Along with other pioneers of technical and progressive Euro thrash, from Mekong Delta to Midas Touch, Sweden’s Hexenhaus deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as Watchtower and Toxik, but for some reason, things just never took off, despite classic late 80s jewels such as ‘A Tribute To Insanity’ and ‘The Edge Of Eternity’. Freshly signed to ROAR, the long split-up Swedes will find their first three albums hitting the shelves once again on May 16th.
Depending on the path you chose, one could say that the story of Sweden’s best kept thrash metal secret starts all the way up in the northern parts of Sweden. In a city called Boden to be more precise. That’s where the metal force Maninnya Blade took it’s form during the middle of the 80s. Their take on techy speed metal caught the interest of the young guitarist Mickael Vikström, better known as Mike Wead and later on the guitarist in both Mercyful Fate and King Diamond. He would start out as a fan of the band, but it didn’t take long until’ he was their new guitarist and the talk of the town.
“When I joined them they already had four great songs more or less done already,” Wead reveals. “The style was much heavier than the music we had done before and to mark the fresh start of the band, at least that’s how we saw it, we also decided to change the name from Maninnya to Hexenhaus. The name is German for witch’s house and is a reference to the Malefizhaus in Bamberg, Germany. A frightful place where hundreds of suspected witches were tortured and executed during the early 17th century.”
After signing with Axis Records, the band entered the studio to record their stellar debut album ‘A Tribute To Insanity’. Half of the album contains the four songs that made up the demo, as well as four more songs that seen the band combine ideas and trading riffs like never heard before on a Swedish metal album. ‘A Tribute To Insanity” was originally released on vinyl on the 17th of October 1988. Pre-order the ROAR reissue, along with ‘The Edge Of Eternity’ and 1991’s ‘Awakening’, three must-haves that belong in every well-sorted speed and thrash metal record collection, now on https://Hexenhaus.rpm.link/tributePR