It’s often been said that good things come to those who wait. Well, Krokus may have only waited four years before getting their first taste of worldwide success, but the recent announcement – almost 35 years after the release of their classic Metal Rendez-vous album – of a quadruple platinum award for the Swiss rock band, surely proves the old adage right all the same.
Released in June 1980, Metal Rendez-vous was the band’s fourth studio album and the first to feature Maltese vocalist Marc Storace. The album yielded three singles, namely Tokyo Nights, Bedside Radio and Heatstrokes, the latter hitting the No.1 spot in the UK Heavy Metal charts, giving the band its stepping stone to international recognition on both sides of the Atlantic, and confirming Krokus as one of, if not the best, hard rock band to ever come out of Switzerland.
“This album woke the Swiss music scene from its slumber,” said Storace, adding that the band followed up the album’s success with a triumphant tour in the US, playing to hundreds of thousands of fans.
Guitarist Fernando Von Arb said they recorded the album for just 15,000 Swiss Francs, a pittance compared to the big budgets that other rock bands were spending on their albums at the time. At the time, the band was living in a cellar.
“We put everything on one card and had nothing to lose,” bassist Chris von Rohr recalled. “We never expected it would take off as it did, and it’s all thanks to the fans.”
Considered to be Switzerland’s most successful hard rock album to date, Metal Rendez-vous has sold more than three million copies worldwide. To mark this achievement, the band’s record company presented the members with quadruple platinum records.
Krokus is meanwhile currently enjoying success with their latest album Dirty Dynamite.
They have confirmed a string of new live dates in Germany during May, as well as appearances at three summer festivals, the Rock the Ring, the Etziken Open-Air Festival in Switzerland and the Masters of Rock in the Czech Republic.
www.krokusonline.com