Consorting with the Black

Norwegian symphonic black-metal masters Dimmu Borgir are joining American bands Danzig, Winds of Plague and Skeletonwitch along with Portuguese Moonspell on the North American Blackest of the Black Tour in October and November. Dimmu Borgir’s eighth studio album, In Sorte Diaboli, was released last April and managed to be the first black metal album to hit number one in their native Norway and also made it to number 43 in the US Billboard 200.

(Tour dates listed on the next page.)

Vreid in the studio

Another Norwegian black metal band, Vreid, recently announced on myspace that they have been making good progress on a fourth, as yet unnamed, album continuing their focus on the Norwegian resistance during World War II. They expect work on the album to be finished by October for a January release.

Grim Tales from Sweden

One Man Army and the Undead Quartet, a death/thrash metal band from Sweden, is set to release their third album, Grim Tales in October or November 2008. Samples can be heard at myspace.

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Paul already told us about Amon Amarth’s new album, Twilight of the Thunder God. Now the tracklist and the cover have been released, along with the information that a limited edition “Deluxe Collector’s” release will be available including an extra live CD and DVD of Amon Amarth’s 2007 appearance at Germany’s Summer Breeze festival. If a 3-disc set is not enough for you, try the even more limited (only 2000 pieces made) “Limited Bubblehead” release including the 2CD+1DVD collector’s edition plus bobble-head dolls of the band members and a 36-page comic. (No, I’m not making this up.)

Twilight of the Thunder God will be released September 17 in Sweden, shortly thereafter in the rest of Europe, and finally Sept 30 in North America.

They also have a North American tour planned for October supported by Ensiferum (FI), Belphegor (AT) and The Absence (US).

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Hide your rum, lock up your daughters: the trolls are coming!

Finntroll, the Swedish-singing folk/black/humppa metallers from Finland are currently on the road in Europe and will be coming soon to North America. Their 2008 tour will be supported by US thrash/death metal band Warbringer. Fans will also be happy to hear that, on their return to Europe, they are planning to record their Sept 20th concert in Amsterdam for an upcoming DVD.

Opeth: coming soon to a hall near you

Paul recently wrote about Opeth’s latest album, Watershed, so it seems only fitting to mention that they are now on tour, busy throughout July and August with a lot of festival gigs. In mid-September, their North American tour begins, supported by US bands High on Fire (for all dates) along with Nachtmystium (9/16-10/4) and Baroness (10/6-10/26).

Nightwish’s Dark Passion Play continues

After a busy summer festival season, the Finnish gothic metal act Nightwish will also be back in North America at the end of August and throughout September for the third North American leg of their ongoing Dark Passion Play tour. They are supported by Sonata Arctica, a power metal band also out of Finland.

Moonsorrow mini-tour

Also worth mentioning, Moonsorrow have announced some North American dates. A Mexican 2-show mini-tour in September and a primarily Canadian tour (with one US show so far) in November, starting with the St. Paul, MN “Heathen Crusade” festival.

Amorphis bring Silent Waters across the ocean

I was talking to an acquaintance tonight who mentioned she is looking forward to the upcoming Amorphis show, so I thought I ought to add their North American dates. Finnish Amorphis published their eighth album Silent Waters in 2007, combining death metal with progressive, gothic and folk elements. Apart from the ProgPower appearance, they will be supported by the very international combination of Swiss band Samael, German/Norwegian Leaves’ Eyes and Virgin Black from Australia.

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Meshuggah are well known among extreme metal circles for their innovative use of jarring rhythms and atonal chord changes. They are very definitely not a band for everyone, but if you have any appreciation for the experimental jazz influenced style known as technical or math metal, Meshuggah are a definite must have. Meshuggah released their 6th full length studio album a few months back entitled obZen, which has gone on to become fairly succesfull in both their native Sweden and the greater Nordic circle as a whole. It has also been receiving exceptionally good critical reviews. For those familiar with the band’s older work, it might be a bit different from expectations, but overall it is worth checking out.

obZen (released March 07, 2008)

1. “Combustion” – 4:11
2. “Electric Red” – 5:53
3. “Bleed” – 7:22
4. “Lethargica” – 5:49
5. “obZen” – 4:27
6. “This Spiteful Snake” – 4:55
7. “Pineal Gland Optics” – 5:14
8. “Pravus” – 5:13
9. “Dancers to a Discordant System” – 9:36

Viking Metal is a subgenre that arose primarily in Sweden during the early 1990s, but has since spread throughout Europe and North America. While there are is huge variety within the subgenre, ranging from language to even the base style, the unifying factor between these bands is the use of Viking influenced themes in the lyrics. Amon Amarth are not the most famous of the myriad of bands occupying this genre, but I personally think that they are one of the best. Admittedly, I’m not a huge fan of their earlier work, but their last album (2006’s With Oden on our Side) is one of the best in the genre. Lots of bloody lyrics suitable for the bloodiest of Viking sagas along with an excellent melodic death metal base make a great combination, and what’s even better is that you can actually understand about 95% of Johan Hegg’s death growl vocals, which is definitely a rarety.

