At The Gates
Biography At The Gates
At the Gates
was formed in Gothenburg Sweden, in 1990, by former members of the death/black metal band Grotesque. They recorded a debut EP, Gardens of Grief, for the Dolores record label, and sold cassettes, vinyl, and t-shirts to promote the recording. The EP led seminal metal label Peaceville Records to sign the band, and they released their debut full-length album, The Red in the Sky Is Ours, in 1992, an album with an eclectic sound, featuring neo-classical arrangements including a string solo.
After the recording of their second studio album, With Fear I Kiss the Burning Darkness, founding member and guitarist Alf Svensson left the band in 1993 to pursue tattoo artistry, comic illustration and his solo electronic-opera-black metal project Oxiplegatz. He was soon replaced by former House of Usher Martin Larsson, who the band knew during their early tours. The band continued touring Europe, and were filmed for a Headbangers Ball special featuring a tour date in the United Kingdom in July 1994.
In 1994, At the Gates released their third album, Terminal Spirit Disease, which was hailed as a breakthrough album. It contained only six new songs, but showed that the band’s sound had progressed immensely in only one year, in terms of playing and production.
The band continued touring and in 1995 released their most commercially and critically successful album, Slaughter of the Soul, on Earache Records. The album is known as their most melodic death metal sound than previous albums. This album firmly rooted the band as one of the leaders of the Swedish metal scene and was labelled as a benchmark album in the Gothenburg sound by AMG.
The band received international attention for the album, gaining them a U.S. tour and heavy rotation of the music video for Blinded by Fear on MTV in America, but despite this international success, the Björler brothers departed in 1996. The remaining members decided it would be impossible to continue without them, so the band broke up. When At the Gates broke up, drummer Adrian Erlandsson, bassist Jonas Björler, and guitarist Anders Björler formed The Haunted. Tomas Lindberg has worked with many bands including Skitsystem, The Crown, Lock Up, Nightrage, The Great Deceiver and Disfear. In 2001, Peaceville Records released an At the Gates retrospective called Suicidal Final Art.
At the Gates announced several reunion shows for mid-2008, including Getafe Electric Festival, Roskilde Festival, Ruisrock, Wacken Open Air, Graspop Metal Meeting, Sweden Rock Festival, Gods of Metal, Hellfest Summer Open Air, Castle Festival, and Bloodstock Open Air, as well as a tour of Japan with The Dillinger Escape Plan, Into Eternity, Pig Destroyer, and Mayhem in May 2008.
When asked in October 2007 if the band was planning on writing a new album, Lindberg replied:
“ No new record will be recorded. The legacy of Slaughter of the Soul will remain intact. It would be fun to write together, but not under the name of At the Gates. ”
Throughout July 2008, they toured the US and Canada on what was dubbed the “Suicidal Final Tour”, and played their final UK show at Bloodstock Open Air on Sunday on 17 August 2008.
In December 2010, the band announced a second reunion in their hometown Gothenburg, Sweden where they will perform at Metaltown 2011. Later that month they announced that they would perform at Bloodstock Open Air in Derbyshire, England.
