Artist description A love of dark, atmospheric music and greater fairy tales initiated the formation of Mjölnir. Thor owned a hammer, which he casted towards his enemies. This hammer, called Mjölnir, symbolizes the destructive force of nature. Fierce lightning storms, that swipe away life as easily as it was once created. After a well-received demo, 'Whispering Sorcery' is the first release by this Holland-based band. Mjölnir's music could well be described as Atmospheric Dark Metal. While the broad keyboard parts set a fabulous, often sinister atmosphere and heavenly female vocals and clean guitars provide a lot of diversity, the edgy, layering guitar lines and deep grunts definitely make this a metalalbum. National media have so far compared Mjölnir with bands like Tristania, Within Temptation and early The Gathering. Mjölnir has already performed with well known acts like Within Temptation, Asphyx and God Dethroned. Despite musical differences, the band was able to convince the audiences at those shows.

Music Style Atmospheric Dark Metal

Musical Influences Gothic, Doom, Death, Black

Similar Artists Tristania, Within Temptation, After Forever, Sirenia, The sins of thy beloved, Trail of tears

Artist History The Mjölnir History During the fall of 1997 three members of the band Rune; keyboardplayer Xander Driessen, bassplayer Herman Kleinsmit and guitarist Dirk, formed a new band together with guitarist Wilfred de Zoete, drummer Linda de Glee and singer Jarno Wilde. This new band was called after the capricious symbol of the hammer of Thor; Mjölnir. After two months Dirk quit the band. The next year also saw a new member coming; singer Marijke Bakker joined the band. Having been part of the band for some weeks only, her first performance with Mjölnir was to be in Hedon as the support-act of gothic metallers Within Temptation. Herman decided to leave the band in october 1998, and was replaced by Carla. The following year became a very turbulent one for the band. In january 1999 the band recorded a four-track demo cd at the Landscape Studios, produced and engineered by Jan Switters. Mjölnir did a lot of gigs in local venues, and one of them was at the "Rabo rock over the Buze" contest in march, which they won unanimously. A part of the prize was to be the supporting act of the popular Dutch hiphop band Osdorp Posse, who were to play in the same venue later that year. Mjölnir opened the gig and succeeded in entertaining a full hiphop-enthusiast audience with their Atmospheric Dark Metal! In july of the same year Carla left, and the band found another person to play the bas, namely Bas Molenaar. During one of the many gigs, God Dethroned's frontman Henri Sattler was in the audience and obviously liked what he saw and heard. He offered the band a record deal on his own label ColdBlood Industries. The band signed the contract in august. Some months later the Mjölnir caravan invaded Frankie's Recording Kitchen. Finally during the fall of the apocalyptic year 2000, Mjölnir's debut album "Whispering Sorcery" was released in the Netherlands. The album was produced and engineered by Robbie Woning and Berthus Westerhuys and has artwork on it by René Bosma. One month after the Dutch release-date the album was distributed worldwide. Halfway the following year, in april, original member and main composer Xander decides to leave. The news comes as a huge shock to the band. Xander has now reached cultstatus with his new band Da Skoda's, and Mjölnir went on with keyboardplayer Vera de Geus. In november of the same year Jeroen ter Horst came to reinforce the band as second guitarist. His presence forced the other members to use earplugs during rehearsals; the sound didn't only get louder but also much more powerful. The distribution of our debut in the US was taken up by the Mexican HAK productions label in the summer of the following year. In June 2002 we were invited to play at the Gryphon Metal Festival in Sursee, Switzerland. It was Mjölnir's first time across the borders, and we had a great time there. The Swiss gig also was Linda's last gig together with Mjölnir. She decided she wanted to put her musical talents into other projects. That left us with the hard task of finding a new capable drummer. Finally in october of the same year we did find a new drummer in the person of Matthijs Oosterhof. At this moment the band is trying to suppress Matthijs's maniacal hyperspeed tendencies, writing new material, preparing for gigs and a demo cd. We are planning to record a new album somewhere next year.

Group Members Jarno - vocals; Marijke - vocals; Wilfred - guitars; Vincent - guitars; Bas - bassguitar; Vera - synths; Matthijs - drums & percussion

Instruments grunts/screams, hymns, guitars, bass, keyboards, drums

Albums Whispering Sorcery

Location Wolvega/Hilversum, Friesland/Noord-Holland - Netherlands

Copyright notice. All material on MP3.com is protected by copyright law and by international treaties. You may download this material and make reasonable number of copies of this material only for your own personal use. You may not otherwise reproduce, distribute, publicly perform, publicly display, or create derivative works of this material, unless authorized by the appropriate copyright owner(s).