Cruelty and the Beast is the third studio album by English extreme metal band Cradle of Filth. It is a concept album based on the legend of the Hungarian "blood countess" Elizabeth Báthory and features guest narration by actress Ingrid Pitt in-character as Báthory, a role she first played in the Hammer Horror film Countess Dracula in 1971. It was released on 5 May 1998 by record label Music for Nations.
Paradise Lost are an English gothic metal band. Formed in Halifax, West Yorkshire in 1988, they are considered to be among the pioneers of the death-doom genre and regarded as the main influence for the later gothic metal movement. Bands that have cited Paradise Lost as an influence, or have covered them, include My Dying Bride, Anathema, The Gathering, Amorphis, Cradle of Filth, Katatonia, Moonspell, Lacuna Coil, HIM, Nightwish and many others. As of 2005, Paradise Lost have sold over two million albums worldwide.
Dan-Erland Swanö, also known as Dan "The Man" Swanö, is a Swedish musician and record producer who is currently the vocalist, guitarist, ex-bassist and ex-drummer for the band Nightingale, lately vocalist, keyboardist and drummer for the band Witherscape, as well as the owner of Unisound, but he achieved fame as the vocalist and songwriter of progressive death metal band Edge of Sanity.
Katatonia is a Swedish heavy metal band formed in Stockholm in 1991 by Jonas Renkse and Anders Nyström. The band started as a studio-only project for the duo, as an outlet for the band's love of death metal. Increasing popularity led them to add more band members for live performances, though outside of the band's founders, the lineup was a constantly changing, revolving door of musicians throughout the 1990s, notably including Mikael Åkerfeldt of the band Opeth for a period. After two death/doom albums, Dance of December Souls (1993) and Brave Murder Day (1996), problems with Renkse's vocal cords coupled with new musical influences led the band away from the screamed vocals of death metal to a more traditional, melodic form of heavy metal music.
Sarah Jane, better known by her stage name Sarah Jezebel Deva, is an English singer. She was the female soprano vocalist for Cradle of Filth for 14 years and the frontwoman of the band Angtoria for 10 years. In 2009, Deva started her self-titled solo project, releasing two studio albums and one EP from 2010 to 2012, and in 2020 announced she would be working with former Angtoria bandmate Chris Rehn on a new project entitled Torn Between Two Worlds.
Draconian is a Swedish gothic metal band formed in Säffle in 1994.
Brave Murder Day is the second studio album by Swedish heavy metal band Katatonia, released on 1 August 1996 by Avantgarde Music. The lead vocals on the album are provided by Mikael Åkerfeldt of Opeth, as Katatonia frontman Jonas Renkse was medically unable to perform screamed vocals anymore following health issues that arose from performing the band's debut. It was also the band's first album with second guitarist Fredrik Norrman.
The Great Cold Distance is the seventh studio album by Swedish heavy metal band Katatonia, released on 13 March 2006. The album was recorded and mixed at Fascination Street Studios in Örebro between May and August 2005.
October Tide is a Swedish death/doom metal band that was created in 1994 by Katatonia vocalist Jonas Renkse and then-Katatonia guitarist Fred Norrman. Norrman revived the band after leaving Katatonia in 2009.
Kill II This are an English groove metal/industrial metal band from Manchester.
Universum are a heavy metal band from Adelaide, South Australia. The band completed formation in early 2007 and describe their sound a fusion of Scandinavian melodic death metal, new wave American metal, old school thrash metal and progressive metal. Universum have released two albums to date, the debut album Leto Destinatus on 15 June 2008 and their second album Mortuus Machina on 1 January 2011.
Travis Smith is an American graphic artist best known for designing heavy metal album art. He has been called "renowned" by Alternative Press and "unquestionably one of the most talented graphic artists in metal today" by Chronicles of Chaos. Smith has done work for many established rock and metal bands, including Death, Devin Townsend, Katatonia, Nevermore, Opeth, Anathema, CKY, Soilwork, King Diamond, Novembre, Avenged Sevenfold, Strapping Young Lad, Persefone, Riverside and Overkill.
Night Is the New Day is the eighth studio album by Swedish heavy metal band Katatonia. It was released 2 November 2009, in Europe and 10 November 2009, in North America through Peaceville Records. Thirteen tracks were recorded, eleven of which made it onto the record. The band describes the material as "Our most varied, diverse and possibly strongest shit all together on one and the same album". "Idle Blood" had the working title "Kozelek", named after Mark Kozelek, a member of Red House Painters, which is one of Katatonia's influences. This is the last Katatonia release with the Norrman brothers.
Creation's Tears are an Irish heavy metal/gothic metal band based in Northern Ireland, with some members based in England.
Jens Peter Daniel Bogren is a Swedish record producer, mixer and recording engineer specializing in heavy metal music. He has worked on albums by Opeth, Dimmu Borgir, Sepultura, Arch Enemy, At the Gates, Katatonia, Babymetal, Soilwork, James LaBrie, Moonspell, God Forbid, Kreator, Devin Townsend, Ihsahn, Dark Tranquillity, Paradise Lost, Amon Amarth, DragonForce, The Ocean, Haken, Between the Buried and Me, Rotting Christ, Symphony X, Myrath, Angra, Dir En Grey, and Powerwolf, amongst others. Bogren lives in Örebro, Sweden and runs both Fascination Street Studios and Bogren Digital.
"Serein" is a song by Swedish heavy metal band Katatonia. It is the second single off of their tenth studio album The Fall of Hearts. The song title alludes to the concept of raining without clouds being visible.
"Old Heart Falls" is a song by Swedish heavy metal band Katatonia. It is the first single off of their tenth studio album The Fall of Hearts.
The Ghost of Orion is the thirteenth studio album by British heavy metal band My Dying Bride. It was released on 6 March 2020 through Nuclear Blast.
City Burials is the eleventh studio album by Swedish heavy metal band Katatonia. The album continues the progressive rock direction used in recent albums while returning to some of their earlier metal instrumentation. Three singles were released in promotion of the album; "Lacquer", "Behind the Blood", and "The Winter of Our Passing".
ØMNI is the ninth full-length studio album by Brazilian progressive/power metal band Angra and the first album by the band with guitarist Marcelo Barbosa replacing Kiko Loureiro, who left the band to join Megadeth. It was elected the 2nd best metal album of 2018 by the traditional Japanese heavy metal magazine Burrn!.
