Absolute had started as a studio-project while I was working as an assistant at Parasound studios in Bensheim. While I was assisting on projects like Sweetbox, Ateed or international Artists using the studio, I was also involved in their music-videos or live-tours. In the summer of 2003 I hired Robby for a video-shoot and on the way to the shoot in Berlin, we made the plan for a new rock-project. Back home I got in touch with Pogo who I hadn't met, yet, but knew about him from his former band Reinvented. 

Well, he liked the idea of something a little heavier and a few months later we got together, jammed 3-4 songs and not soon after, the producer I worked for got involved as producer for this band, as well as the second guitarist.

So, by 2004 we started working on a full-lenght album, which took us about 2 years to finish. 

Getting signed by AFM records out of Hamburg, we played with all kinds of national and international Acts like Silbermond, Revolverheld, Acht, Gil Ofarim, Bonfire, Gotthart and many more as well as festivals like the Summerbreeze.

We had a few national singles on german rock-radio like "Sebastian" or "The Ultimate Show", which were widely recognized by the rock-press.

While working on our second album things got so tense between the members of the band that Robby quit the band in the beginning of 2008. After a really successful showcase-gig with a different drummer (Urban Berz from The New Roses) in Frankfurt things got even more tense between the remaining members that we called it quits and went seperate ways.

We left behind a landmark-album and countless memories at countless gigs. That's why I will always cherrish what we had accomplished, even though I had decided to start over from scratch with a solo-project called BREITENBACH.

LINKS:

ABSOLUTE @ Spotify

ABSOLUTE @ AppleMusic

It all started out as a solo-project, after I had written a few songs that I had wanted to record, like "Sail Me" or "Waiting". Then after splitting from the band Absolute, there was no more waiting. So, I asked Pogo and Robby to help me out in the studio for this album and maybe even at playing live. For some reason they agreed and the first gig in 2008 turned out as a surprise for us.
We had been playing together for quite some time now, since the beginning of 2004. But this time there was a whole different energy between us. So that night we decided to turn it from a solo-project into a real band. A trio.

We started playing all kinds of gigs and festivals and practiced our craft on our own. No record-label, no producer, just us.

In 2010 I had founded my own little label named BStar Records just for the purpose of releasing our own music. Said and done, on April 15th 2011 our debut-album named "Starting Over" was released. Not just digitally, but as a CD in every major record-store in Germany, as well as amazon. That was an amazing milestone and gave us the opportunity to go play in every big city nationwide. Granted they were all small club-gigs, but we were even so blessed as to support bands like Anberlin or Dance Gavin Dance. We even had a live appearance on Germanys biggest TV-soap called "GZSZ - Gute Zeiten, Schlechte Zeiten" and did a whole lot of crazy cool stuff. Like occupying a city-house in Frankfurt and playing on its balconies unannounced and as a big surprise to friday afternoon market-goers.

In 2012 we went into the studio for two months straight to record our second album, which included songs like "To Eternity" or "ready when you are" or "All the way". After its release we were fortunate enough to support "Prime Circle" out of South Africa, which was an amazing Germany-tour for us all. 

Our songs were being played on tv and radio and we had built up a small community of followers all over Germany.

Unfortunately, after six years, tensions in the band came back and we weren't able to solve our issues, so we called out for a break. Not knowing that this break would ultimately take another four years.

In 2018 we got back together in a rented rehearsal space for a jam and figured it would be time again to get back in the ring. This time we had asked Tim Kosack to join in as a second guitarplayer, which he did. We recorded and released an EP called "On a flow" which featured the song "Pretty Little Things" and went on to write for a new album.

In 2020, when Covid hit, we switched plans and instead of finishing a whole album, we released one song per month for nine months straight.

In the end of 2021 we got together with the guys from Studio8 and planned a live-unplugged-recording, filmed and released as video. All that under title "Live & Acoustic", including 16 songs. 

Looking back that was the beginning of the end for the project. We've had so many different ideas turned into reality. Songs from "Sail Me" and "Follow Me" to "Waiting" and "Don't come back" to "Bad Illusion" and "To The Haters". From playing support for international rock-acts to occupying a building, playing a guerilla-concert to making the first barrier-free music-video by a german artist (Waiting). Taking a big break, trying to start off as a four-piece band, sometimes with softer and sometimes with harder songs.

And all that still under the name that once was meant to symbolize a solo-project.

It was time for a new chapter. No, not a new chapter, it was time for a new book! 

So, after Tim quit the band, we all quit the band and started something absolutely new.
With new songs, all rock-songs and a new name. Something from scratch. Something to start off new - again. Power State!

LINKS:

BREITENBACH @ Facebook

BREITENBACH @ Instagram

BREITENBACH @ Spotify

BREITENBACH @ AppleMusic

BREITENBACH @ YouTube

I grew up on american pop and rock music. We had a few American military bases around the area I grew up in and my musical taste was far from any german music. Nevertheless, after countless years of writing songs in english (and mean countless! I wrote my first sing in 4th grade! ;)) I tried writing some in german. Something I had never done before and when I moved from Frankfurt to Leipzig in 2015, I had about 20 german songs, of which I released 5 on an EP called "Lichterloh". 

I had played a few shows here and there, even joined some bigger names like "Wirtz" or "Richie Sambora" from Bon Jovi, when he was on a solo-tour in Germany. Though my heart was never really in it, I liked this period of my live and the experience of it all.

In 2017 I partnered up with the MediaApes and went to Austin, Texas for the SXSW conference. That's where we shot the music-video to "Lichterloh" and that's where I got my middle-name, hence my artist-name. 

LINKS:

TOBY BREITENBACH @ Spotify 

TOBY BREITENBACH @ AppleMusic

TOBY BREITENBACH @ YouTube