Outshine was formed in December 1995 over a couple of cold beers. In the south of sweden in a town called smålandsstenar, guitarist Jimmy Norberg (from a trash/punk metal band, ”Dead by dawn”) contacted keyboardist and singer Mattias Claesson. Both were much in to gothic music and they decided to form a band, Outshine. Batterist Rickard Johansson and basist Dennis Johansson (from dead by dawn) joined aswell.

The first gig was only a month later and from that the wheels started to move. Outshine had a couple of gigs (Björkhultet, Bredaryd, Värnamo etc.) and people liked the heavy combination betwin synth and metal music.

In October `96, just after a gig in Cupolen, Värnamo, Jimmy Norberg went on an round the world trip for 3 months. After coming home, basist Dennis J left the band. Johan Karlsson (Incabuz, ? ) joined the band for a short period, but in May `97, the band took a break for 2 months. Back on track in August `97 the band (now a three piece) started to write songs and in November `97 basist Eddie Ben-tov (guitarist in Trigger and later on Superdice) joined the trio. During this time a demo-tape was recorded in Ben-tov Studios, Gislaved. It was a two song demo featuring ”I wanna die” and ”Commit suicide”. But during this recording, batterist Rickard J found out that he wasn`t suited for this type of music so he left the band after the final recordings. Outshine plays a very hard, slow, down-tuned type of music but still it´s very beutiful in some parts. It takes a special kind of musicians to make it sound good. That´s why the new batterist Robert Pettersson from a Gislaved band and a friend to Eddie, didn´t fit in to Outshines style, so further work in this constilation was inpossible. Now in May `98 Outshine was only a two-piece but a month later batterist Anders Carlberg, a rock ´n roller from Hyltebruk joined the band. Anders fitted in the band directly and after only 3 months, in October ´98, the recordings of ”Lost in sanity” was complited. It contained four songs and got really good reviews. 4/5 in Finnveden newspaper and 5/5 in the big swedish magazine, Chili.

Outshine started to work on more material and in March ´99 basist Fredrik Nilsson (from Skåne, Sweden) arrived. The pace was much higher now and after Augustirocken ´99 keyboardist and singer Mattias Claesson wanted to take a break. During this time guitarist and founder of Outshine, Jimmy Norberg, was playing guitar in Superdice a 70-ties influenced band. This project took all the time and after some fights and internal problems Outshine was put on ice in September ´99.

It took almost 2 years before in August ´01 guitarist Jimmy N, keyboardist Mattias C and drummer Anders C was back on track again. Basist Fredrik N was out and Outshine decided not to bring a new bas player on board. During the 2 years Outshine was down guitarist Jimmy N concentrated himself on Superdice instead. But after a move back and forth to Gothenburg, the members of Superdice splitted to other projects, and for Jimmy N, Outshine was taken up again.

During the 7 years that Outshine has excisted, there has been many problems and alot of different members., but the founders, Jimmy and Mattias had always a precise thought on how Outshine should sound and feel.
In May ´02, after Outshine begun to write alot of new songs, drummer Anders C decided to leave the band. Was that the end of Outshine ?

Well, Jimmy and Mattias put the band on ice for a couple of months because of this incident. But in late June´02, they met up with batterist Per Josefsson, o young drummer from Smålandsstenar. After a couple of weeks playing some of the old material, Outshine was set to go back to the studio again. Despite lack of a steady bas player, Outshine is back on track again and hopfully it will stay that way.

Paradise Lost, Weeping Willows, Depeche Mode, Morrissey, Type o negative, 69 eyes, Kent, Nick Cave.