# Tiamat (band)

Tiamat is a Swedish metal band that formed in Stockholm in 1987 and led by Johan Edlund. The band went through a number of stylistic changes in their earlier releases before settling on gothic metal.

## History

Initially, the band had the name Treblinka and a style of black/death metal. After having recorded the album Sumerian Cry in 1989, guitarist/vocalist Johan Edlund and bassist Jörgen Thullberg parted ways with the other two founding members, and subsequently changed the name to Tiamat, after the Babylonian goddess representing the primordial sea and forebear to other gods. The Sumerian Cry album included re-recorded Treblinka songs and was released in June 1990. AllMusic refers to early Tiamat as "one of the leading lights in symphonic black metal."
After the debut, Edlund's leadership would modify the band's style with influences ranging from Black Sabbath, Mercyful Fate, Candlemass, Pink Floyd and King Crimson, with Sumerian lyrical themes. H. P. Lovecraft's writings also appear to have influenced Tiamat's thematology, a development consistent with a broader trend in death metal culture. Polish guitarist Waldemar Sorychta would produce and contribute instrumentation to many of the band's albums, as well as those by Tiamat's own tour and labelmates, including Moonspell, Rotting Christ, Lacuna Coil and Samael.
1994's critically acclaimed Wildhoney mixed raw vocals, slow guitar riffs and synthesizer sounds which sounded different from other extreme metal bands active at that time. An almost continuous forty-minute piece of music, Wildhoney led to the band's appearances at the Dynamo and Wacken Open Air heavy metal festivals in 1995. The group would play a second gig at Dynamo two years later.
Upon the release of A Deeper Kind of Slumber in 1997, Edlund relocated from Sweden to Germany and declared himself the only permanent member of the band; all albums that would follow would cement the band into a more gothic rock sound, quite different from the extreme music they did in the years before, with recent albums showing a Sisters of Mercy and Pink Floyd influence.
The band signed to Nuclear Blast in June 2007, and released their ninth album Amanethes on 18 April 2008.
On 10 August 2008, Thomas Wyreson announced that he was quitting the band, stating that "it's just kinda hard to make everything work with the family etc."
Their song "Cain" was also featured in the 2004 video game Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines.
The band's tenth full-length studio album, The Scarred People, was released on 2 November 2012 through Napalm Records.

## Discography
### Studio albums

| Title | Album details | Peak chart positions | Peak chart positions | Peak chart positions | Peak chart positions | Sales |
| Title | Album details | SWE | GER | AUT | BEL | Sales |
| Sumerian Cry | Released: 7 June 1990 Label: CMFT Productions Formats: CD, LP, CS, DL | — | — | — | — | |
| The Astral Sleep | Released: 1 September 1991 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, LP, CS, DL | — | — | — | — | |
| Clouds | Released: 2 December 1992 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, LP, CS, DL | — | — | — | — | |
| Wildhoney | Released: 25 October 1994 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, LP, CS, DL | — | 29 | — | — | US: 8,082+ |
| A Deeper Kind of Slumber | Released: 12 August 1997 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, LP, CS, DL | 39 | 29 | 22 | — | |
| Skeleton Skeletron | Released: 11 August 1999 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, LP, CS, DL | 56 | 19 | 47 | — | |
| Judas Christ | Released: 30 April 2002 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, LP, CS, DL | 52 | 28 | — | — | |
| Prey | Released: 27 October 2003 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, LP, CS, DL | — | 83 | — | — | |
| Amanethes | Released: 27 May 2008 Label: Nuclear Blast Formats: CD, LP, DL | 13 | 69 | — | — | |
| The Scarred People | Released: 2 November 2012 Label: Napalm Formats: CD, LP, DL | 11 | 62 | — | 154 | |
| "—" denotes a recording that did not chart or was not released in that territory. |||||||

### Singles

| Title | Year | Album |
| "A Winter Shadow" | 1990 | The Astral Sleep |
| "Cold Seed" | 1997 | A Deeper Kind of Slumber |
| "Brighter Than the Sun" | 1999 | Skeleton Skeletron |
| "Vote for Love" | 2002 | Judas Christ |
| "Cain" | 2003 | Prey |
| "The Temple of the Crescent Moon" | 2008 | Amanethes |
| "Born to Die" | 2013 | The Scarred People |

### EPs

| Title | EP details |
| Gaia | Released: 28 November 1994 Label: Century Media Formats: CD |
| For Her Pleasure | Released: 8 November 1999 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, DL |

### Live albums

| Title | Album details |
| The Sleeping Beauty (Live in Israel) | Released: 5 April 1994 Label: Century Media Formats: CD |

### Compilation albums

| Title | Album details |
| The Musical History of Tiamat | Released: February 1995 Label: Century Media Formats: CD |
| Commandments | Released: 26 February 2007 Label: Century Media Formats: CD, DL |
| The Ark of the Covenant - The Complete Century Media Years | Released: 18 August 2008 Label: Century Media Formats: CD |

### Video albums

| Title | Video details | Peak chart positions |
| Title | Video details | SWE |
| The Church of Tiamat | Released: 24 April 2006 Label: Metal Mind Productions Formats: DVD | 5 |
| "—" denotes a recording that did not chart or was not released in that territory. |||

### Music videos

| Year | Title | Directed | Album |
| 1992 | "Sleeping Beauty" | — | Clouds |
| 1995 | "Whatever That Hurts" | Tamara Jordan | Wildhoney |
| 1995 | "Gaia" | Tamara Jordan | Wildhoney |
| 1997 | "Cold Seed" | Tamara Jordan | A Deeper Kind of Slumber |
| 1999 | "Brighter Than the Sun" | Doro Film | Skeleton Skeletron |
| 2002 | "Vote for Love" | Alexander Detig (Sound & Vision Film, Video & Media GmbH) | Judas Christ |
| 2003 | "Cain" | Patric Ullaeus (Revolver Film) | Prey |
| 2003 | "Do You Dream of Me?" | Eugen Erhan | Wildhoney |
| 2012 | "The Scarred People" | angst-im-wald | The Scarred People |
| 2013 | "384" | Ioanna Lampropoulou | The Scarred People |
| 2013 | "Love Terrorists" | Johan Edlund, Ioanna Lampropoulou | The Scarred People |
| 2013 | "The Red of the Morning Sun" | Johan Edlund, Ioanna Lampropoulou | The Scarred People |