Primordial

Biography

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Primordial (1987-present): a Black Metal band from Dublin, Ireland.

ack in 1987 Primordial started when Pól MacAmhlaigh (bass) and Ciarán MacUiliam (guitars/bodhrán/tin whistle/keyboards) first began playing together with Pól's brother, Derek (drums) and new recruit Naihmass Nemtheanga (vocals). The band (who were called Forsaken for a brief period) played a rough hybrid mix of early, primitive thrash metal and Death metal involving a lot of covers of Death, Sepultura, and the like).

vocalist Nemtheanga (Real Name: Alan Averill) joined the band after seeing an advertizement in the Dublin specialist heavy metal shop The Sound Cellar in 1991.

After Nemtheanga joined, the band started to pursue a darker direction citing influence from Bathory, Celtic Frost and the emerging Greek and Norwegian black metal scenes.

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Primordial was the first black metal styled band to emerge from Ireland with the release of their Dark Romanticism (1993) demo in the early summer of 1993. After a live 1994 soundboard recording from Dublin was sent to 'Cacophonous Records', the band was subsequently signed for the release of their debut album Imrama.

Although their debut album, Imrama (1995), was in a more melodic black metal musical direction, they gradually came to refine their sound with A Journey's End (1998), which included the use of mandolins and whistles and a more epic style. The two subsequent releases, The Burning Season EP (1999) and Spirit the Earth Aflame (2000), showed the band's reflection of cultural geist and emotion, woven into black, Celtic, and folk metal musical styles. They then toured with various bands into the extreme metal genre, including Norwegian black metal band Immortal.

For A Journey's End, Simon O'Laoghaire took over drums. This arrangement lasted for Spirit the Earth Aflame and Storm Before Calm (2002).

Primordial's fourth studio album, Storm Before Calm, but it was the band's fifth album, The Gathering Wilderness (2005; with Micheál O'Floinn on guitars), that turned out to be a much darker and bleaker record than any they had made before.

In January 2006 the band played their first US show alongside Thyrfing and Moonsorrow at the Heathen Crusade Metalfest in Columbia Heights, Minnesota.

The band's sixth album, To the Nameless Dead, was released on 16 November 2007.

In November and December 2010, the band entered Foel Studio in Wales to work with producer Chris Fielding once again. The resulting album, Redemption at the Puritan's Hand was released via Metal Blade on April 22, 2011.

2014 saw the release of their eighth studio album, Where Greater Men Have Fallen. The EP Heathen Legacy (2018) followed, along with Exile Amongst the Ruins (2018). The Camelot Sessions (2022) and How It Ends (2023) followed, after which O'Laoghaire would leave.

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