Now that I’ve (hopefully) got your interest, Amon Amarth have announed that they will be releasing a new album aimed at late summer of this year. Unfortunately there isn’t a lot of information released yet, but we do know it will be called Twilight of the Thundergod, that there will be 10 tracks, that the band entered the studio on the first of May, and the names of 3 of the songs: Guardians of Asgaard, Live for the Kill, Tattered Banners and Bloody Flags. Based on the excellence of the band’s last abum I’m expecting great things from Twilight, and eagerly anticipate its release!

Amon Amarth’s back catalogue should be available from most retailers (I know Futureshop in Canada carries at least some of their albums, A&B Sound will order them in for you, and of course Amazon carries all the albums) and naturally once Twilight is released it will be available from these sources as well.

One of the best known bands to have come out of the Scandinavian metal scene is revered Swedish band Opeth. While originally a death metal band, in the past decade Opeth have begun to incorporate a variety of other influences into their sound, including most noticeably acoustic guitars and clean vocals in addition to the more brutal death metal sections. While this is a little bit late, Opeth released their seventh and most recent album, Watershed, this past May. Due to Opeth’s huge worldwide success, the album should be available at both your local record store as well as from major online retailers such as Amazon.

1. “Coil” – 3:10
2. “Heir Apparent” – 8:50
3. “The Lotus Eater” – 8:50
4. “Burden” – 7:41
5. “Porcelain Heart” – 8:00
6. “Hessian Peel” – 11:25
7. “Hex Omega” – 7:00

Anyone familiar with the heavier side of Swedish music will likely have heard of the little town of Umeå, home town of thrash metal legends Meshuggah, but they are hardly the only band to hail from this hot spot of musical talent. Cult of Luna are another heavy band from the little town in North Sweden, but aside from these two things Cult of Luna are an entirely different beast from Meshuggah. Cult of Luna are heavily influenced by the doom/sludge sound which has been growing in popularity the past few years, and they fit nicely into the new genre dubbed post metal by music critics. This makes Cult of Luna a musical cousin of bands like Isis, Rwake, or fellow Nordics Callisto.

Cult of Luna have just released their fifth studio album, titled Eternal Kingdom, in their native Sweden, and will be releasing it in North America next week. I haven’t had the opportunity to hear it yet, but based on previous albums like Salvation or Somewhere Along the Highway I expect it will be an awesomely dark album. Supposedly the plot of the album was inspired by a journal the band found on the site of an old mental institution, which contained the ravings and hallucinations of a madman. I’ve heard similar stories before, so I’m a little dubious as to the veracity of the band’s story, but it sounds like an interesting premise nonetheless.

1. “Owlwood” - 7:39
2. “Eternal Kingdom” - 6:41
3. “Ghost Trail” - 11:50
4. “The Lure (Interlude)” - 2:33
5. “Mire Deep” - 5:10
6. “The Great Migration” - 6:32
7. “Österbotten” - 2:19
8. “Curse” - 6:30
9. “Ugín” - 2:44
10. “Following Betulas” - 8:56

When the album is released in North America, it should be available from all the big retailers like Amazon and quite possibly your local record store.

Hello, I’m Valtteri from Finland, and I’ll be contributing to this blog as often as possible. As I’m Finnish, I’ll most likely concentrate the most on music from my own country (I can’t really avoid coming into contact with news from Finland, can I), although I’m also very interested in expanding my knowledge in the other Nordic countries as well. To kick this thing off, here’s a piece of news from Sweden!

The popular Swedish rock and pop outfit Kent just released a new single from their current album Tillbaka till Samtiden, which saw the light of day last year. The material on the album initially drew controversy among the legions of Kent fans with it’s renewed, electronically enhanced style, but the new direction was all for the good of the long-running band, because Tillbaka till Samtiden received mostly ravingly praising reviews and was a success all around. The new single, titled Vy från ett luftslott (Punks Jump Up Remix) is a more dance-oriented reworking of the track Vy från ett luftslott from Tillbaka till Samtiden, and it’s a great way to introduce yourself to Kent’s unique style of addictive pop-rock. You can download the 100% free single with artwork on Kent’s website, but since the site is completely in Swedish, I’ve included direct links to it below.

Download Vy från ett luftslott (Punks Jump Up Remix) 320 kbps with artwork (8,2 Mb)

Download Vy från ett luftslott (Punks Jump Up Remix) 128 kbps with artwork (3,6 Mb)