History & Biography This Hammerschmitt from Bavaria was born a couple of years after the Hammerschmitt from Hesse, but also professed to hard rock, heavy metal and thrash. Livewire was the initial monicker in 1986. The members were in school. Pierrot was active between 1987 and 1996 whereupon it became Hammerschmitt and released a self-titled demo in 1997. The new monicker was a harbinger of a heavier sound, but the impetus for the name change was to escape the contract with Pierrot’s label. The band had an independent release re-issued by several labels in 2000. The act appeared at Germany’s Biker Union and became somewhat popular with German bikers. A second record appeared in 2005 and a live CD and DVD came in 2006. This did the band no favours given how it was riddled with cover versions.
The band opted to change things up and for the next record, which again came in five-year increments, added a sexy woman and, get this, its logo to the cover of Still On Fire. The band had switched to English here, which it had also done on a promotional EP called Carol with Pierrot in 1992. Unfortunately, the band committed the fatal mistake of entrusting the record to Massacre Records, which famously does not know there are fans (or countries) outside the borders of Germany, anything about the word ‘publicity’ and so nothing much happened. There was a tour with Serious Black and Sinbreed in 2016 however. The group played at Rock for One World 2017. A new record did appear ahead of schedule in 2019 however. Amazingly, the line-up had remained stable until now.
Being true to its membership, Stefan being in the risk group and the pandemic the band said its goodbyes in May 2020. Stefan had not joined the band live for the first time in October 2019. The band had cancelled all live work for the past year. In fact, recordings for Dr. Evil were cancelled and redone due to the quality of the recording. A final single was Ewigkeit (The Last Salute) in late 2020.
Come 2023, however, Stefan was unable to climb the stage anymore and so respecting the original line-up the band picked up a new monicker and a new drummer called Kilian Keller from Magical Heart. Concerts throughout 2023 and early 2024 and a fundraising page followed. The band was collecting money to record an EP.
Ben and Gernot are brothers. Stefan is their uncle.
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