Roland Grapow, present in the band since 1989, and Uli Kusch from 1994, decided to form a side project and shortly after this decision, both were fired from their long-time job in Helloween.

MTV also presented the inaugural Headbanger's Ball Tour with Helloween joining San Francisco Bay area thrash-metal band Exodus in support of headlining act Anthrax.

Tensions within Helloween worsened, and the band split into three factions, with Michael Kiske and Ingo Schwichtenberg on one side, Michael Weikath and Roland Grapow on the other, and Markus Grosskopf in the middle, trying to keep peace between the four men.

1993 would come to a close for Helloween with no singer, no drummer, and no record contract ( EMI released the band from its agreement for the low sales numbers for Pink Bubbles Go Ape and Chameleon ).

Despite not possessing the four-octave range boasted by Kiske, Deris's vocal similarity to Kai Hansen, his enthusiasm, his strong songwriting skills, the return of the " classic " Helloween sound in songs such as " Where the Rain Grows " and " The Game Is On ", and the seeming rejuvenation of Weikath and Grapow seemed to strike a chord with the fans.

With this new lineup and a new record contract with Castle Communications, Helloween released its comeback album, Master of the Rings.

Immediately following the tour, Helloween parted ways with guitarist Roland Grapow and drummer Uli Kusch.

Helloween has since completed their studio album Gambling with the Devil, which was released on October 23, 2007.

Helloween teamed up with Kai Hansen's current band Gamma Ray for their 2007 / 2008 " Hellish Rock " world tour, which started in early November 2007.

Helloween were headlining and Gamma Ray were labeled as the " very special guest " with most shows also having fellow German " guest " Axxis.

The tour is notable for Kai Hansen stepping on stage with his former band fellows Weikath and Grosskopf to perform hits " I Want Out " and " Future World " in the last encore segment of Helloween.

He then joined Anders, Joacim, Stefan again, with bands Helloween, Gamma Ray and Pretty Maids, amongst others, and played in the celebration of the 20 years of the German rock club Rockfabrik.

Along with Helloween, Blind Guardian, Gamma Ray, Angra and Rhapsody of Fire, Stratovarius are considered one of the leading groups of the power metal and symphonic metal genre.

However, some power metal bands incorporate bass that is more audible with colorful patterns distinct from the rhythm guitars, such as Helloween, Hibria, and Symphony X.

Often referred to as melodic power metal, European power metal originated from speed metal and the New Wave of British Heavy Metal, emerging in mid / late 1980s with Helloween, Blind Guardian and Stratovarius.

Helloween, followed by early Gamma Ray, mixed fast palm muted speed metal riffs with high-pitched clean vocals, and with a strong focus on melody and uplifting, positive themes.

They were, together with German bands Helloween, Gamma Ray, Grave Digger, Running Wild, and Rage, the pioneers in German power metal, taking their influences mainly from Helloween as well as from Judas Priest.

He was also one of the guest musicians in Avantasia's 2010 world tour, which have put him to play live together with fellow ex-bandmate Michael Kiske, after more than twenty years since he left Helloween.

In 2005, he toured with the young German power / Viking metal band Stormwarrior from his home town of Hamburg as lead singer, playing material from his classic Helloween debut album " Walls of Jericho "-the favorite album and greatest influence of Stormwarrior.

His influence in almost all of the Power Metal bands to come from Europe and his introduction of a new form of Heavy Metal in the early 80's with his band Helloween has earned him the title amongst other musicians in the Power Metal scene as " The Grandfather of Power Metal ".

He first started using them during his days with Helloween after hearing testimonials of ESP from artists such as George Lynch and Kirk Hammett of Metallica.

In 1988, after four years with the German power metal band Helloween, guitarist and songwriter Kai Hansen decided, for reasons that are still the subject of much debate, to leave the group.

Hansen claimed that Helloween had become too big for him to handle, although the group's troubles with financial issues and their record company, Noise Records, most likely played a part as well.

Hansen is the founder, lead guitarist, and vocalist of power metal band Gamma Ray, and the co-founder and former member of German metal band Helloween.

In 2011, he joined the band Unisonic featuring former Helloween vocalist Michael Kiske.

Kai Hansen and Henjo Richter also participated in Tobias Sammet's project Avantasia, on both The Metal Opera and The Metal Opera Part II, along with various other musicians including Hansen's former bandmates from Helloween, Markus Grosskopf and Michael Kiske.

He is also rumoured to have offered his services to Hansen's former band Helloween for their album Rabbit Don't Come Easy following the departure of their guitarist Roland Grapow.

Following a period of several years working behind the scenes in music production, multi-instrumentalist and producer / engineer Piet Sielck joined with former Helloween bandmate Kai Hansen and then-drummer for Blind Guardian Thomen Stauch in a new project that would blend power metal with a high-concept science fiction story.

Tobias Sammet chose not to call Matos for the 2010s world tour due to the presence of too many musicians at the current world travelling tour, including former Helloween members Michael Kiske and Kai Hansen.

In the years since, however, Kiske was fired from Helloween and the issues within Pink Cream 69 worsened.

Legal disputes with their record company, prevented Helloween from releasing new material until 1991's Pink Bubbles Go Ape, which was followed by 1993's Chameleon.

Both Pink Bubbles Go Ape and Chameleon were commercial failures and resulted in Kiske leaving Helloween.

Pink Bubbles Go Ape is the fourth studio album by German power metal band Helloween, released in 1991.

This is the second Helloween live album to feature Andi Deris as frontman, and third overall.

He was replaced by Andi Deris, who has remained with Helloween ever since.

One version of events states that Weikath, Deris and Grosskopf felt that Kusch and Grapow, in particular, were spending more time on and paying more attention to their new side-project, Masterplan ( Grapow's output on Helloween albums had dropped to barely one song per album by that point ); since the others believed that Kusch and Grapow were not 100 % dedicated to Helloween they were dismissed.

#" The King for a 1000 Years " ( Music: Helloween ; Lyrics: Deris ) – 13: 54

Helloween recorded and released its first record in 1985, a self-titled EP containing 5 tracks.

It took six months to record the second album Return To Heaven Denied and before its release the band took part in that summer's metal main event: " Gods of Metal ", together with some of heavy metal's biggest acts such as Black Sabbath, Pantera, Helloween, Blind Guardian, etc.

Tensions within the band and its management resulted in an album that is highly eclectic in terms of its musical aesthetics, to the point that it has been rejected by the band's core audience as not being a Helloween album at all.

) Following these releases, Helloween began the search for a new vocalist.

With their new lead vocalist in tow, Helloween approached record labels Noise International and RCA and proposed the release of a double-LP to introduce the new line-up.

Roy Z ( Judas Priest, Halford, Iron Maiden's Bruce Dickinson, Helloween ) was the producer for the new album.

After this tour it was announced via Michael Kiske's official website that Kai would join his new band Unisonic, as they " instantly felt the magic of Helloween years again and had a lot of fun together on and off

The album contained acoustic re-arrangements of his old Helloween material and one new song.