--

If you want to know how the exemplary German Power Metal should sound, just listen to Heavens Gate, the most underrated and for some people the best German band from Wolfsburg. When you listen to their early albums, you understand from the very first moment what energy and power in their pure state mean. For me this is, maybe, the only band that doesn't let me fall asleep even in the dead of night. There is something very special in their, one would think, not so complicated music that wins your heart once and for all.

It's a pity that Sascha Paeth with his talent and amazing sense of melody devotes all his time to other musical projects, and that lately we can hear unique, clear and strong voice of Thomas Rettke only as backing vocals on someone else's albums.

The band was founded in 1982 as Steeltower in Wolfsburg. In 1984 Axel Thubeauville got their tape from 'Horus Sound Studio' owned by Frank Bornemann. Axel thought it was a great band, bought the rights and released their album 'Night of the Dog' on Mausoleum Records. The lineup was as follows: Thomas Rettke - vocal, Bernd Kaufholz - guitar, Ingo Millek - guitar, Manni Jordan - bass guitar, Thorsten Muller - drums. According to other sources they were known as Carrion from the middle of the eighties.

In the spring of 1987 the band was renamed Heavens Gate.