Helloween "Walls Of Jericho/Judas/Helloween"

Walls of Jericho is the debut full-length studio album by German power metal band Helloween, released in 1985 on LP by Noise Records. It is the only album featuring Kai Hansen as lead vocalist, although he would continue to act as guitarist on subsequent albums.

In 1988, Walls of Jericho was released on CD. Due to the enhanced capacity of the CD, the Helloween EP/mini-LP and the song "Judas" from the Judas EP were added to the Walls of Jericho track listing; they are now released as a compilation. In the late 1980s, due to a manufacturing error, side one of several cassette copies of Walls of Jericho accidentally contained the music of Celtic Frost's To Mega Therion, confusing many first-time Helloween listeners.

The titular entity in the song "Gorgar" is the first talking pinball machine ever produced.
The main theme of Edvard Grieg's "In the Hall of the Mountain King" is used in the song "Gorgar."
The intro to "Starlight" is taken from a commercial in the movie Halloween III: Season of the Witch.
The song "Heavy Metal (Is the Law)" is not an official live recording. Rather, crowd noise was added.
The live versions of "Ride the Sky" and "Guardians" are not live recordings; they are the same songs as found on Walls of Jericho but with crowd noise mixed in. The actual live versions of the two songs appeared only on the original 12" vinyl edition of the "Judas" single.

Professional wrestler Chris Jericho took his ring name and the name of his submission maneuver from the title of this album.

Tracks 1, 6, 8 by Hansen/Weikath
Tracks 2, 5, 7 by Hansen
Tracks 3, 4, 9 by Weikath

Track 1 is largely based on the melody of the nursery rhyme "London Bridge Is Falling Down", though the band's use of it stems from the 'Happy Happy Helloween' theme from the film Halloween III: Season of the Witch.

Recording information:

Recorded and mixed between September and October 1985 at the Music Lab Studio in West Berlin, West Germany.


Co-produced by Helloween.