AVANTASIA

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Download the track "Dying For An Angel" from the album "The Wicked Symphony" as MP3 for free!

About Avantasia

Tobias Sammet became known amongst Rock fans all over the world as the singer and songwriter of EDGUY, one of Germany's biggest internationally acclaimed Rock bands in recent music history, having played numerous headline tours in Europe, Australia, Asia and North, Central, and South America.
In 1999 Tobias started his side project AVANTASIA.


AVANTASIA cooperation: Tobias Sammet and Klaus Meine (Scorpions)

What was originally planned as a one-off studio affair, was revived in 2007. The album "The Scarecrow" was released in 2008 and was officially amongst the 20 best selling albums all over Europe upon its release, it entered the charts in 15 countries (Germany #8), featured the Top 10 hit single "Lost In Space" and producer Sascha Paeth received an award for "The Scarecrow" having been chosen "Best Rock Production 2008" by the Association of German Sound Engineers (VDT).
On the album Tobias had been working with fellow musicians like Jorn Lande, Eric Singer (KISS), Rudolf Schenker (SCORPIONS), Bob Catley (MAGNUM), Kai Hansen and Michael Kiske both ex-HELLOWEEN), Alice Cooper and many more.

The unexpected success of the album resulted in a Festival-tour, climaxing with a headlining show at the prestigious Wacken Open Air in front of more than 85.000 people. When the tour was over AVANTASIA had played in Europe, Asia and South America in front of more than half a million people. Tobias later recalled: "Allstar albums are being recorded quite often, but I don't think the Heavy Metal circus has seen a giant allstar show like that travelling around the world."
To this date EDGUY and AVANTASIA have sold more than 2.5 million CDs worldwide - exclusively on Independent labels and to quote Tobias: "(...) without kissing ass in today's fast food music business (...)"

Despite his busy lifestyle and another two world tours TOBIAS SAMMET spent the few free weeks in 2008 and 2009 in the studio to work together with producer Sascha Paeth on new AVANTASIA-material which is now in the form of the albums ”The Wicked Symphony” and ”Angel Of Babylon” just before its release (April 3rd). Like the former masterpieces there will be breathtaking performances of numerous guest stars for the fans. So the majority of the drums was recorded with KISS-drummer ERIC SINGER, ex-KISS-guitarist BRUCE KULICK did many lead guitars and JUDAS PRIEST-fans are able to look forward to the cooperation with RIPPER OWENS. In addition to it there is the duet of TOBIAS and SCORPIONS-front man KLAUS MEINE on the hymnal earwig ”Dying For An Angel”. For this song there also has been a video shooting.

Since March 2011, the 2DVD "The Flying Opera" is released. What is documented on this double-DVD now is the highly memorable first AVANTASIA world tour that followed after the album’s big success. It included not only a headliner show at the” Wacken Open Air” in 2008 and at the “Masters Of Rock” festival in Czech Republic, but also shows in Asia, South America and all over Europe in front of more than 500.000 people! Tobias walks down memory lane:
“We went from Switzerland to Sweden, from there to Moscow, Tokyo, Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Santiago de Chile, Sao Paulo and back to Europe within a few days! We barely slept but had much to laugh about – everyone was good-tempered all the time. (…) It doesn’t matter whether you play in Russia or Brazil – as soon as you’re on stage, you speak a universal language!”

In the end, “The Flying Opera“ illustrates the sheer magnitude of this historic event perfectly and sure is huge fun to watch for AVANTASIA fans from all over the globe!