Celtic Frost

Celtic Frost
Celtic Frost live at Tuska Open Air Metal Festival 2006. The band's distinctive skull-and-spears logo can be seen on the banners.
Background information
Origin	Zürich, Switzerland
Genres	Extreme metal, heavy metal, avant-garde metal
Years active	1984–1993, 2001–2008
Labels	Century Media, Noise, Metal Blade
Associated acts	Hellhammer, Apollyon Sun, Mind Funk, Triptykon, Kharma, Coroner
Website	www.celticfrost.com
Past members	Thomas Gabriel Fischer Martin Eric Ain Franco Sesa Isaac Darso Stephen Priestly Reed St. Mark Ron Marks Dominic Steiner Curt Victor Bryant Oliver Amberg Erol Unala

Celtic Frost (/ˈkɛltɪk frɒst/) was a Swiss extreme metal band from Zürich. They are known for their heavy influence on the extreme metal genres. Formed in 1981 as Hellhammer, the band became Celtic Frost in 1984 and was active until 1993. It re-formed in 2001 and disbanded following frontman Tom Gabriel Fischer's departure in 2008. The band was inspired by heavy metal groups such as Black Sabbath, Judas Priest and Venom, but also by gothic rock acts like Bauhaus, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Christian Death, and by the hardcore punk group Discharge.

Their music included elements of various extreme metal styles. Their earlier music was sometimes classified as thrash metal, black metal and death metal and their later work as doom metal and gothic metal. The level of experimentation on albums such as Into the Pandemonium led certain journalists to describe the band's direction as avant-garde metal.