Katatonia

Katatonia
Katatonia at Kavarna Rock Fest 2011, Bulgaria
Background information
Origin	Stockholm, Sweden
Genres	Heavy metal progressive rock progressive metal doom metal gothic rock death-doom (early)
Years active	1991–1994 1996–2018 2019–present
Labels	Avantgarde Music No Fashion Peaceville Vic Napalm Records
Spinoffs	October Tide Bloodbath
Members	Jonas Renkse Anders Nyström Niklas Sandin Daniel Moilanen Roger Öjersson
Past members	Guillaume Le Huche Fredrik Norrman Mikael Oretoft Mattias Norrman Per Eriksson Daniel Liljekvist Mikael Åkerfeldt
Website	katatonia.com

Katatonia is a Swedish heavy metal band formed in Stockholm in 1991 by Jonas Renkse and Anders Nyström.^[1] The band started as a studio-only project for the duo, as an outlet for the band's love of death metal. Increasing popularity led them to add more band members for live performances, though outside of the band's founders, the lineup was a constantly changing, revolving door of musicians throughout the 1990s, notably including Mikael Åkerfeldt of the band Opeth for a period. After two death/doom albums, Dance of December Souls (1993) and Brave Murder Day (1996), problems with Renkse's vocal cords coupled with new musical influences led the band away from the screamed vocals of death metal to a more traditional, melodic form of heavy metal music.

The band released two more albums, Discouraged Ones (1998) and Tonight's Decision (1999), before settling into a stable quintet lineup for all of the 2000s. The band released four more albums with said lineup: Last Fair Deal Gone Down (2001), Viva Emptiness (2003), The Great Cold Distance (2006) and Night Is the New Day (2009), with the band slowly moving away from their metal sound while adding more progressive rock sounds to their work over time. While lineup changes started up again into the 2010s, Renkse and Nyström persisted, and the band continued on to release their ninth and tenth studio albums, Dead End Kings (2012) and The Fall of Hearts (2016). After touring in support of the album through 2017, the band entered a hiatus at the beginning of 2018. The band returned from their hiatus in February 2019, with their eleventh studio album, City Burials (2020), and twelfth studio album, Sky Void of Stars (2023).