Emerald

The heavy metal band Emerald from Düdingen, Switzerland was founded in 1995 and rose out of the ashes of the 2 local bands Dark Crystal and Oppress. Two years later Emerald played their very first gig at the annual concert of the local music school "David's Musicworld"in the following line-up: Jvo Julmy (vocals / guitar), Michael Vaucher (guitar), Adriano Troiano (bass), Thomas Vaucher (keyboards) and Stefan Neuhaus (drums).

In this line-up, Emerald recorded their first self-financed album Rebels Of Our Time which was released independently in 1999. In general the album was very well received.

Shortly after, Adriano Troiano decided to leave the band since he wanted to concentrate on his own projects. A replacement was found in Stephan Kaufmann.

In 2001 the band delivered their second independent release Calling The Knights. The reviews for this album were once again stellar and the CD was even awarded "demo of the month" in the prestigious Rock Hard Magazine. This led to the band's first record contract with the german label "Shark Records / Crazy Life Music" who then re-released Calling The Knights in a re-mixed version with new artwork and 2 bonus tracks.

Later that year, drummer Stefan Neuhaus quit the band to spend more time with his family. After a long and tedious search, a suitable replacement was found in Andy Bächler.

In 2003 Emerald had the honour of playing at the Headbangers Open Air in Germany. 

In 2004 Emerald entered the Mohrmann Studios in Germany to start the recording of their 3rd album Forces of Doom which was released via Shark Records.

In 2006 Emerald signed a new contract with Pure Steel Records and started working on the next album Hymns To Steel. At that time Adriano Troiano re-joined the band and replaced bassist Stephan Kaufmann who left the band due to personal reasons.

Right after the release of Hymns To Steel in 2007, drummer Andy Bächler decided to leave Emerald as well in order to concentrate on other projects. Al Spicher was recruited as the new man behind the drumkit.

In the middle of the songwriting process for the next album, Emerald had to undergo once more a massive line-up change: Founding member and main trademark of the old Emerald sound, Jvo Julmy quit the band due to personal reasons. Since Julmy was the band's vocalist as well as the 2nd guitarist, he was replaced by 2 new members: Thomas L. Winkler on vocals and Manuel Werro on guitar. 

In 2010, the newborn sextett entered the Little Creek Studio in Switzerland to record their fifth album Re-Forged under the supervision of producer V.O. Pulver (gurD, Poltergeist, Destruction). The album featured some very special guests such as Sean Peck (Cage), Mike Sifringer (Destruction) and Damir Eskic (Gonoreas). Despite the massive Line-up changes the record was very well received by the press as well as the fans. Emerald were able to promote their album at the Up The Hammers Festival in Athens, among others,

Only 2 years later, Emerald released their sixth studio album Unleashed which was once again produced by V.O. Pulver. With George Call (Aska / ex-Omen / Banshee) the album featured once more a very special guest. The band went on to promote this album on their first ever European tour as support for the legendary US metal band Helstar, which brought them to countries like Germany, Belgium, The Netherlands, Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria and Switzerland.

Meanwhile the album received once again excellent reviews from all over the globe.

In the beginning of 2013 Thomas L. Winkler and Manuel Werro decided to leave the band. While Manuel left immediately, Thomas agreed to still play all remaining gigs that were scheduled for the rest of the year. A new lead guitarist was quickly found in Julien Menth. 

Meanwhile, the long and tedious search for a new singer began. No suitable Swiss singer seemed to be available for the position. In 2014 the band finally scored George Call (who already appeared as special guest on the previous album) as the new voice of Emerald. Since George was based in the US, it wasn't possible to play any gigs for the time being. Therefore Emerald concentrated on writing new songs for the upcoming album. During that time Adriano Troiano once again left the band due to lack of motivation. A replacement was immediately found in young bass player Vania Truttmann.

In November 2014 Emerald hit the Little Creek Studio once more to record the songs for the next album in their instrumental versions. Afterwards the tracks were send to George to add his vocals overseas. But since George was a very busy man and involved with several other bands and projects, it took him more than a year to start the recordings of his vocals for the album. Meanwhile the band grew impatient and started looking again for a new singer based in Switzerland. This time they were lucky and found the perfect singer in Mace Mitchell. George still contributed 3 tracks for the album. The rest was performed by Mace.

The new record is called Reckoning Day and will finally see the light of day in early 2017.

To be continued...