Tom Naumann (born October 20 1965, in Esslingen, near Stuttgart) is a German rock guitarist, songwriter and live musician. He has also been a guitar teacher since 2006.[1]
Naumann plays lead guitar and writes songs with bands Sinner and Primal Fear, which he has been a member of since 1988 and 1997, respectively. Since 2016, he has worked as a live musician at "Rock Meets Classic", an annual concert series in Germany, Austria and Switzerland in which rock stars such as Ian Gillan (Deep Purple), Steve Lukather (Toto) oder Alice Cooper, supported by a symphony orchestra, perform hits from their rock discography.
Biography
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Naumann began playing guitar in 1981 after attending a live concert by British rock band Judas Priest.[2] In 1984, together with friends, he formed the school band Freeze Frame[3], which mainly played their own compositions. In 1986, Freeze Frame took first place in the "Hard & Heavy" category at the State Rock competition in Baden-Württemberg.[3] The band’s subsequent studio recordings were produced by Mat Sinner.[4] The ballad Everybody, composed by Naumann, was released on Sinner’s 1987 album Dangerous Charm.[5] Between 1986 and 1987, Freeze Frame opened several Sinner shows in southern Germany. At the end of 1987, Naumann became the second lead guitarist for Sinner, alongside his guitarist fellow from Freeze Frame, Armin Mücke. He played his first concert in Copenhagen during the multi-week Dangerous Charm tour in January 1988.[6]
In August 1990, Mat Sinner's solo album Back to the Bullet was released, which became Naumann's first studio album.[7] Between 1992 and 1998 Naumann released six albums with Sinner, including the live album In the Line of Fire (Live in Europe) in 1996.[8] The 1998 album The Nature of Evil became the band's most successful album, reaching number 63 in the German album charts.[9]
In 1997, Tom Naumann and Mat Sinner supported a live tribute show of their friend Gamma Ray singer Ralf Scheepers, who was preparing for a possible rehearsal with Judas Priest for Rob Halford's succession.[10] As a result of this musical infidelity, they began to write songs which sounded much more aggressive and harder than their previous work. Eventually, the three musicians founded the power metal band Primal Fear. Their self-titled debut album positively surprised the German metal scene and entered the German album charts at number 48.[11] Naumann also participated in the second Primal Fear studio album Jaws of Death, before leaving both bands shortly after the album’s release for unspecified reasons.
In 2003, Naumann produced and played on the debut album of Swiss metal band Godiva.[12] In the same year, Naumann rejoined both Sinner and Primal Fear as a songwriter and guitarist. In 2007, Naumann again left Primal Fear due to unspecified health issues in the midst of the recording of the album New Religion. In March 2008, Naumann replaced the Brainstorm guitarist Torsten Ihlenfeldt in the majority of the "Downburst" European tour shows, as Ihlenfeldt was unable to complete the tour due to personal reasons.[13] Between 2005 and 2013, Naumann also played guitar on the recordings[8] of German death metal band Debauchery, and also helped out as a guitarist during some of the band's shows.
In 2013, Naumann recorded the guitars for Shakra singer Mark Fox's solo album Lucifer under producer Dennis Ward and was also hired as a live guitarist for the tour that followed.[14] In the same year, he re-recorded guitar solos for the Sinner remake album Touch Of Sin 2.[8] In late 2013, Naumann was engaged again by Primal Fear and replaced Magnus Karlsson as live guitarist, who had to cancel the extensive tour program planned over the subsequent six months (20 concerts in Europe, 21 in the USA, three in Japan and six summer festivals)[15] due to a personal family situation.[16]
Since the release of the album Rulebreaker in 2016, Naumann has once again been considered an official band member of Primal Fear and has been involved in the tours and subsequent albums released by the band. In addition, Naumann has also contributed as a guitarist and songwriter to Sinner’s two revival albums, Tequila Suicide (2017) and Santa Muerte (2019).[8] Since 2016, Naumann has also been a permanent band member of the Mat Sinner Band during the Rock Meets Classic tours and, up to 2020, has played in 60 shows.[17]
Equipment
editGuitars
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Naumann prefers to play Gibson Les Paul style guitars. Two of his favorite models are a black, revised Gibson Les Paul Standard for live performances (see image from the Rockharz Festival, above) and a black Gibson Les Paul Custom for studio recordings.[18] In the Rock Meets Classic concerts, he uses Lester models by the German guitar manufacture Maybach in two light finishes (Midnight Sunset and Edelweiss), which are similar to the Les Paul. Since Naumann is left-handed, he plays the corresponding left-handed models. For strings, he uses the brand Ernie Ball in gauge 10-52.[19]
Sound
editIn order to create the characteristic heavy metal sound of the 80s, Naumann initially used the then-classic Marshall stack combination of a JCM 800/900 amplifier and two stacked boxes, each containing four 10-inch speakers. In the early days of Primal Fear he used the Savage type tube amplifiers from the German manufacturer Engl, and did so until 2013. Since 2014, he has been using Kemper digital amplifiers, especially for live performances, to emulate an Engl profile (see amp modeling).[20]
Discography
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References
edit- ^ "Gitarrenunterricht Esslingen" (in German). 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ "Tom Naumanns Myspace site". 2019. Retrieved 2019-03-11.
- ^ a b "Gitarrenunterricht Esslingen – Über mich" (in German). 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ "Axel Winkler „52 Jahre im Schnelldurchlauf"" (in German). 2021. Retrieved 2021-03-11.
- ^ "Discogs encyclopedia "Sinner, Dangerous Charm"". 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-12.
- ^ "Tom Naumann "Tom Naumann has returned!"". 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-12.
- ^ "Encyclopaedia Metallum "Back to the Bullet"". 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-12.
- ^ a b c d "Encyclopaedia Metallum "Tom Naumann"". 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-12.
- ^ "Official German Album Charts "The Nature of Evil"" (in German). 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-12.
- ^ "Interview Primal Fear Vocalist Ralf Scheepers". 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ "Primal Fear Homepage „The Primal Fear History"". 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ "Encyclopaedia Metallum "Godiva"". 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-12.
- ^ "BRAINSTORM Guitarist Issues Post-European Tour Update". 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-12.
- ^ "Discogs encyclopedia "Fox, Lucifer"". 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-12.
- ^ "Primal Fear Homepage / Tour". 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ "Primal Fear Homepage / News „A Christmas Story"". 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ < "Rock meets Classic Homepage / Archive" (in German). 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ "Guitar Special Vol.20 with Tom Naumann". 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ "Equipboard.com Tom Naumann". 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.
- ^ "Interview with Gonzalo Pozo for Sonic Perspective". 2021. Retrieved 2021-12-30.