Tag: Oklahoma

Oliver Magnum were founded in october 1983 by the rhythm section Dan Kurtz and Curt Daughterty. Soon after that Monte Humphrey joined the band, which at the time started to play their first live gigs as an instrumental trio. In 1984 vocalist Mark Mueller left his old band to join Oliver Magnum.

Rumors say that the band won a “Battle of the Bands” contest in Tulsa, Oklahoma which enabled the band to enter a studio and record their first demo tape. This demo tape entitled 01986 included the 4 songs “Trapped”, “Silent Scream”, “Old World Nites” and “Fahrenheit 451”, which got fantastic critics in all fanzines/magazines. According to the band, “1986” did sell over 2000 times within 2 years, “Old World Nites” later appeared on Metal Massacre IX. About a year later, Oliver Magnum made another recording session and recorded a song called “Metal Cruelty” which was meant to be released on a sampler that unfortunately has never been released.

The first line-up change took place in late 1988 and brought new singer James Randel into the band. At this time Mark Mueller didn’t want to play heavy metal anymore. This line-up recorded the self-titled debut album, which actually was supposed to be entitled Metal Cruelty. Metal Cruelty was used by the band as a promo tape to raise interest for a record deal. The band signed a record deal with New Renaissance records which released Oliver Magnum in 1989 and licensed the album to SPV Steamhammer in Europe. The album contains the 4 songs of the demo tape and 4 additional songs. The album track “Sister Cybele” was also released on a SPV sampler called The Future of Metal Is Now. Oliver Magnum also managed to finance a self produced video clip of their song “Trapped”. Oliver Magnum didn’t achieve much in the way of sales, and they were dropped from their record company.

Randel lost faith in the band and quit Oliver Magnum after the release of their debut album and was temporary replaced by Jimmy King. Randel later appeared as vocalist on the first {link Forté} album and in early 1991 vocalist Mark Mueller rejoined the band. But this line-up was only able to record a few more songs which were released in 1992 as the Drive By demo as well as a split 7″ entitled Necessary Evil. After those releases it became quiet around Oliver Magnum and finally the band split-up around 1997. They also appeared on the Dominion Records compilation Tomorrow Never Tells with “Time to Tell” and “American Queen.”