According to Bravewords.com, Next year’s Wacken Open Air festival will take place in Wacken, Germany from July 31st – August 2nd, 2014. At the Hamburg Metal Dayz the promoters of Wacken Open Air announced new bands for the 25th edition of the festival. A total of 13 bands were confirmed for the big anniversary in 2014.
The latest acts confirmed are HEAVEN SHALL BURN, J.B.O., DEVIN TOWNSEND PROJECT, SODOM, ONKEL TOM, DECAPITATED, FOR THE IMPERIUM, THE OCEAN, ENDSTILLE, TORMENT, MASTERPLAN, KNORKATOR and A PALE HORSE NAMED DEATH, who join the previously announced acts AMON AMARTH, APOCALYPTICA, ARCH ENEMY, AVANTASIA, BEHEMOTH, CHILDREN OF BODOM, EMPEROR, ICED EARTH, KING DIAMOND, KREATOR, PRONG, and SCHANDMAUL.
EDGUY frontman Tobias Sammet has issued the following recap of the just-completed world tour from his AVANTASIA project:
“Friends, finally I have cooled down a little after this extensive AVANTASIA world tour. Finally I have found a few moments to write down my thoughts on the tour.
“I have been on several world tours — I must have played something like 700 concerts in my life — and I have to say: it’s never been so difficult to say goodbye after a tour.
“The Mystery World Tour was an amazing experience for me. Never before an AVANTASIA tour has been spread out over four months, never before I heard so many bad jokes (from anyone other than me) and never before I came home missing touring so much that it actually hurt, although I was happy to be back with my loved ones and get some rest. I wondered myself what it is that makes the difference between earlier tours and this tour, and I guess it’s simple: first of all, the tour was long enough to get used to being around those lovely fellow Avantasians. Second, if I compare it to EDGUY tours: whenever we say goodbye, we know we’ll meet a couple of months later to conquer the world again. With AVANTASIA, the future is completely uncertain.
“I was accused of lying when I hit the road for The Mystery World Tour after I had announced the end in 2011. But you can imagine it is not that easy to rely on a return of AVANTASIA, it depends on a lot of parameters, not at least all the musicians and their personal schedules.
“I thank God that He gave us the chance to bring that lineup together and do this tour, I hope we will do it again some day, but you can never take that for granted, nor plan it, let alone expect it to happen again. I just hope one day it will happen. For sure, there will be another album in a couple of years. But as much as I would love to do a tour, I do not know if we’ll ever find a timeframe in the future that will allow us to bring the project on the road again. The organisation, the schedules, everyone’s individual obligations with their individual bands, it’s grinding… That’s why I am rather thankful that I was given that chance.
“I wanna thank my agency, All Access, and my road manager, AC, in particular for making the impossible possible. I wanna thank my production manager, FD, for administrating everything with a vengeance and a whip, sending trucks from Slovakia to England and making the show look great from Costa Rica to Canada to Russia to Japan and back. I wanna thank the whole crew, who are the best technicians from East Bumfuck to Bali, and, of course, I wanna thank the immortals who I was given the chance to share the stage with. I will miss everyone of you (even Achim), and I will never forget that tour! I love you all!
“I also wanna thank YOU people out there who made this tour a very successful tour, who came in thousands to our shows, I enjoyed playing for each and everyone of you! Don’t think I take it for granted, I had the time of my life, and I know that I am blessed — having fans and friends like YOU!”
AVANTASIA made its North American debut on July 7 at the Quebec City Summer Festival (Festival D’été De Québec) in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada.
AVANTASIA‘s new album, “The Mystery Of Time”, was released on March 30. The effort was made available as a regular CD, limited-edition vinyl and limited-edition hardcover book with a 28-page booklet containing ten regular songs and two bonus tracks (“The Cross And You”, “Death Is Just A Feeling”). The cover artwork was hand-painted by world acclaimed British fantasy artist Rodney Matthews. Among Rodney‘s most famous artworks are not only album covers for rock legends such as MAGNUM, THIN LIZZY, ASIA and NAZARETH, he has also designed the characters for the TV series “Lavender Castle” and created the covers for novels by British fantasy author Michael Moorcock and many more.
