Sunday 17 May 2015

LAMB OF GOD to Release New Album “VII: Sturm Und Drang” – Available Worldwide July 2015 via Epic Records



Grammy-nominated, chart-topping Richmond, VA based heavy rock band LAMB OF GOD will release their highly-anticipated seventh full-length album, VII: Sturm Und Drang, worldwide this July via Epic Records. Today, after weeks of hinting at fans about the imminent release, the band is unleashing a brand new track, “Still Echoes”, via www.lamb-of-god.com.

LAMB OF GOD’s last album, the 2012 Grammy-nominated Resolution, debuted at #3 on the US Billboard Top 200, #1 on the US Top Hard Rock and Rock Album charts, #2 on the Canadian albums chart, and #3 on the Australian albums chart.

“Still Echoes” will be available via all digital retailers and streaming services beginning Monday, May 18th.

LAMB OF GOD frontman Randy Blythe states, “The time has come to give the fans their first taste of the new LAMB OF GOD album. This is a very, very dark, yet sonically highly varied, record. As it's always good to come out of the gate hard with a fast and aggressive one, we chose this track "Still Echoes" to kick it off. Enjoy/destroy.”

Several exclusive VII: Sturm Und Drang pre-order bundles are available now via vii-preorder. Make sure to stay tuned for more VII: Sturm Und Drang clips, tracks, and videos... coming soon.

VII: Sturm Und Drang is once again produced and mixed by Josh Wilbur with engineering by Wilbur, Nick Rowe, and Kyle McAulay, and was recorded at NRG Recording Studios in North Hollywood, CA and Suburban Soul Studios in Torrance, CA.

Catch LAMB OF GOD on tour this summer with Slipknot, Bullet For My Valentine and Motionless In White:

NORTH AMERICAN TOUR:

LAMB OF GOD W/ Slipknot, Bullet For My Valentine & Motionless In White

7/24 - West Palm Beach, FL @ Cruzan Amphitheatre 7/25 - Tampa, FL @ MidFlorida Credit Union Amphitheatre 7/26 - Atlanta, GA @ Aaron’s Amphitheatre at Lakewood 7/28 - Detroit, MI @ DTE Energy MusicTheatre 7/29 - Darien Center, NY @ Darien Lake Performing Arts Center 7/31 - Saratoga Springs, NY @ Saratoga Performing Arts Center 8/1 - Wantagh, NY @ Nikon at Jones Beach Theater 8/2 - Hartford, CT @ XFINITY Theatre 8/4 - Boston, MA @ XFINITY Center 8/5 - Holmdel, NJ @ PNC Bank Arts Center 8/6 - Pittsburgh, PA @ First Niagara Pavilion 8/8 - Toronto, ON @ Molson Canadian Amphitheatre 8/9 - Montreal, QC @ Parc Jean-Drapeau - Heavy Montreal 8/11 - Washington, DC @ Jiffy Lube Live 8/12 - Virginia Beach, VA @ Farm Bureau Live at Virginia Beach 8/14 - Indianapolis, IN @ Klipsch Music Center 8/15 - Chicago, IL @ First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre 8/16 - St. Louis, MO @ Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre 8/19 - Denver, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre 8/21 - Salt Lake City, UT @ USANA Amphitheatre 8/23 - Auburn, WA @ White River Amphitheater 8/24 - Vancouver, BC @ Rogers Arena 8/26 - Concord, CA @ Concord Pavilion 8/28 - Las Vegas, NV @ MGM Resort Festival Grounds 8/29 - Phoenix, AZ @ AK-Chin Pavilion 8/30 - Albuquerque, NM @ Isleta Amphitheater 9/2 - Austin, TX @ Austin360 Amphitheater 9/4 - Houston, TX @ The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion 9/5 - Dallas, TX @ Gexa Energy Pavilion

ABOUT LAMB OF GOD:

Richmond, VA natives LAMB OF GOD originally formed in 1994 as Burn The Priest while in college together at Virginia Commonwealth University, initially performing in meagre venues and hocking rough demos amongst the local scene. In 1998, the band changed their moniker to LAMB OF GOD, which would mark their impending ascension to top-tier status, as well as one of the only tangible career deviations that the band would ever undertake – having consistently released chart-topper after chart-topper while maintaining a true and constant line-up of members and increasingly growing fanbase; a rarity in modern music. The band’s first major release, 2000’s New American Gospel, was immediately touted as an instant metal classic. AllMusic stated it best, “The essential signatures of post-Pantera metal are in abundance on Lamb of God's inaugural album. New American Gospel provides a mighty oak upon which gritty American metal's faith is maintained, effectively bridging the '90s' insistence upon drill-sergeant technicality and the old school's determined focus on riff construction.”

In 2007, just a short time after putting out monumentally successful releases Ashes of the Wake (Album, 2004, #27 of 200 debut), Killadelphia (DVD, 2004, RIAA Platinum), and Sacrament (Album, 2006, #8 of 200 debut), LAMB OF GOD was honored with a Grammy nomination for the track “Redneck”. This would mark the first of four Grammy nominations for the band. After the release of Walk With Me In Hell (DVD, 2008), the second and third Grammy nominations came in 2010 and 2011 for tracks “Set to Fail” and “In Your Words”, both cut from Wrath (CD, 2009, #2 of 200 debut). The fourth nomination arrived for the band’s track “Ghost Walking”, cut from their 2012 album Resolution (CD, #3 of 200 debut). Now, on the cusp of releasing their seventh full-length album VII: Sturm Und Drang, the five-piece is poised to prove their lasting consistency by offering another blistering contribution of the highest quality heavy metal – a record that no one other than LAMB OF GOD could truly execute.

