Poisonblack

Poisonblack emerged in the mid-2000s as a Finnish goth metal act whose mainstream breakthrough hinged on former Sentenced frontman Ville Laihiala. Born June 13, 1973, in Oulu, Finland, Laihiala launched the project in 2000 while still serving as lead vocalist for Sentenced, the chart-topping Finnish metal group. He had first assumed that role on Sentenced’s fourth album, Down (1996), then continued through five further Century Media releases: the chart-toppers Crimson (2000), The Cold White Light (2002), and The Funeral Album (2005), as well as the double-disc swan-song set Buried Alive (2006), which captured the band’s final concert on October 1, 2005. Late in his Sentenced tenure, Laihiala established Poisonblack chiefly to play guitar rather than sing. The lineup featured Janne Markus on guitar, Antti Remes on bass, Tarmo Kanerva on drums, and Marco Sneck on keyboards. Poisonblack’s first album, Escapexstacy, arrived in 2003 with Charon singer Juha-Pekka Leppäluoto handling lead vocals; it achieved only modest notice, prompting Laihiala to rejoin Sentenced until the latter group disbanded in 2005. Reviving Poisonblack afterward, he assumed lead vocals himself for the 2006 follow-up Lust Stained Despair, which climbed to number two on the Finnish albums chart and yielded the Top Five single “Rush.” The next effort, A Dead Heavy Day (2008), fell short of that commercial peak yet still reached the Top Ten and produced the single “Bear the Cross.”