| Magnus Karlsson | |
|---|---|
| Born | November 26, 1973 (age 37), Sweden |
| Genres | Heavy metal, hard rock, Power metal, symphonic metal |
| Occupations | Musician |
| Instruments | Guitar, Bass, Keyboards, Banjo, Accordion, vocals |
| Years active | 1989–present |
| Labels | Frontiers Records |
| Associated acts | Primal Fear, Starbreaker, Allen/Lande, Kiske/Somerville, Bob Catley, Last Tribe, Midnight Sun |
Magnus Karlsson is a Swedish heavy metal guitarist, multi-instrumentalist and producer. He is currently one of the guitarists of the band Primal Fear.
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Magnus attempted school to study classical guitar when he was 10 years old, later on he was very much into "The New Wave Of British Heavy Metal" of bands such as Iron Maiden, Dio, Judas Priest and Black Sabbath. His influences as a guitarist were Steve Morse, Steve Vai and Allan Holdsworth. He has played in various metal and fusion bands early on and developed a style which mixes metal and folk music.[1]
His first critically acclaimed musical project was with the band Last Tribe, which has released three full-length albums.
In 2004, Magnus started to work as a session musician in a project put together by Frontiers Records, which had the intention to have two acclaimed heavy metal vocalists singing together as a duet. The project ended up featuring Magnus's two favorite singers nowadays, powerhouse vocalists Russell Allen (Symphony X) and Jørn Lande (Masterplan) and it was simply called Allen/Lande. The project already has three albums with all music and lyrics written by Magnus Karlsson, featuring a variety of hard rock and heavy metal songs with a progressive metal touch.
In the same year he also started to write music for a project with singer Tony Harnell (TNT), drummer John Macaluso (Ark, Yngwie Malmsteen) and bassist Fabrizio Grossi (Steve Vai) that would later on become the band Starbreaker.
In 2008, he worked with Magnum vocalist Bob Catley on his solo album Immortal writing all the songs himself .
Recently, Magnus joined German metal band Primal Fear making a big contribution to the band's songwriting. He also teamed up with the band's bassist and leader Mat Sinner to work in a number of projects released by Frontiers Records, such as Kiske/Somerville (another singer-duet project, featuring ex-Helloween singer Michael Kiske and American singer and vocal coach Amanda Somerville) and the first solo album by Primal Fear frontman Ralf Scheepers.