Runemagick

Over the years, Gothenburg, Sweden's Runemagick have distinguished themselves as one of the most prolific, yet still most obscure, bands ever to emerge from that hallowed heavy metal capital. Boasting a straightforward but effective sound spanning the realms of death, doom, dark, and even thrash metal, Desiderius — the band that would become Runemagick — was originally founded in 1990 by vocalists/guitarists Nicklas "Terror" Rudolfsson and Robert "Reaper" Pehrsson. But after a series of demos yielded nothing more than an unauthorized bootleg in Poland and a botched U.S. record deal in 1993, a dispirited Rudolfsson vanished from sight for three years before resurfacing as a member of both Sacramentum and Deathwitch.

The latter fortuitously paired him with likeminded guitarist Fredrik Johnsson, who helped him resurrect Runemagick in 1997 as a nearly self-sufficient duo. After polishing off some of those old demos, they quickly signed with Century Media and, though still working concurrently with other projects, Runemagick managed to peel off three albums in the next three years, these being 1998's The Supreme Force of Eternity, 1999's Enter the Realm of Death, and 2000's Resurrection in Blood. In 2001 came a label switch to Norway's Aftermath Records, and to make up for lost time, the workaholic duo hired bassist Emma Karlsson (also Deathwitch) and drummer Daniel Moilanen to help them stuff not one, but two new Runemagick albums into 2002.

Most critics and fans agreed that both Requiem of the Apocalypse and Moon of the Chaos Eclipse represented career bests, but unfortunately, all of this hyperactivity finally caught up with guitarist Johnsson, who decided to concentrate on Deathwitch alone at this time. Runemagick was thus reduced to a still quite functional trio for 2003's Darkness Death Doom and 2004's On Funeral Wings.