Editing Helloween (section)

=== Early years and first album (1984–1986) ===
Helloween was formed 1984 in [[Hamburg]], West Germany. The original line-up included [[Kai Hansen]] on vocals and rhythm guitar, [[Michael Weikath]] on lead guitar, [[Markus Grosskopf]] on bass and [[Ingo Schwichtenberg]] on drums. That year, the band signed with [[Noise Records (Germany)|Noise Records]] and recorded two songs for a Noise compilation record called ''[[Death Metal (Split album)|Death Metal]]''. The compilation featured the bands [[Hellhammer]], [[Running Wild (band)|Running Wild]] and Dark Avenger. The two tracks were "Oernst of Life" by Weikath and Hansen's "Metal Invaders," a faster version of which would appear on the band's first full-length album.

Helloween recorded and released its first record in 1985, a [[Helloween (EP)|self-titled]] EP containing five tracks. Also that year, the band released its first full-length album, ''[[Walls of Jericho (album)|Walls of Jericho]]'', which helped spawn speed metal.<ref>{{Cite web|date=20 July 2016|title=Top 50 Metal Bands of All Time|url=https://loudwire.com/top-metal-bands-of-all-time/|access-date=30 June 2021|website=[[Loudwire]]}}</ref> During the following concert tour, Hansen had difficulties singing and playing the guitar at the same time. Hansen's last recording as the band's lead singer was in 1986 on a vinyl EP titled ''Judas'', which contained the song "Judas" and live versions of "Ride the Sky" and "Guardians" recorded at Gelsenkirchen. (The CD edition has the live introduction, but the songs have been replaced with studio versions and crowd noise spliced in.) Following these releases, Helloween began the search for a new vocalist.<ref>{{Cite web|date=1 April 2021|title=metal-rules.|url=https://www.metal-rules.com/interviews/GammaRay_KaiHansen.htm}}</ref>

Hansen said in an interview 1999: {{cquote|''"We wanted to go for a lot more intricate stuff on the guitar and more technical. So it was like getting harder and harder for me without having big experience on vocals. I never had lessons or anything and I was not that fixed on the guitar yet so it was getting difficult. On the other hand we thought it would be really cool to have a real front man, a real singer. We heard Queensryche, the first album that they did, and we thought wow that would be cool to have a singer like that who could be very stable on the high soaring notes and have a lot of expression."''}}