Composer and vocalist with both EDGUY and AVANTASIA, Tobias Sammet is one of Germany’s biggest artists in recent music history. Just prior to leaving for the next leg of the tour to South America with his all-star rock opera, AVANTASIA, Metal Shock Finland‘s Senior Manager Ali Blackdiamond caught up with Tobias for an interesting and amusing chat about his latest offering “The Mystery Of Time,” Bloodstock Festival and more.
Listen to the full interview on the audio player below and also here are a few excerpts from the conversation:
Discussing the whole AVANTASIA project and touring arrangements, Tobias stated (and joked!):
“It’s not as complicated as it looks. I probably shouldn’t say that because I would probably encourage people to do the same thing and that would make me furious! (laughs) If someone said ‘yeah only the best can do that’ it’s gonna wreck your nerves and don’t try this at home. If there’s any musicians out there listening to this show, considering or thinking about doing it themselves, don’t do it! You will have a heart attack in no time!”
Tobias talked of his reasons for having British fantasy artist Rodney Matthews design “The Mystery Of Time” album artwork:
” It’s been a dream of mine to work with him, I’m a huge fan. I have books of him, I have pictures framed on the walls of our house that were painted by him. In fact, I’m so crazy about his art I just received a book that I ordered, it just came today and when I opened the package, I found I already had it. it’s called ‘In Search Of Forever,’ I bought it twice now!
I’ve always been a huge fan of Magnum and Magnum’s artwork and this album “The Mystery Of Time” is so rich in detail and I wanted to create a true piece of art, musically. I also wanted to stress that by choosing the right artwork I wanted to have something handcrafted, I wanted to have something timeless, something that is not up to date, something that is not trendy, something that you would not expect on an Avantasia album that is being released in 2013. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to say Rodney’s art is old fashioned, I just want to say it’s timeless, a piece of art. That’s what I really love about it, I had to have Rodney’s artwork on my album.”
We talked of the upcoming Bloodstock Festival and Tobias had an unforgettable memory from his last appearance there with EDGUY:
“You don’t remind people of a defeat in football and you don’t mention the war in England if you are German. I went onstage and thought people were a bit reserved and thought I should tickle them. So I said ‘we may have lost the war, but we made it to the quarter finals!’ and luckily everyone started to laugh! In England you have to work hard to make people laugh about your jokes, but when you do, people reward it. That’s when Bloodstock and I became real friends!
I’m looking forward to playing Bloodstock because it’s in the mother country of heavy metal and it’s the country where this was all invented and that’s where we’ll bring Avantasia. It’s the first time for Avantasia on a stage in England.
There’s going to be everybody – Eric Martin, Ronnie Atkins, Bob Catley, Amanda (Somerville), Michael Kiske. The only thing is that we’re not gonna do the full show, because that would be 3 hours, and there’s other bands who want to go on after us! It will be a smooth ‘best of’ set.”
Discussing what’s happening with EDGUY at the moment, Tobias said:
” We won’t disband, we will go on. We are about to start working on a new album this fall. We will take all the time we need until we come up with something that makes sense. I don’t expect a new album to come out until spring or summer 2014.”
Just after we received the information that the new album THE MYSTERY OF TIME has also entered the Swiss album Top 10 charts at #5 we can proudly announce that it has also entered the United World Charts at position #31 – marking Tobias‘ highest world chart entry ever and making AVANTASIA the only German music act in the worldwide sales charts that combine sales of all major music markets such as the USA, UK, Asia and Europe. What makes it even more astonishing is that the album hasn’t even been released in the USA and Canada yet.
Other chart entries read as follows:
Germany #2,
Switzerland #5,
Sweden #9,
Finland #9,
Austria #11,
Hungary #15,
Norway #19,
England #6 (Rock, #97 international),
Czech Republic #20,
Spain #29,
France #48,
Netherlands #85,
Japan #17 (international artists).
