Zagan leaves Countess

With regret we have to announce that our guitarist Zagan has decided to leave the band. He made this decision because his heart is no longer in being part of the band, as he feels he has accomplished all he can with Countess. While we are obviously sad to see him leave, we cannot but respect his decision.

Zagan joined Countess in 1995 and was part of the line-up that played quite a few shows in the mid-nineties - including our legendary tour with Barathrum and Sabbat - and recorded the 'Hell's Rock & Roll' EP. After the split of the live band at the end of 1997, he still occasionally worked with the band in following years. In 2013 he rejoined the band full-time and was instrumental in the resurrection of the live band the next year.

Zagan on stage in Augsburg in 2014

Over the years, Zagan definitely left his mark on the Countess sound. Not only because of his great leads, but also because of his input on arrangements and of course because of the music he contributed to the band. He was responsible for our classic anthem 'Hell's Rock & Roll' and most recently wrote a substantial amount of material for our latest full-length 'Fires Of Destiny'.

We wish Zagan all the best for the future and the best of luck with whatever his future endeavours may be. Enjoy some of his most notable contributions to the Countess canon in this special playlist:

Looking back on fifteen full-lengths

This month, our official playlist takes the listener on a condensed trip through our entire discography. The playlist features one song from each of our fifteen full-lengths, picked by Orlok. For the occasion, Orlok looks back on all of these records and explains why he chose the tracks he did.

The official playlist on Spotify

"The first track is from our third album 'Ad Maiorem Sathanae Gloriam' (1995). This was a special record for us, since it was the first one recorded in an actual studio. Though this caused quite a bit of stress since we had just three days to record and mix everything, this proved to be a very educational experience and also led to the album having a pretty good sound. This was also the first Countess album to garner some positive reviews, much to our own surprise. The full story of the album can be found here. The album has a very distinct sound and some really good songs, the best known of which are undoubtedly 'The Priest Must Die' and 'The Wrath Of Satan's Whore' that have both become classics and are still being played live. Here I went with the former, because it is a great opener - on record as well as live.