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bass |
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vocals & guitars |
guitars |
Hammerheart is perhaps the most expressive Slovakian heavy
metal band of these days, which is proud to present itself to NWOBHM from their very
beginning. The very first idea was set up in August 1994 by, at that time, scholarly and to the
common society non-conforming rockers Denis Beláčik and Mark Estočin, who were able
to put the first complete line-up together not sooner than only in May 1995.
Jan Šintaj took the bass guitar and the drums were taken care of by Martin Bartánus.
In this line-up the band existed until February 1996. Then came Shisho -
Denis' years long friend - and took the place of the bass. Several
performances followed and yet in August of the same year the band started working
on their very first studio demo recording named "When Dark Dreams..." which was released
a year later. After Martin Bartánus left in August 1998, Mario Zvara /ex-Walkyrie/
took over his post. Thereafter the band was given its first very important music offer by the
Metal Age Productions - participation on compilation "The Grimoire of Exalted
Deeds", which resulted into the band going into the studio in March 1999 again.
The band recorded their promo material, which has been later used as an application
to the prestigious competition "Rock Made in Gambrinus". This is where Hammerheart
finished in the final 2nd place within the attendance of more than 700 bands from
former Czechoslovakia and through this success reserved itself an invitation
to the great festival "Noc plná hvezd" in Trinec, Czech Republic. The band achieved
remarkable success there. Audience really liked the performance and the media
were impressed as well. In October 1999 the above mentioned compilation was
released. Hammerheart shared the glory with about 20 bands from around the world.
In the year 2000 the band was given numerous interesting concert opportunities
and concentrated its efforts on the Czech Republic mainly where it won over
quite a powerful number of fans. In June the guys got perhaps
the greatest satisfaction in their existence when they performed as the support
for the music notability ALICE COOPER during his tour concert in Ostrava, Czech
Republic. Finally, they stood up on the main stage at the festival Noc plná
hvezd 2000. After performing with german SODOM and after cancelling the concert
with GAMMA RAY in Zlin (Czech Republic) they finished the year at Hammerock
2000 in the home environment, this time warming up the instruments for the legend
called SAXON. During the next year the band continues with live performances
until the beginning of July when Denis is leaving to Ireland. After his return,
soon in October 2001 Mark and Mario definitely left the band due to many
differences in the band's future meaning. After very short search, new members
are found. Ian Glorian - the excelent axeman & Adrian Ciel not worse on drums.
This line-up is to last for 2 years only as
in the beginning of 2004 Mario comes back to the band. Two years later,
In May of 2006 the long awaited debut album "Dreamworks" is finally released through
Ride Production company. Subsequently the band tries to make a small distribution
& promotion into several countries - especially Japanies fans are really fascinated of
how great this record sounds. Significant success of this title flows very quickly
into pre-agreement with German Karthago Records to release
band's second album that should be available at the end of 2010.
As Shisho left the band very shortly after the Dreamworks release in August 2006,
it took some time to find a suitable replacement. This caused also the band not performing
so many live shows through the next couple of years and postponing all works for the next CD.
All seems to be fine at the end of 2008 again, when new bassman is finally discovered - the young blood
for Hammerheart - Ivan Dzurek. This is followed with Adrian Ciel's return to the band in August 2009.
So new episode may begin now ... by the middle of 2014 they've started small cooperation with ex-Iron Maiden singer Blaze Bayley. They play several shows together as his support band for special Maiden shows. Early in 2020 the long-awaited joined single Distant Skies is released shortly followed by the full album Beyond The Farthest Point. |
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