Over the last few years, the Noctis Valkyries metal festival has become one of the more well-known and respected metal festivals and conferences in North America. The unique blend of bands with the conference portion has established Noctis as a destination for many discerning metal fans. A week before the festival the Friday night had sold-out to the disappointment of many, and Saturday night sold out within minutes of doors opening.
This is a review of the third edition of Getaway Rock Festival that was held in Gavle, Sweden during three hot days in July. The festival has a new organizer – the German FKP Skorpio – and we were eager to see how the festival was planned this year. We got to see some exclusive Swedish performances by Suicidal Tendencies, Nightwish, Venom, Manowar, Ministry and Yngwie Malmsteen to mention a few. Other acts that performed were Mustasch, Saxon, Finntroll, Satyricon, Behemoth, Devin Townsend Project and Ghost. Read more about the festival down below.
To travel from the North Sea into the Atlantic Ocean, they must sail around the British Isles. Before doing so they decided to visit a town in North East England that they are familiar with from last year: Newcastle, and what a welcome they got! On arrival they all got injected by a deadly toxin: VENOM!
70000TONS OF METAL, The World’s Biggest Floating Heavy Metal Festival now sails through the Channel into the Atlantic. Our course: Straight West.
Make no mistake, 70000TONS OF METAL is not your grandma’s cruise. It’s also not one of the cruises that share the ship with normal cruise guests. This is an all heavy metal cruise! Can you imagine that? A whole luxury cruise ship full of metalheads? And since there is no backstage area you will have the opportunity to mingle side-by-side with the artists in this incredibly fan-friendly scenario that has no comparison. It’s like everyone has a backstage pass!
So far 30 out of a total of 40 bands on board are known:
ALESTORM
AMORPHIS
ATHEIST
CANNIBAL CORPSE
CHILDREN OF BODOM
CORONER
DARK FUNERAL
ELUVEITIE
GOD DETHRONED
GRAVE DIGGER
HAMMERFALL
IN EXTREMO
KAMELOT
MOONSORROW
MY DYING BRIDE
NIGHTWISH
OVERKILL
PENTAGRAM
PESTILENCE
PRETTY MAIDS
RIOT
SAMAEL
STRATOVARIUS
SUFFOCATION
TANKARD
THERION
TRISTANIA
VENOM
VIRGIN STEELE
WHIPLASH
70000TONS OF METAL will sail Monday, January 23, 2012 aboard the Royal Caribbean “Majesty of the Seas” from Miami FL to George Town, Cayman Islands and will not return you to the real world for four days until Friday, January 27, 2012.
Ticket prices start at US$666 plus US$289 taxes and fees per person and include all on-board entertainment, non-alcoholic and non-carbonated beverages, all meals at the dining rooms, most on-board restaurants and even 24 room service!
What are you waiting for? You might even need a vacation from this vacation when all is said and done! Check out http://www.70000tons.com/ for more information and book your cabin NOW!
“We have decided to change our name.
It was brought to our attention that a band who named themselves after our 6th Venom album, Prime Evil had decided to get back together after we had announced our intentions. We had already signed our deal with Scarlet and had appearances booked but we have decide to cancel those shows as our belief is that EVERY band should have a chance and we do not wish to exclude anyone so we have made this change. We apologise to the Venom Legions and fans who chose our name but we hope you support this/our decision…… and so….Welcome to the MPIRE of EVIL!”
Mpire of Evil features Tony Dolan – former bassist and vocalist of Atomkraft and Venom.
Universal Music will release pioneering UK black metallers VENOM’s new album, entitled Fallen Angels, in August / September 2011 (exact date to be confirmed). Complete album details to follow.
About the band’s new album, bassist/vocalist Conrad “Cronos” Lant recently told The Quietus that “the new tracks are tremendous. Basically, if you think of the way Antton was playing, especially on the last album Hell, he is a nu metal drummer and comes from that kind of background. He’s hung round Venom most of his life and it was just good to introduce him to the whole Venom concept of playing like the way Abaddon used to play. Basically Abaddon came from a rock background and then basically developed a black metal, speed metal, thrash metal style. The nu metal drumming is very different and it was a steep learning curve for him. At the end of the day he’s got his own style and he wants to be known for what he’s done and not be in my shadow which is totally understandable. Some of the guys we had coming to the rehearsals were not ex-CRADLE OF FILTH but they were still ‘I’ve been in this band, I’ve been in that band’ but they were all far too young, you know. We were looking for someone in their thirties upwards who understood rock music.”
According to a band update, pioneering UK black metallers VENOM’s new album is currently being mixed and the band’s management and label are in discussions regarding the release date, soon to be announced. The band are again working with top producer Tom Belton at his London Studio.
