Gamma Ray is a power metal band from Hamburg, northern Germany, founded and fronted by Kai Hansen after his departure from the German power metal band Helloween. Hansen is the current lead vocalist, guitarist as well as the chief songwriter of Gamma Ray. The band is known as one of the most prominent bands of the German heavy metal scene.
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. He proceeded to do some studio work with German power metal band Blind Guardian and in 1989 decided to form his own project with long-time friend Ralf Scheepers, former vocalist of the band Tyran Pace. This two-man project grew into a four-man band with the addition of Uwe Wessel on bass and Mathias Burchardt on drums. This was the first line-up of Gamma Ray, bearing a sound understandably close to that of Helloween of that period.
There's a house down on the corner
That we always used to talk about
Never had the guts to go inside
Not even on a dare
Boarded up and creepy
Scary eyes looked out upon a sleepy town
Fascination kept us guessin'
Why the sign read to beware?
We always knew just
What would hit the fan
If we got an up close look
At the boogie man
Shadows on the wall
Voices in the hall, oh, yeah
There's more than just a mouse
In the Zavelow House
Zavelow, Zavelow, Zavelow, yo
I could look inside the window
If I jumped upon my trampoline
Could've sworn I saw Hannibal Lichter
With a hatchet and a head
Not the kind of place you'd see
In Better Homes and Gardens magazine
Unless they did an expose
On the night of the living dead
But with a pretty girl
To hold my hand
Could've got an up close look
At the boogie man
Yeah, shadows on the wall
Voices in the hall, oh, yeah
There's more than just a mouse
In the Zavelow House
Oh, Zavelow, woah
But with a pretty girl
To hold my hand
Could've got an up close look
At the boogie man
Yeah, shadows on the wall
Voices in the hall, oh, yeah
There's more than just a mouse
In the Zavelow House
Yeah, shadows on the wall
Voices in the hall, oh, yeah
There's more than just a mouse
In the Zavelow House
(Zavelow, Zavelow, Zavelow)