ABRAXAS, a power metal band from southern Germany which was founded at the end of 1985 by Jan Müller (bass) and Heiko Burst (drums).
Following several gigs and after our first demo called "Vampire" which was recorded in early 1988, we gained considerable success.

With line-up changes in Joachim Hittinger (vocals) and Oliver Mindner (guitar) we found two appropriate musicians for our band. Back then, we recorded our second demo "Shattered By A Terrible Prediction" (1989) with Oliver, who was 15 at that time. The demo received excellent reviews by our fans and in the press.

With this production and some great live gigs (along with U.D.O., Zed Yago, Sinner, Kruiz) bigger magazines such as Metal Hammer, Break Out and Rock Hard as well as some reputable record companies paid attention to us.

This led to Multimedia Publishing taking notice of us and releasing the demo as an EP in the spring of 1989. However, despite producing 1.000 copies they didn't manage to deliver them to the stores and we were obliged to distribute them ourselves.

After this, Stephan Rohner (guitar) and Andreas Hittinger (keyboards) joined us in summer 1989. Joachim Hittinger left and in June 1990 the ex-MANIA shouter Chris Klauke (vocals) joined us.

With this line-up we produced the demo "Gates To Eden" in December 1990. This demo was well received by the national and international press and got pretty awesome reviews by our fans, as well.

Due to this fact we were able to sell quite a lot of tapes and even some record companies took notice and made us various offers. Unfortunately, these offers proved to be unacceptable for us after we had taken a closer look. Therefore, we recorded our follow-up demo "Signs" in December 1991. This demo got fantastic reviews and a lot of airplay all over the World.

During the newcomer festival in Reutlingen in March 1992 we clearly left 17 other bands behind and ranked in first place.

In December '92 we reached the 3rd place of the biggest German newcomer band-contest at Rockfabrik in Ludwigsburg.

After that we decided to record the self-financed full length album "The Liaison". The album was recorded and mixed at the excellent Marquee-Studios in Reutlingen. Everybody who had already listened to it was totally impressed without any exception. Without doubt, with this album we surely will move a big step forward on the national and international market. Mid September '93 "The Liaison" was released in Japan.

Due to circumstances beyond the bands power the album was not released in Europe right after its Japanese release. The label which were supposed to release it in 1994 in Europe were sold to another company which completely changed the concept of the label. No more heavy metal releases. A few months later the label disappeared from the scene. A guy who worked for the label joined another company and took Abraxas over there. But the negotiations didn't led to a final result for both parties. A short time later the label went bankrupt. The same person who took the band to this label founded his own company Milecrest Music and could finally conclude a contract with the band. He always believed in the band and didn't give it up. To make the album more attractive the packaging was improved with new cover artwork, new layout, three bonus tracks and a new remastered sequence.

The album title changed to "Tomorrows World" and will be definitely released through A2Z records, a label of Milecrest Music, in October 1997. Since (mid 1994) the Japanese pressing was never repressed, there are always lots of requests for this album from all over the World. It's a true power metal classic in old German Metal tradition.

Now something about our name. ABRAXAS is a magic word stemming from the Alexandrinical Gnossis (= revelation). The value of the Greek letters equals 365. ABRAXAS, therefore, is something like a God of the year. This God was displayed on the so-called ABRAXAS-gemstones as a being with human body, snake feet and a cock's head.

From www.tartareandesire.com