Having amassed the globe with countless world tours and millions of albums sold, all-the-while overcoming countless hurdles ranging from personal demons to vocalist Randy Blythe’s 2013 trial in Prague (which resulted in the acclaimed 2014 full-length feature documentary, As The Palaces Burn, and upcoming book, Dark Days: A Memoir, authored by the frontman and releasing in July), LAMB OF GOD stands the test of time as the biggest, most influential heavy metal band of the new millennium.

THE OTHER - Fear Itself out via Steamhammer 22 June 2015

***EUROPE’S PREMIER HORROR PUNK ROCK BAND’S NEW ‘FEAR ITSELF’ STUDIO ALBUM UNLEASHED JUNE 22nd ON SPV***



Europe’s Number One Horror Punk Rock band The Other are set to unleash their mighty sixth studio album, ‘Fear Itself’, as a digipak CD, and as a double vinyl gatefold album, with printed inner sleeves (+ CD), on Steamhammer / SPV on June 22nd. The Other have also lined up a UK headline tour in November; dates are:

09.11.15 Manchester – Tiger Lounge 10.11.15 Leicester – The Shed 11.11.15 Nottingham - The Old Angel 12.11.15 Birmingham – Scruffy Murphy’s 13.11.15 London – The Purple Turtle 14.11.15 Brighton –Green Door Store

There are phases in life which you want to leave behind as quickly as possible, as The Other know only too well. Although their album ‘The Devils You Know’ and subsequent tour of Germany marked a major step in the right direction in 2012, the band surrounding front-man Rod Usher soon suffered a number of severe setbacks when they found themselves having to cope with two significant personnel changes – which also meant a 50% exodus of their former line-up, leaving Rod Usher and drummer Doc Caligari to their own devices. “Of course we asked ourselves: quo vadis?” Usher confesses, “but from the beginning Doc and I were determined to keep going, no matter what. Now we know that sometimes you have to wade through a vale of tears to create an atmosphere of departure.”

The band owes its newfound optimism to guitarists Pat Laveau and Ben Crowe, plus bassist Aaron Torn, who not only complete the line-up perfectly, but have also made the band stylistically more diverse thanks to the conscious distribution of the guitar parts onto two pairs of shoulders. You want proof? All you have to do is listen to the new album ‘Fear Itself’, a dark grab bag packed with the most powerful horror punk worldwide, the way only The Other are capable of creating it. Usher: “Our new band members have contributed lots of ideas to the new album, so our musical range is more diverse than ever before.”

Usher is referring to tracks such as ‘In The Dark’, a Cult influenced goth rock number with a melancholy 80’s feel to its chorus, the sinister ‘Doll Island - Isla De Las Muñecas’ with it references to Glenn Danzig and his band, and to ‘Nie mehr’, the traditional The Other metal opener, for the first time featuring German-language lyrics.

Of course there are also those punk rock tracks with sing-along chorus parts which are so typical of The Other, for example ‘Bloodsucker’ and ‘The Price You Pay’, both more than likely to become real live faves. Other highlights on the album are ‘Screams In The Black House’, fast and melodic, emotional and dark, with a twin-guitar solo and hints of Iron Maiden and Thin Lizzy thrown in. Usher: “The lyrics are about that sinister hut in the forest that everybody remembers from their childhood. Only here we’ve also got a bogey man.” ‘Rise’ is very much in the tradition of older material such as ‘Hyde Inside’ and ‘Howling At The Moon’, Usher’s lyrics bringing to mind Edgar Allan Poe and his motto “The death of a beautiful woman is unquestionably the most poetical topic in the world”.

***The first single plus video from the album is entitled ‘Dreaming Of The Devil’*** Usher states that “It’s about women who feel strangely attracted to bad guys. We can tell you a thing or two about that, and that’s what we’ve done in this song. Even if it’s wrapped in a horror story with the devil cast in an erotic part.”

So The Other obviously continue to have a penchant for unusual subject matter, as the album title hints: the term ‘Fear Itself’ is part of a quote (“nothing to fear but fear itself”) by former US president Franklin D. Roosevelt and refers to an unfounded fear that’s impossible to define (like the spider featured on the album’s cover artwork), but also the fear of new directions/decisions/risks (like the labyrinth on the cover).

Like its predecessor ‘The Devils You Know’, ‘Fear Itself’ was produced by Waldemar Sorychta (Grip Inc., Tiamat, Moonspell), who was also responsible for the powerful final mix of ‘New Blood’ (2010). As far as The Other are concerned, Sorychta is the ideal producer, or, as Usher puts it: “There could be no better producer for The Other than Waldemar, with the exception of Bob Ezrin (Alice Cooper, Kiss) and Rick Rubin (Metallica, Danzig, The Cult) perhaps.”

And there could be nobody better than Daniel Madden and the Figurenwerkstatt Ruland replica workshop to create the Rod Usher and Doc Caligari collectible dolls and The Other wall plaque. So The Other mark 2015 continue to be a multimedia spectacle, a real Eldorado for horror fans and collectors. ‘Fear Itself’ is the perfect soundtrack for that scene.



Release Date Europe: June 22nd, 2015
Release Date Germany: June 19th, 2015
USA / Canada: June 23rd, 2015