Formed in Essen, Germany in 1982, Kreator are arguably the most influential and successful European thrash metal band ever; like many of their European speed metal brethren, Kreator fused Metallica's thrash innovations with Venom's proto-black metal imagery. Often referred to as one of the "Big 4" of Teutonic thrash metal, and they are often credited with helping pioneer death metal and black metal by containing several elements of what was to become those genres. The band has achieved worldwide sales of over two million units for combined sales of all their albums, making them one of the best-selling German thrash metal bands of all time. The band's style has changed several times over the years, from a Venom-inspired speed metal sound, later moving in to thrash metal, and including a period of transitioning from thrash to industrial metal and gothic metal throughout the 1990s. In the early 2000s, Kreator returned to their classic thrash sound, which has continued to the present. With hindsight, and a sense of history, Outcast is certainly one of Kreator's most inventive and important albums. The German gargantuan-watt gladiators' eighth studio release was different to anything they'd done in the past, during a time when metal was in turmoil due to the grunge and Nu Metal explosions. The title Outcast was appropriate for how the band felt in the late 1990s and when Outcast was released in July 1997 it wasn't a huge selling album; nonetheless it proved they were still an exciting, individual and focused band.