Vikings Invasion

Scandinavian Metal Band

Previously described as "Sub-Sabbath 70s slobbery by some guys who somehow figured out how to use electricity,", Vikings Invasion were a German-speaking Swiss trio who played quite a rough type of blues rock with a slight progressive touch. Members Charles Sterchi on guitar and vocals, Eric Eberhard on bass, and Gerhard Burri on drums had played together in this simplest possible configuration already since 1970, and originally called themselves Dreieinigkeitsmoses (Trinity Moses in English), after a character by Bertolt Brecht. Someone in UK didn't like the name (I wonder why...), and made the classical mistake of mixing up Sweden (Vikings...) with Switzerland, and voilà: Enter Vikings Invasion. In 1975, their only LP (optimistically called 'Vol. 1'), was released exclusively in England where they lived and had concerts for some time. A bad sounding bootleg later showed up in Switzerland. The dragon on its cover is actually a so called wyvern (or wivern), a legendary bipedal winged dragon usually depicted with a tail ending in a diamond- or arrow-shaped tip, often used in heraldry. This particular one is the Basel Wyvern from where these guys originated.