‘Krampus’ is the third new music and video released during 2016 from Snowy Shaw‘s forthcoming first album as a solo artist to be out in early spring 2017. Odd and unconventional as it may seem, ‘Alcoholocaust’, ‘Nachtgeist’ and now ‘Krampus’ could and should be viewed as premotional videos rather than promotional since the songs themselves aren’t available yet until next year. Made to introduce the fans to the new chapter in the wondrous world of Snowy Shaw, both musically and visually and to offer a sneak peak on what’s to come. ‘Krampus’ is created by by Snowy Shaw, Lucky Ludde and Patric Ullaeus and recorded at Tomten’s Verkstad. Mixed and mastered by Fredrik Nordström at Studio Fredman, check out ‘Krampus’:
Over the past few years having played shows and released the live DVD/CD box “SNOWY SHAW: 25 years of madness in the name of metal” where Snowy and his namesake band ( + special guests) play “All his favorites songs from all his former bands” as well as two separate live albums “Snowy Shaw,.. is Alive! “and “Live in Hell”. All of which about 65% are Snowy‘s own compositions, while the rest consists of music Snowy either recorded with the original band, toured the world playing or both.
Since replacing Mikkey Dee as a drummer in King Diamond in 1989 Snowy has earned himself a reputation as one of the scene’s most hard working multi-talented artist and multi-istrumentalist with numerous bands and projects such as Therion, Sabaton, Notre Dame, Dream Evil, Dimmu Borgir, Mercyful Fate, Memento Mori, XXX, Opera Diabolicus, Kee Marcello, illwill, Mad Architect, Denner/Shermann etc.
2017 sees him bring his spectacular show to the U.S for the first time with the sold out show at Prog Power Atlanta, in September. The plan to to add more U.S dates as well as a tour of South/latin America during the period is currently in the making.
“Frankly speaking, after all these years with various duties and positions in countless bands I’ve reached a point in my life where I feel that if I don’t get to do my own shit now, and the way I want it I might as well give up music altogether. Apart from doing the occasional recording session job every now and then I really can’t picture myself ever joining another band again. As grateful and proud as I am, having had the privilege of working with all those fabulous bands in the past, it’s a bit like Been there/ done that. So come hell or high water, for the rest of my days I’ll be a solo artist. And I do mean that in the truest sense of the word, meaning that I’m doing it all myself with the exception that I do have a live band appearing with me while on stage. Although I might be able to play and sing it all on the recordings I simply can’t do it all at once for obvious reasons“.
Heavy metal legends SAXON have announced that bass player Nibbs Carter will be missing several shows due to a family emergency. The band have announced a temporary replacement for some of the European shows, welcoming Gus Macricostas to the SAXON family:
“Due to a family emergency Nibbs will not be playing the following shows:
11.12.16 SI – Ljubljana 13.12.16 Italy – Bologna 14.12.16 Italy – Milan
16.12.16 ES – Bilbao
17.12.16 ES – Madrid
18.12.16 ES – Barcelona
And we would like to introduce GUS MACRICOSTAS filling in on bass.
We know you will all welcome Gus to the Saxon family for the albeit brief run of shows until Nibbs returns.
Blues guitar champion Joe Bonamassa gave a security member during his recent show in Tulsa a hit in the head with his guitar for harassing a member of the crowd, reported ultimate-guitar.com.
The musician even shared a photo of the whole incident, along with the following note:
“And to the bouncer who harassed one of our fans up front… That is why you can now tell your family and friends what a 51 Fender No-caster to the head feels like. Don’t ever put hands on my fans again. Consider that a love tap reminder.”
Based on the photo, Joe received plenty of support from the crowd for his action.
TONY IOMMI is to undergo surgery to have a lump removed from his throat, just in case it’s cancerous, according to teamrock.com.
The Black Sabbath icon will receive treatment before the final leg of the band’s farewell tour begins next month.
He told in August that his cancer was in remission after revealing in 2012 that he’d been diagnosed with lymphoma.
Now he’s recalled how his illness, combined with the disagreement that led drummer Bill Ward to leave the band, came close to shutting them down.
Iommi tells the Irish Times: “I went for a check four weeks ago and the doctor said that, at the moment, there’s no activity where I had the cancer before – but there is activity in the throat.
