Stardown is a Russian metal band from St. Petersburg, performing groove metal with elements of alternative metal. The team was founded by former members of Amatory, The Korea and Katalepsy.
The band was formed in 2005 in St. Petersburg by members of Amatory (drummer Daniil Svetlov and guitarist Alexander Pavlov), The Korea (bassist Stas Rozhdestvensky) and Katalepsy (guitarist/vocalist Evgeny Ardentis). In the same year, the four of them recorded a demo, tracks from which were later included in their debut full-length album Insi Deus, released in 2006, and later in 2007 in a limited edition. Their debut album was produced by Jacob Hansen (Denmark), who is also known for his collaboration with Amatory (producing the albums Inevitability and Book of the Dead). A music video was released for the song "Shinjitsu". In July 2007, the band played at the Rock Palace Open Air festival in St. Petersburg along with such bands as Grave, Dismember, Swallow the Sun and Master.
In 2011 their second full-length album Venom is released, also produced by Hansen. Shortly before the release of this album, Svetlov left the group. Instead, drums for the album were recorded by drummer Richard Evensend, known for his work with bands such as Chimaira, Therion, Demonoid and Soilwork. Members of other bands were also noted on the album - Denis [DENVER] Zhivotovsky from Amatory and Vyacheslav Sokolov from The Wheels of the Sorrow sang backing vocals on the track "Pray For Nothing", which was later filmed the second video of the group, and Steve Smith from American band Nevermore played the guitar solo on the song "Embrace This Beauty".
By the start of work on the third album Void (2014), Ardentis decides to focus entirely on vocals. At first, the group tried to get by with one guitarist, but later the line-up was replenished with a fifth member. The drums for this album were recorded by Kevin Telly of Suffocation and produced by Tu Madsen, who previously produced Amatory's Instinct of the Doomed. Mazzar Records was unable to release this album on physical media at the time of release. This only happened in 2016. In the same year, Mazzar Records re-released it digitally. Some of the planned tracks were not included in Void, but they were included in the 2015 album Fill the Void.
EP Blood is coming out in 2019.
At the moment, the latest release is the Empathy album, which was released in 2021 both on digital platforms and on physical media. Empathy was the band's first album to be released on vinyl and cassette.
- Insi Deus( 2006)
- Venom (2011)
- Void (2014)
- Fill The Void (2015)
- Void (digital re-release) (2016)
- Blood (2019)
- Empathy (2021)
