Artist: WOLF HOFFMANN [ACCEPT]
Album: HEADBANGERS SYMPHONY VINYL (LP BLACK)

Release date: 2016
EAN/UPS: 727361369811
Media type: LP

Wolf Hoffmann has a passion. His life-long love and dedication to heavy metal music is documented in dozens of albums spanning four decades with his long time heavy metal band ACCEPT. But beyond heavy metal, Wolf has an incessant craving for the classics, yes, the ones written decades and centuries ago.

Classical music has always been an influence - albeit limited - on ACCEPT’s Teutonic approach to rock and heavy metal. However, it wasn’t until 1997 during a extended hiatus from ACCEPT, that Wolf Hoffmann finally had the chance to fully explore and fulfill this interest by recording his first astounding solo album »Classical«, a record filled with his rock guitar driven interpretations of some of classical music’s most loved compositions.

Fast-forward to 2016… Wolf Hoffmann has once again taken time out from ACCEPT to complete the long awaited follow-up to »Classical«: »Headbangers Symphony«. It’s truly a bold statement by a genuine musician who simply refused to rest on his laurels and continues to push and challenge himself.

“I am just so excited about »Headbangers Symphony«. It has taken a long, long time but here we are, it’s done, finally!” Wolf is just bursting with vigor as he talks about his latest labor of love. But why now? “It’s truly coincidental, after we completed the last ACCEPT tour, I finally had the time to finish it. I started this a few years ago. The early recordings have been sitting in my archives in my home studio for years, almost completed. The reality was that with the continued success of ACCEPT, I was only able to work on it when ACCEPT was not recording or touring.”

Now that the album is done, Wolf is proud looking back and is pleased with this true labor of love; something he has wanted to do since the first »Classical« came out almost 20 years ago. While ACCEPT’s Peter Baltes added several impressive bass lines, and other notable guest musicians made an appearance as well, the bulk of the work was completed by him and Melo. So what compositions did finally make the cut?

“There are two major categories,” Wolf elaborates. “First the heavier stuff like Beethoven, the bombastic, full force epics on which you can simply shred along. Of course then there are the ballads, slower compositions that bring out the deeper feelings in each listener.”


Side A:

01. Scherzo
02. Night On Bald Mountain
03. Je Crois Entendre Encore
04. Double Cello Concerto In G Minor
05. Adagio

Side B:

01. Symphony No. 40
02. Swan Lake
03. Madame Butterfly
04. Pathétique
05. Meditation
06. Air On The G String