“When I get back to England I have to have an operation to remove this thing at the back of my nose. The doctors found a lump and we don’t know if it’s cancer or what. But I feel okay at the moment.”
The guitarist has previously confirmed that his health is one of the main reasons Black Sabbath are retiring. He says: “I was knocked for six when doctors told me it was stage-three cancer. It really did change my life as far as what I have to do now.
“I have to live what life I’ve got. I’ve been on the road for nearly 50 years – I need to be at home more and I need to pay more attention to my friends and family.”
He describes the experience of being told he had cancer as “the lowest moment” and says it was different from the factory accident that left him with two fingertips missing from his right hand, which took place when he was a teenager.
“The thing with the fingers, you can carry on,” he reports. “But with cancer you just don’t know. You don’t know how long you’re going to be here and how bad it’s going to get.”
As their fans know very well, metal giants ACCEPT never rest on their laurels! The band are in the middle of recording their highly anticipated next album and are also set to release a brand new live package “Restless And Live” on 13th January via Nuclear Blast. This package will include the entire show ACCEPT played at Bang Your Head Festival 2015 on Blu-ray/DVD plus two live CDs, with different recordings from during the European tour.
Metal Shock Finland Senior Manager Alison Booth, recently celebrated the fourth anniversary of her radio show Blackdiamond’s Metal Mayhem on http://www.totalrock.com. Metal veteran, guitarist Wolf Hoffmann joined the celebrations on the show to chat about the new “Restless And Live” release, the forthcoming new ACCEPT album and much more! The whole radio show will soon be available to hear at this location, but you can hear the chat with Wolf (plus a song in between!) on the audio player below, along with a few excerpts to read:
Discussing “Restless And Live”:
“We wanted to have our own production featured as much as possible for the DVD, we didn’t really know how it was going to turn out. We just watched the footage afterwards and thought ‘wow, it’s awesome!’ looks really good, the edits are really cool, so we decided to release it. We figured it’s a good time for a live DVD.
What I think is important to mention too was that we didn’t just do the cheap way and did the audio CD from the exact same footage as the DVD – no, we used recordings from all over the world and across Europe. There’s a lot of material on the audio CD’s that’s completely different from the DVD part. Andy Sneap mixed them all, it took him forever, it’s a lot of different tracks! ”
Talking about the forthcoming tour with SABATON:
“I think this is gonna be a fun experience for us. It’s one of those things we spontaneously agreed to because it also gave us a chance to leave the studio for a while. We’ve been locked up in the studio working on the new Accept album for some time now. We can actually leave all that, go on the road, have a little bit of fun! It’s not our tour, it’s really Sabaton’s tour – we can just go out there and enjoy playing for a while in front of audiences, then go back to the studio and finish what we started.”
Working with Andy Sneap and the new ACCEPT album:
“This is the fourth time in a row with the same producer, it’s a world record for Accept for sure! Every time we work together it turns out fantastic, we love what the final result is. We have a great working relationship, so why change it if it works, right?“
“The only thing I can tell you is that it feels as Accept as ever. It feels maybe a slightly bit heavier for now, but these things are always hard to say when you’re in the middle of it. Man, it’s gonna sound like Accept as always, there’s not gonna be any weird surprises – we’re not gonna go soft, we’re not gonna go jazz! We’re really just trying to get better at what we already do.
We’re trying our best to get it done in time for next year, July or August. We’ve got a bunch of basic tracks done, a lot of vocals are done, so we’re looking pretty good at this point.”
“Headbangers Symphony” fan reaction:
“I didn’t know how it was going to go, but everybody loves it, it’s amazing! People are much more open minded and into this kinda stuff than I thought they would be.”
On more future classical work:
“There might well be, there’s a time and a place for all that. Right now I’m working on the new Accept album and when that’s done and we’re touring with it, maybe by that time I start thinking about new ideas for another classical project, I’d love to do it. First and foremost I’d like to do some shows with it though, that would be the more immediate thing for me to think about, to perform this stuff live on stage and get some shows under our belt. That would be fantastic and what I’m really looking forward to because this music’s really meant to be played live, I can’t wait for that to happen!
There are some definite plans next year, I can’t tell you yet. I can officially tell you it will happen.”
