At The Gates Family Tree
This is a project aimed at making it easy to see who inspired the bands you love or even hate. For this I try not to use any influences that the band don’t claim themselves. There will be a focus on predecessors but successors will be added as they site the band. These trees become more and more interactive as new bands are added, allowing you to click any band that has a tree and jump to it.
We want our lists to be better. If you know something that belongs on this list, let us know. When in doubt we will leave it out, so we need reliable sources.
At The Gates are pioneers of melodic death metal and a very important band. The core of the band has been with vocalist Tomas Lindberg, drummer Adrian Erlandsson, and bassist, and bassist Jonas Björler. Until more recently Jonas’s twin brother Anders Björler was on guitar, but his role was filled by Jonas Stålhammar starting in 2017. Alf Svensson was on the second guitar for the first two albums and since then that role has been filled by Martin Larsson. Larrson and Stålhammar have not written in the band, and Adrian has only co written one song. This list will focus on the influences of the other members.
Allan Holdsworth
Tomas is fan of German prog bands like Can, Tangerine Dream, and Neu!. He also an occasional fan of jazz. He said the first stuff he was listening to as a kid was rock ‘n’ roll from Chuck Berry, Bill Haley and Elvis Presley. Around 10 he got into a broader array of music from his sister’s boyfriend’s collection with bands like MC5, the Stooges, Thin Lizzy, Blue Öyster Cult, Dead Boys, The Cramps, Ramones, Black Sabbath, Wishbone Ash, and Deep Purple.
Anders said that Alf brought influences from Swedish folk, classical and opera, mainly Russian composers. In a 1997 interview Alf said he mostly listened to “opera, medieval music, and music from the early part of this century, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, and all their Swedish likes”
When asked about his solo album, Anders said it would reflect influences from “Italian soundtrack music like Goblin, Bruno Nicolai, Fabio Frizzi, Walter Rizzati, etc., mixed with influences from progressive UK bands (King Crimson, Camel, UK, Alan Holdsworth), Post Rock (Explosions In The Sky, MONO), ambient (Harold Budd, Brian Eno) and Jazz/Swedish Folk Music (Jan Johansson, Esbjorn Svenssons Trio, Lars Gullin, etc.).”
Martin has been on guitar since 1993 but has only written for a couple songs. Metallica is the only influence I’ve seen him name.
Jonas has said he is influenced by 70’s progressive rock, but didn’t name specific bands. He said his first concert was Motley Crue and then got into heavier stuff. He also said that he had a music teacher in school and they use to jam AC/DC. Before getting into Thrash he was big in British and German Metal.
Adrian has only co-written one song that was on the first album. Besides bands named above, he also named influences as Exodus, Forbidden, and Saxon.
Bands influenced by At The Gates!
As this project advances, bands will be added here… there are many!