Victory

Victory is a hard rock/heavy metal band from Hanover, Lower Saxony, Germany, that was formed in 1984. Some members played in Fargo (3) before. Not to be confused with Victory (18) from Bremen, Victory (16) from Sweden and Victory (17) from the United Kingdom.

When experts talk about important German cult bands, the name Victory always comes up. The band from Hannover belonged alongside Accept and the Scorpions to Germany's number 1 export article in the eighties and was one of the few acts that could establish itself in the USA. Their carrer began in the autumn of 1984, when guitarist Tommy Newton and bass player Peter were working on a new album for their band Fargo. Impressed with the exciting song material, the Scorpions drummer Herman Rarebell took the band under his wing and booked an American producer. Two days later, the band could reviel that the internationaly renominated Rock singer Charlie Huhn had joined the group. The result of the studio session was then sent on to the US manager David Krebs (Aerosmith, Scorpions, etc.), who then took the musicians to New York. Here the band name Fargo was changed to Victory and they were introduced to all the major record companies where they were finally taken on by ´Epic` (Sony Music). With this Victory then travelled to Los Angeles, where they let the then, in his view, the most important sound engineer Michael Wagener mix the recording. In 1985 the debut album Victory was thren released into the record shops worldwide. In the same year the band went on their first US tour: Victory completed 60 shows in the United States including four of the largest festivals in the country where they let themselves be celebrated by 80.000 crazy fans at the ´Texxas Jam` Festival in Dallas.
After some restructuring in the band personel, whereby Herman Frank (onetime Accept and Sinner), the perfect second guitarist was found, the album Don´t Get Mad - Get Even in 1986 and a year later the celebrated Hungry Hearts were released. After countless tours in Europe and a further tour in the USA the most successful Victory chapter was rounded up with the release of the log awaited live album That´s Live (1988).
Charlie Huhn then left the band but an adequate replacement in the form of Fernando Garcia could be found. In 1989 the album Culture Killed The Native was released, which enabled Victory to enter the European and US-Charts once again. A third US tour followed and in Europe the band toured alongside Gary Moore. After a further two studio albums (Temples Of Gold, 1990 und You Bought It - You Name It, 1992), Victory gave a farewell concert in their hometown of Hannover in 1993 which was then released as the double album Liveline. There was then four years of silence around the successful formation until in 1996 with a changed line up, the studio production Voiceprint was recorded, unfortunately this album couldn't reach the standards of their earlier work.