Wolf Hoffmann will celebrate his birthday on 10th December, so we wish him a very Happy Birthday!
For more information on Blackdiamond’s Metal Mayhem, visit the official Facebook page here and the official website at this location.
Greg Lake, one of the key figures in the prog rock boom of the 1970s, has died at the age of 69, reports theguardian.com. In a statement posted to EMERSON, LAKE & PALMER’s Facebook page, his manager, Stewart Young, said: “Yesterday, 7 December, I lost my best friend to a long and stubborn battle with cancer. Greg Lake will stay in my heart forever, as he has always been. His family would be grateful for privacy during this time of their grief.”
Though best known as a third of the prog supergroup Emerson, Lake and Palmer, Lake first came to prominence as a founder member of King Crimson, singing and playing bass. He had worked with King Crimson’s leader, Robert Fripp, on unsuccessful projects such as the Shy Limbs, but King Crimson’s debut album, In the Court of the Crimson King, proved to be a landmark in the emerging progressive style, reaching N0 5 in the UK and No 28 in the US after its release in 1969. Reviews, though, were mixed – the legendary US critic Robert Christgau called it “ersatz shit”.
Nevertheless, its reputation grew until it was seen as an undisputed classic, with Pete Townshend of the Who calling it “an uncanny masterpiece”. Its standout song, 21st Century Schizoid Man, became a touchstone for musicians attracted as much by its sense of rage as its technical virtuosity.
Although Lake appeared on King Crimson’s second album, he had already left the group to found ELP, alongside keyboard player Keith Emerson of the Nice and drummer Carl Palmer of Atomic Rooster. The group were an instant success, their first five studio albums all reaching the Top 1o in the UK, and their first seven going gold in the US.
They also gained a reputation for their spectacular live performances, which were hugely expensive to mount – “We had 100 road managers at one point, so you can see the cost,” Lake told Melody Maker in 1974 – but attracted massive audiences. They were also reflected in an extravagant live album – their 1974 release Welcome Back My Friends to the Show That Never Ends … Ladies and Gentlemen, Emerson Lake & Palmer was a triple album, but it still went Top 5 on both sides of the Atlantic.
To non-prog fans, though, Lake was best known as the maker of one of the UK’s most enduring Christmas hits. I Believe in Father Christmas reached No 2 in 1975. Lake spoke to the Guardian about the song last month, for an article about Christmas songs to be published next week. “When Pete Sinfield and I wrote I Believe In Father Christmas, it was about how Christmas had deteriorated and was in danger of becoming yet another victim of crass corporate financial exploitation,” he said.
“As much as I love everyone having a good time, it’s about more than 12 pints of lager and a crate of Baileys. It’s more important to make some spiritual human contact, or visit someone lonely. We never had any commercial or financial intentions, but of course, now everyone wants to know how it feels to receive all the lovely royalties, which are apparently delivered by wheelbarrow by Santa himself, after a long day climbing down everybody’s chimneys.”
Emerson, Lake and Palmer’s reputation was damaged by the punk explosion of the late 70s, and they broke up in 1979. Lake had an unsettled 1980s musically, playing briefly with another supergroup of prog alumni, Asia, and forming a new ELP – Emerson, Lake and Powell, with Cozy Powell replacing Palmer. Lake worked as a solo artist, too, before the original ELP reunited in 1991 on an on-again, off-again basis.
Though they never recaptured anything like their original popularity, the swings and roundabouts of rock heritage meant that their final gig, in 2010, was something of a return to the glory days, as they headlined the High Voltage festival in London.
Kimmo Kuusniemi’s ASA unveil the long-overdue release of "Collective Failure" + first music video for title-track! Check it out and stay tuned for more news! Click image to watch the video
Kimmo Kuusniemi’s SARCOFAGUS return with a Historic 2010 Concert Video Premiere on YouTube! Click image to watch the video
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Visionary artist KIMMO KUUSNIEMI's ANCIENT STREAMING ASSEMBLY (ASA) have released “Aurora Nuclearis”, a powerful 12-minute audiovisual experience, dedicated to the Late Keyboardist Esa Kotilainen. - Click image to watch the video
Click image to watch the video
Metal Shock Finland (World Assault ) 