About the band’s new album, bassist/vocalist Conrad “Cronos” Lant told The Quietus recently that “the new tracks are tremendous. Basically, if you think of the way Antton was playing, especially on the last album Hell, he is a nu metal drummer and comes from that kind of background. He’s hung round Venom most of his life and it was just good to introduce him to the whole Venom concept of playing like the way Abaddon used to play. Basically Abaddon came from a rock background and then basically developed a black metal, speed metal, thrash metal style. The nu metal drumming is very different and it was a steep learning curve for him. At the end of the day he’s got his own style and he wants to be known for what he’s done and not be in my shadow which is totally understandable. Some of the guys we had coming to the rehearsals were not ex-CRADLE OF FILTH but they were still ‘I’ve been in this band, I’ve been in that band’ but they were all far too young, you know. We were looking for someone in their thirties upwards who understood rock music.”
Interview & All Live Photos By Lord of The Wasteland; Promo Pics Courtesy of Roadrunner Records
Transcription By Claudia
Many readers’ first exposure to Dez Fafara may have been in the late nineties when he was fronting nu-metal band Coal Chamber but after that group disbanded in 2002, Fafara ventured out on his own with his new group, DevilDriver. On their just-released third album, THE LAST KIND WORDS, DevilDriver combine heavy grooves with dark lyrics and some impressive guitar melodies that have sprung up here and, to a lesser extent, on 2004’s THE FURY OF OUR MAKER’S HAND.
A few hours before the band was scheduled to hit the stage for the Hartford, Connecticut stop of Ozzfest 2007, I spoke to Fafara about THE LAST KIND WORDS, the merits of the Hammond B3 organ, turning forty, spirituality and kicking the ass of Venom singer, Cronos.
Central Park Kaisaniemi Helsinki Finland 30.6-2.7.2006
Pics and article by the Finnish Metal-Rules.com team respectively (Luxi “The Keeper of Moshpit” Lahtinen, Arto “The mighty servant of metallic death” Lehtinen & Marko “KISS my ass” Syrjälä)
Once again thousands and thousands of metal fans arrived to conquer the capital of Finland, Helsinki. This was of course for the annual and prestigious Tuska Open Air Festival. The festival is arranged in the heart of the town, namely the central park Kaisaniemi. Nearly 33,000 freaks of all ages, possessed by metal, gathered to enjoy the metallic feast to the central park. Unlike the previous events of Tuska having been totally sold-out, instead a few days of the event this year weren’t sold out for some strange reason. Obviously the line-up didn’t manage to convince everyone to check out for example Sisters Of Mercy, Opeth, Celtic Frost.
Frankly, from our point of view, the bill for 2006 didn’t definitely offer any groundshaking names. Celtic Frost and Venom stand for the more nostalgic trip back to the 80’s in the eyes of several old school thrash metal maniacs, but in the positive way. Picking up Sisters Of Mercy to conclude the first opening day went beyond the sense of humour of several people. To be honest, none of these bands would have been the right ones to be a headliner for each day. But all in all the bill was based on covering a variety of different metal genres ranging from hyper-blasting metal to a more melancholic Finnish mainstream rock stuff ala Timo Rautiainen. Especially odd and strange sounding names booked to the festival had room to perform stuff of their own. Having a large range of metal and other types of rock proves Tuska is not limited to one certain metal category as everyone had something to feel, taste and see during these three long days.
Now it is definitely true that The Gods made and created Metal as the weather was extremely warm and hot during the whole weekend as there was no single rain cloud floating above the festival area. In general the atmosphere was peaceful and bigger problems managed to be avoided, thanks to the common metal spirit of the Finnish die hard metal freaks.
As usual, it has turned out to be an annual mandatory tradition for compiling this article of the Tuska festival in Metal-Rules.com with both pleasure and pain. Therefore the Finnish Metal-Rules.com pain squad spent the whole weekend testifying several acts in action and tried to feel and taste the spirit of Heavy Metal and soccer during three insane long days in the beautiful central park of Kaisaniemi with several friends as well as everlasting enemies as usual. Enjoy…
Wow! This is the sixth time that the Finnish Metal-Rules squad makes an invasion to the mighty Swedenrock festival. Over 60 bands descended on the the southern area of Sweden for a festival that turned out to be nothing but an utter blast! The bill of Swedenrock festival 2006 covers a wide range of metal styles and even classic rock stuff (Journey and Molly Hatchet). Therefore, there was at least something for everyone who attended the festival. As usual, the whole festival was once again sold out when around 20,000 people arrived at the area every day. The Swedenrock festival has always had tremendous luck with the weather as once again the gods of weather blessed this rocking metallic heaven on the earth with an extreme hot and sunny weekend that burned red the skin of several festival goers.
As stated in the first sentence, this is the sixth time that the Swedenrock festival has been featured in the site of Metal-Rules.com, so it is quite logical for us to give a real in-depth article of several bands performing at Swedenrock. Enjoy !!!
