With North America playing a fast game of catch-up, the Theremin EP and the US versions of Dreams of a Cryotank and Sequencer had been released in rapid succession. It would result in the band embarking on their first European tour-opening for Steril and Haujobb-and their first foray into North America, having been newly signed to San Francisco-based 21st Circuitry Records.
Sequencer’s success would mark an early turning point in the band’s career. Everything about Sequencer was a step forward, from the densely-layered sonic mélange to the emotionally-nuanced lyrics. What resulted from these sessions would be Sequencer, arguably one of the band’s greatest works and the vehicle that would launch them onto the international forefront. If the aim was to produce a record which matched the scope and success of Dreams of a Cryotank, they would have been aiming too low.
By early 1995 Covenant would have its first record deal outside of their native Sweden.īack in the studio, the band went to work on their sophomore album. One of these would be Stefan Herwig, then manager of German record label Off Beat. Their connection with early audiences would garner influential recruits. Over time the set design became less ostentatious but the core intensity of the band’s live performance remained. Early live incarnations involved elaborate costuming and included such otherworldly figures as “space samurai”. Most notably Dreams of a Cryotank would spawn an important early club hit for the band, “Theremin”, a track which can still be heard on dancefloors today.īy this point Covenant was already making a name for themselves through their live shows. Clarke and the cold, rhythmic precision of their electronic music forbearers on everything from obvious club tracks to a 23-minute long ambient noise piece called “Cryotank Expansion”. An ambitious effort, Dreams of a Cryotank would reflect the influence of visionary works by Ridley Scott and Arthur C. That album would be Covenant’s first release, Dreams of a Cryotank. Little did he know, a deal with Swedish label Memento Materia and an entire album’s worth of material would soon follow. Their first song written as the contemporary incarnation of Covenant was “Replicant”, a track which, Simonsson notes, was such a quantum leap forward for the band that he was certain it would be the last one he’d ever write. Over time the line-up trimmed down to a cast of three: vocalist and songwriter Eskil Simonsson, keyboardist and lyricist Joakim Montelius, and keyboardist Clas Nachmanson. Whether or not life subsequently imitated art or art subsequently imitated life is debatable, either way the band’s moniker ended up perfectly summing up the vision, grandeur, and brotherhood that is the band itself.īeginning, as most bands do, as teenagers fiddling with instruments in their parents’ basement, the earliest incarnations of the band featured, astoundingly, six members. As a name, Covenant-with its biblical overtones-was perhaps a bit ambitious for an upstart band of teenagers from southern Sweden armed with rudimentary electronics, but it ended up being extraordinarily fitting. It’s a name that implies extraordinary commitment, a certain grandiosity, and a bond stronger than blood.