Gardenian

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laying in the New Wave Of Scandinavian death metal, Gardenian played a melodic form of death metal known to their area. Indeed, under the membership of Jim Kjell (vocals/guitar), Niklas Engelin (guitar), Håkan Skoger (bass) and Thim Blom (drums), they would release Two Feet Stand in 1997 and Soulburner in 1999; Soulburner being a prime cut of melodic death metal except for the addition of ex-Artch vocalist Eric Hawk for half the tracks to perform Bruce Dickinson styled "clean" (not growly or raspy) vocals. The follow-up, Sindustries (2000), displayed a definite maturation with Kjell now assuming both "clean" and raspy vocals and the music moving beyond the basic "Gothenburg" sound.

In 2000, shortly after the release of Sindustries, Gardenian felt disappointed with the way their label, 'Nuclear Blast', was treating them and they separated from the label.

The band underwent some lineup changes in 2003 with Skoger then Albertsson coming and going on bass to finally settle on Robert Hakemo, Apollo Papathanisio taking over vocals, and Niklas Engelin returing on guitars to plan a release for later that year, but it never materialized, and the band broke up in early 2004. Engelin would move on to join Passenger and then In Flames. Later a new band featuring ex-members would form by the name of Kerozene.