Kreator | |
---|---|
![]() Kreator performing at the Reload Festival in Germany, 2018 | |
Background information | |
Also known as | Tyrant |
Origin | Essen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany |
Genres | Thrash metal |
Discography | Kreator discography |
Years active | 1982–present |
Labels | |
Members | Miland "Mille" Petrozza Jürgen "Ventor" Reil Sami Yli-Sirniö Frédéric Leclercq |
Past members | Michael Wulf Jörg "Tritze" Trzebiatowski Frank "Blackfire" Gosdzik Tommy Vetterli Roberto "Rob" Fioretti Andreas Herz Joe Cangelosi Christian "Speesy" Giesler |
Website | www |
Kreator is a German thrash metal band from Essen, formed in 1982.[1] Their current lineup consists of lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist Miland "Mille" Petrozza, drummer Jürgen "Ventor" Reil, lead guitarist Sami Yli-Sirniö, and bassist Frédéric Leclercq. The band's lineup has changed multiple times throughout its 42-year career, most noticeably with their bassists and lead guitarists. Petrozza and Reil are the only two original members left in Kreator, although the latter took a break from the band from 1994 to 1996. Yli-Sirniö has been the lead guitarist of Kreator since 2001, while Leclercq joined in 2019 as the replacement of Christian "Speesy" Giesler, who had been a member of the band since 1994.
Kreator has released fifteen studio albums, two EPs, two live albums and three compilation albums. They gained a large underground fanbase in the international thrash metal community,[2] with their second studio album Pleasure to Kill (1986) regarded as an influential album of the genre.[1][3] Many of their subsequent albums — including Terrible Certainty (1987), Extreme Aggression (1989) and Coma of Souls (1990) — were also highly acclaimed.[4] Despite being an influential band,[5] as well as one of the first European thrash metal acts to sign to a major label (signing to Epic Records in 1988), Kreator would not achieve mainstream popularity until later albums, including their thirteenth studio album Phantom Antichrist (2012) and its follow-up Gods of Violence (2017), both of which charted highly in many countries, with the latter reaching number one on the German charts.[4][6][7] Their latest studio album, Hate Über Alles, was released on 10 June 2022,[8] and the band is currently working on new material for their next album.[9]
Kreator has achieved worldwide sales of over two million units for combined sales of all their albums, making them one of the best-selling German thrash metal bands of all time.[10][11][12] Along with Destruction, Sodom and Tankard, they are credited as one of the "Big Four" of Teutonic thrash metal,[13] responsible for developing and popularizing the German thrash metal scene as well as pioneering the then-emerging death metal and black metal genres during the mid-1980s.[14][15]