name to Blind Guardian. In the early days they recorded two demos: 'Symphonies Of Doom' (1985) (wich wasn´t such a big hit), and 'Battalions of Fear' (1986) (which was quite successfull).

This band was obviously influenced by RPG Epic metal and Helloween. Lucifer's Heritage consisted of four skilled bards: They have had the same lineup since (talk about friendship!). There the band was originally formed in 1985, under the name Lucifer´s Heritage. The four bards have their origins in the small town of Krefeld in Germany.

The bards tale blind guardian