Van Canto - A-cappella metal from Germany

Hello Steemians,

this post is about a German band without guitars or keyboard, with only their voices and drums. But if you have a group of singers with such great voices you don't need a guitar.
I know it's hard to imagine metal without guitars, so just give it a listen:
song: If I Die In Battle; drums and the more metal part starts at 1:15

Van Canto consists of 6 singer and 1 drummer and was founded in 2006 as a studio project. "Canto" is from the Latin word "cantare" which means "I sing" and "Van" has no special meaning "but looks great on the posters".

Apart from the drums, the only effect they're using is for the solo parts were they need a distortion module to make it sound like a guitar-solo. They can bring in natural effects when they sing normal but not when they sing with their head-voice with which they sing the solos.
Why not also replace the drums with a beatbox? Their answer:
"First, because it would sound like discopop and secondly, it would be a shame to have a drummer like Basti and not to let him play".
Without the drums I think the pressure behind the music would be missing and the power would be lost. So i'm glad they decided to leave the drums as... drums.

Since 2006 they created 6 studio album and a bunch of great a-cappella covers of famous songs:

• 2006: A Storm to Come
• 2008: Hero
• 2010: Tribe of Force
• 2011: Break the Silence
• 2014: Dawn of the Brave
• 2016: Voices of Fire

They have cover versions of songs like
Sabaton's "Primo Victoria" (feat. Joakim Brodén)
"Wishmaster" of Nightwish
Metallica's "Master of Puppets"
"Kings of Metal" of Manowar
Metallica's "Battery"
"Fear of the Dark"
or my favorite: The Bard's Song from Blind Guardian:
Interesting video... he's filming the cat like it's a dangerous beast 😁

Another great quiet song of Van Canto (if not the best!) is "Last Night of the Kings" from their third album "Tribe of Force". If you have not gave the other songs a listen, listen to this! You don't have to be with rock or metal to love this wonderful piece of music:

So, i posted a song with drums and "guitar solo", a great cover and a self-created quiet song... yep that's enough in think.