THE GATES OF SLUMBER SET TO ENTER STUDIO AND BEGIN WORK ON NEW ALBUM

CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED “TRUE HEAVY METAL BAND” KICKS OFF EUROPEAN TOUR WITH CATHEDRAL; ANNOUNCES PARTICIPATION AS PART OF 2011 ROADBURN FESTIVAL

Celebrated “True Heavy Metal band” THE GATES OF SLUMBER will enter England’s Orgone Studios with producer Jaime Gomez Arellano (Ghost, Angel Witch) later this month to lay down tracks for its forthcoming new album. The follow up to the Indianapolis trio’s critically acclaimed LP Hymns of Blood and Thunder will see a spring, 2011 release via Rise Above Records.

THE GATES OF SLUMBER recently announced the addition of new drummer, “Cool Clyde” Paradis into its ranks. A New Orleans native and Hurricane Katrina survivor, Paradis joins THE GATES OF SLUMBER hot off stints in Sourvein, Substance Abuse and the New Orleans blues act T-bone and The Rhythm Makers. A photo of the new lineup can be viewed at this location.

“The new music is taking on a more troglodyte doom metal feel,” exclaimed THE GATES OF SLUMBER front man / guitarist Karl Simon. “With Clyde now in the band, the feel of things was bound to change; he’s not only a different drummer, but from a totally different school of thought with regards to the drums. It’s no secret that Saint Vitus’ shuddering doom crawl was the root that inspired this band and we’d both felt that over three albums we’d taken the raw epic feel as far as we could. Now, it’s time to get back to basics, shed some of the bulk and get ugly again. No warriors this time, no acoustic guitars, no keyboards, no lofty Nietzschean ideals. Just black bile and a bit of the old “white magic; black magic.”

THE GATES OF SLUMBER is currently in the midst of a European tour as hand-picked support for legendary doom rock band Cathedral. The trek will run through November 20 in Paris, France. Additionally, THE GATES OF SLUMBER has been confirmed as one of the featured acts for the 2011 Roadburn Festival, set to take place April 14-16 in Tilburg, Holland. Check out Roadburn’s official THE GATES OF SLUMBER announcement flyer at this location.

ELECTRIC WIZARD TO RELEASE NEW ALBUM

World-class British doom metal band ELECTRIC WIZARD will release its long-awaited new album Black Masses in North America on January 18, 2011 via Rise Above Records. The legendary group’s seventh studio album and first since 2007′s Witchcult Today, Black Masses was recorded with Grammy Award-winning British recording engineer Liam Watson (The White Stripes) in London’s Toe Rag Studios and promises to deliver “a crushing behemoth of funereal march pyschedelia” and “the oblivion and ecstasy of 10,000 watts of doom!”

Long hailed as the true heirs to Black Sabbath, ELECTRIC WIZARD have achieved near iconic status in the metal underground but have not — as of yet — crushed the world! Now, in league with Satan himself, ELECTRIC WIZARD prepares to annihilate the planet with Black Masses, its new LP and dark prayer to “Luciferian heavy metal” via crackling, vintage valve amplifiers set to full overdrive. Propelled by gigantic riffs and dripping with dark, bluesy undertones, Black Masses is an ugly, sleazy and dirty album steeped in unruly themes of 70′s exploitation cinema, occultism, substance abuse and narco-satanism. Taken as a whole, the record creates a twisted amalgam of late 60′s dark acid psychedelia and early 80′s satanic metal, all draped in both vile, misanthropic imagery and lyrics.

“This ritual incantation of heavy metal sorcery will break down your psyche as wave upon crushing wave of lead weight acid-laced Doom leaves you numb and broken before our unholy altar,” declared ELECTRIC WIZARD cult leader Jus Oborn when reached for comment. “Violent, bleak and ritualistic, we bow to the black altar of the RIFF. We do not rock, we kill!”

EXTRAORINDARY SWEDISH METAL BAND GHOST TO RELEASE DEBUT ALBUM

Bizarre Swedish black metal buzz band GHOST will dispense its debut directive Opus Eponymous in North America on January 18, 2011 via Rise Above Records. The release of the album will assist the abhorrent agents in spreading their “unholy gospel” and “tricking mankind into believing the end is ultimately a good thing via the ever so popular rock music medium.”

GHOST‘s Opus Eponymous is a daringly fascinating combination of satanic rock music merged with an almost unthinkable pop sensibility; this is Black Metal at its most original and deceiving apex. Musically rich and teeming with an undeniably authentic classic metal aura (described “as if the last three decades of heavy metal history never existed”), Opus Eponymous baits and ensnares with its undeniable accessibility while “majestically weaving a melodic spell of evil through the senses until listeners become utterly possessed and open to any diabolical suggestion”.

Enveloped in a shroud of mystery and standing anonymous beneath the painted faces, hoods and robes which their sect demand, the six nameless ghouls of GHOST deliver litanies of pulsating heavy rock and stimulating lyrics which “glorify and glamorize the disgusting and sacrilegious”. The music and philosophies of GHOST specifically target “individuals who have a void in their life perhaps caused by some form of emotional trauma or upset” (research suggests these are most likely adolescents); this dearth can then be alluringly filled by GHOST‘s music and philosophies, “so that in time the easily manipulated will come to share the views and goals of the Coven’s ministry and can prepare their own plans for the downfall of humanity.”

A sampling of the sextet’s suggestive strain is available for ingestion immediately as Stereogum premieres the shadowy GHOST song “Ritual”. Check out the unsettling, “chirpiest song about human sacrifice” ever put to tape today at this location.

CHILDREN OF BODOM UNVEILS ALBUM COVER, TRACK LISTING TO NEW RECORD “RELENTLESS RECKLESS FOREVER”

HD TRAILER FOR BAND’s NEW MUSIC VIDEO “WAS IT WORTH IT?” NOW AVAILABLE

CHILDREN OF BODOM (also COB), the hard partying Finnish Heavy Metal band that features frontman and modern day guitar hero Alexi Laiho will release its new album Relentless Reckless Forever on March 8, 2011 via Universal Music. Today, COB reveals the album’s cover art, which can be viewed now at this location.

Recorded in Petrax Studios with famed rock producer Matt Hyde (Slayer, Monster Magnet), Relentless Reckless Forever is the seventh studio album of CHILDREN OF BODOM‘s illustrious career and the first new record from the band since 2008′s Blooddrunk, which debuted at #22 on Billboard’s Top 200 Chart and scored the quintet its third consecutive #1 debut in Finland. On Relentless Reckless Forever, COB‘s high-energy hooks and electric energy forge stadium-sized heavy metal anthems that seethe with both marvelous musicianship and a phenomenal pop prowess. The quintet’s unique union of haunting melodies, rhythmic sensibility, guitar-and-keyboard interplay and king-size solos is supercharged to the maximum, and the resulting record is poised to push the band – already on the brink of breakout success in the U.S. – to an altogether new pinnacle.

“We worked super hard on this album, at least for me it was pretty much no sleep or rest for six weeks,” stated Laiho. “But we were determined to make the best COB album ever, so we were willing to do whatever it took. Of course, having our producer Matt Hyde kicking our asses 24/7 definitely made the results even better, so obviously we’re more than anxious to get this album out there”