Masquerade (Swedish band)

Masquerade
Origin	Skövde, Sweden
Genres	Rock, Hard rock, Heavy Metal, Power metal, Neo-classical metal
Years active	1988–present
Labels	Metal Blade
Members	Tony Johansson – vocals, Thomas G:son – guitars, Marco Tapani – drums, Henrik Lundberg – bass

Masquerade are a Swedish rock band established in Autumn 1988. They released their debut album in 1992 and have since released four further albums.

During their first two years the band concentrated on writing music, rehearsing, and performing live. In 1990 Masquerade recorded a promotional cassette and a single that was favorably reviewed in the English magazine Metal Hammer. After signing on with Empire Records, in early 1991 the band started recording their self-titled album. The record company brought the engineer Ronny Lahti (Saigon Kick, Europe, Talisman, Electric Boys, Clockwise) into the project for finalizing the mixing. The album was released in 1992 to positive reviews by critics, who found the album comparable to the music of bands like Whitesnake and Def Leppard.

After their first album tour, the band developed new material, and began recording their new album Surface of Pain, again together with Ronny Lahti as the sound and mixing engineer. Released in 1995, the album was characterized by a heavier approach than the debut album, and gained the band exposure to an American audience.

The band then worked together on the third album Flux with Fredrik Nordström, who had achieved success with the band HammerFall.

In Disguise was released in 2004, and issued in Japan in 2005 on Spiritual Best Records.

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