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Talisman are an excellent hard rock band characterized by an international melodic/powerful sound |
Talisman started off more or less as the brainchild of the amazing bass player Marcel Jacob. He played with bands like Rising Force, John Norum Group and Power. |
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On the first self titled album,Talisman were not really a band: Marcel was playing with John Norum when he started working on the tracks he thought would end up on the second Norum's solo album after he left Europe. The singer on those demos was Göran Edman, also in John Norum Group at that time. But John rejected the songs and, in the meantime, Göran was offered to join Yngwie Malmsteen. |
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Marcel was later contacted by a guy who had previously worked for the label which had originally showed some interest in the demos. This guy was pretty much sure that a couple of tracks could easily become hits. This was very good but Marcel didn’t basically have anyone lined up. |
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So he started looking around for musicians, while the auditions done to some Swedish vocalist contenders were unsuccessful. Cary Sharaf (ex Wasa Express guitar player) suggested the name of Jeff Scott Soto: he was called, he got the material and said yes! |
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Both Jeff and Marcel had played on Malmsteen's "Marching Out" in 1985, hitting the road to support the album and making quite a stir in Japan. |
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In February of 1989 the recordings for the first album took place in Stockholm with Christopher Ståhl (Power) and Mats Lindfors (Norum, Grand Slam) on guitars, Peter Hermansson (220 Volt, Norum) playing drums on some tracks and Mats Olausson (Yngwie Malmsteen, Glory) on keyboards. Marcel programmed the rest of drums and played all rhythm guitars with the help of the producer Mats Lindfors on "Women, whiskey and songs" |
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| Unfortunately, Electra Records, the label Marcel was signed to, went bankrupt just when the mixing was finished, therefore the album got locked for a while. |
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Meanwhile, Jeff US based project Eyes got signed. Marcel left for LA to help Eyes demo and record what would be their first release. |
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During this time somebody from the label that had originally signed Talisman found a new label to work for and the masters of the first album were bought from the bankruptcy. So “Talisman” was eventually released in February 1990 on the Airplay/Vinyl Mania. |
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The first single "I'll be waiting" was tested on the biggest hit radio show and reached number 2 in the top ten of the singles chart! The album ended up selling more than 33,000 copies in two months in Sweden! |
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On live gigs the band featured Jason Bieler on guitar (Saigon Kick), Jakob "Jake Samuels" Samuelsson on drums and Thomas Wikström (Talk of the town, Candlemass) on keyboards and backing vocals. Talisman ended up on the top ten list of drawing acts in Sweden in the summer. Unfortunately, the label went bust putting an end to any chances of international adventures for the album. |
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The time following summer 1990 was rather difficult. Jeff was signed to the label Pasha Records doing Eyes. Jason Bieler was enjoying some success with Saigon Kick. |
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Marcel got signed to Warner Records Sweden because of the success of "Talisman" and had to put together a band. A trip to the US and the UK followed, looking for talent but nothing really worked. |
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Eventually Marcel met again Matti Alfonzetti, an old acquaintance from grade school and from touring in 1986 with Swedish fusion/rock group Wasa Express, and they started writing and recording together in 1992. |
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After some auditions, Matti, Marcel and Jake Samuels chose the young guitar player Fredrik Åkesson (19 years old at the time). When everything seemed to be perfect, the guy that got Marcel signed to Warner left and the new person in charge was not interested in dealing with any acts he hadn’t signed himself. |
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Since it took most of 1992 to find a new label, Matti Alfonzetti left and joined Skin Trade. |
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Christer Wedin, who was doing some press and promotion for the label that released “Talisman”, became the Swedish label manager for Dutch/Canadian label Dino Music (later Empire Records). Christer was interested in releasing a second Talisman album, if only Jeff was available. As Eyes were history (the album was released on a label apparently dealing with rock music for the first time), JSS agreed. So back to the studio once again! |
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In the meantime Jake Samuels had left to join Zinny Zan's band and so Marcel programmed all drums. The new album "Genesis" was recorded in three weeks’ time in December 1992 at Stocksund Recording Studios, in the elegant quarter of Stockholm, where the video for "Mysterious" was shot as well. Jeff joined the guys with his then girlfriend Julie Greaux (Billy Idol, Axel Rudi Pell) who ended up playing the grand piano on "All I want". |
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In conjunction with the release of "Genesis" early 1993, Dino Music Records managed to obtain licensing of the first album from Vinyl Mania and re-issued "Talisman" adding six live tracks taken from some gigs played in Sweden in 1990. |
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When “Genesis” was released, the single “Mysterious” got some airplay, and the album immediately sold more than 15,000 copies in Sweden. Furthermore, both “Talisman” and “Genesis” gathered some international interest and were released in Japan on Zero. |
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The band did a club tour in Sweden in March with Julie Greaux on keyboards and Jake Samuels back again on drums. |
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While the band was planning a tour in Japan, Jake left again to pursue a singing career. The new drummer was found in Jamie Borger (long time favourite drummer for Marcel) from the just broken up band Treat. Talisman became “a group” for the first time and were now ready to tour Japan (where the live album "5 out of 5" was recorded and released postponed) and Europe. |
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| For the next album the group prepared more than for any previous recording. |
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After the end of the European tour early October, the guys were supposed to fly to LA to record the already available material. But those plans were disregarded and the recording got delayed. Fredrik, Jamie and Marcel spent the following two months in a rehearsal studio in Upplands Väsby, just outside Stockholm, writing, playing bits of music, improvising arrangements, learning the new stuff and collecting tons of material. |
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In January 1994 Jeff joined the guys and the band recorded and mixed the new album "Humanimal" at Sound Trade Studios in Stockholm. Everything was perfect: the recording sessions, the working environment, everyone having much fun! Except for Jeff being worried about his home situation because of the huge earthquake which hit LA killing 60 and injuring around 8,000 people.
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Additional musicians on “Humanimal” were Julie Greaux as backing vocalist and the sound engineer Ronny Lahti playing the funky wah guitar on "Seasons". |
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The guys, being so pleased with the recordings (22 tracks recorded and mixed in 22 days), wanted to make it a double album at first place but then decided against it since pretty much all the material would fit on one cd. So Jeff and Marcel chose the set of the songs to be on the album. |
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Unfortunately, the Japanese label Zero Records, was allowed to put together their own version of the album suitable for the Japanese audience. |
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The whole matter turned out to be a mess: the German version by Polydor was different from the Swedish one featuring "Hypocrite" as bonus track; the Japanese had to release the Swedish version too because of the amount of imports; in Europe a second version was released with the outtakes from the first one. |
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"Humanimal" was greeted with great enthusiasm thanks to a successful combination of metal, funky and pop influences. It is still the favourite album of several fans and of more than one member in the band. Despite some good album sales, no touring was done for this album. |
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In 1995 Marcel and Jeff worked together in LA to write the songs for the next album "Life". Drums were recorded by Jamie in a very short time at Park Studios. After doing overdubs, the tapes were sent to Jeff so that he could record the bulk of the vocals at home. The original mixing took place in the same studio where "Genesis" was recorded, once again with the help of Mats Lindfors, but something didn’t sound right to the guys and the album was remixed for the European version.
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At the same time, several problems with the labels (Polydor, Zero, Empire) occurred, leading the band not to get any touring done for the album. |
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| The guys took a break from Talisman for 3 years... |
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