12.04. B Moens – PPM Festival
13.04. CH Pratteln – Z7
14.04. CH Pratteln – Z7
16.04. I Mailand – Alcatraz
18.04. D Ludwigsburg – MPH Arena
19.04. D Kaufbeuren – All-Karthalle
20.04 D Fulda – Esperanto Halle
22.04. D Berlin – Tempodrom
23.04. D Hamburg – Große Freiheit
25.04. D Oberhausen – Turbinenhalle
26.04. D Lichtenfels – Stadthalle
10.05. NL Amsterdam – Melkweg
31.05. ES Madrid – Sonisphere
01.06. ES Barcelona – Sonisphere
08.06. S Sölvesborg – Sweden Rock Festival
21.06. F Clisson – Hellfest
23.06. RU Moscow – Milk
25.06. ARG Buenos Aires – El Teatro
27.06. CHI Santiago de Chile – Teatro Caupolican
29.06. BRA Sao Paolo – HCBC Hall
03.07. CRC San Jose – Peppers
05.07. MEX Mexico City – Circo Valador
10.07. J Tokyo – Shinagwa Prince Stella Ball
13.07 D Ballenstedt – Rock Harz
14.07 CZ Zlin – Masters Of Rock
08.08. SLO Snina – Festival Rock Pod Kameňom
10.08 UK Derbyshire / Catton Park – Bloodstock Festival
While the band are preparing to hit the road and bring the biggest show in the band’s history to the stages around the globe (featured guests will be Michael Kiske, Bob Catley, Eric Martin, Ronnie Atkins, Amanda Somerville, Thomas Rettke, Olli Hartmann and Tobias of course) we have been informed that the new AVANTASIA album THE MYSTERY OF TIME is breaking all records in the history of AVANTASIA. Having sold more than twice as many copies as any previous AVANTASIA album in the first week of its release, THE MYSTERY OF TIME has rocketed straight to #2 of the official German Mediacontrol album charts. For the first time AVANTASIA has also made it to the Top10 in Finland, not to mention making it to the Top10 in Sweden again, while none of the previous albums had made it there. Also, the album made it to the Top10 of the English Rockcharts for the first time in the history of AVANTASIA. First chart positions read as follows (other countries will follow shortly):
Germany #2
Sweden #9
Finland #9
Austria #11
Norway #19
England #6 (Rock, #97 international)
France #51
Netherlands #85
In Japan the album went in at #17 of the international artists album charts.
Tobias has sent us the following statement:
“To all fans, thank you all for your support! A lot of amazing musicians have worked their asses off to make “The Mystery Of Time” a timeless piece of art. Is it Heavy Metal? Is it Classic Hard Rock? Is it Epic Metal? Is it Rock? The answer to all of those questions is “yes, it is!” It is all of that. I’d call it a piece of music that I put together being nothing but a fanboy myself! It reflects my personal taste, nothing else! I am really proud and thankful. And I also wanna thank everybody who’ve helped me put it together. Now we are getting ready for the tour and Jesus Christ, this show will be massive! Tomorrow I am gonna meet the rest of the guys to rehearse and bring the Metal Opera on the road again!!!!!!!! Playing three hours might be a challenge, but we have to cover six albums, so it would be even more of a challenge to just play two hours and pick the right songs. What I can say?! We’ll play a lot of the “Metal Opera 1 & 2” and pretty much all of the new album… Plus the highlights of “The Scarecrow”, “The Wicked Symphony” and “Angel Of Babylon”. A lot of people kept asking if we do the whole show in all countries, I have to admit: We can’t do the full three hours at the festivals, we can’t play a 15 minutes track at festivals! Impossible! So, it will be 90 minutes at festivals only, but we give our best nevertheless… Thank you all for your support and see you on the road!!! Tobi”
The MYSTERY WORLD TOUR will kick off next Friday in Mons, Belgium.
Nuclear Blast has issued that finally the new AVANTASIA masterpiece “The Mystery Of Time” has hit the stores. Many journalists have already stated, that the album might be the most enchanting and complete AVANTASIA adventure of all time.
The record is featuring ten tracks and guest stars such as Biff Byford (Saxon), Michael Kiske (Unisonic, ex-Helloween), Joe Lynn Turner (ex-Rainbow, ex-Deep Purple), Eric Martin (Mr. Big), Ronnie Atkins (Pretty Maids), Bruce Kulick (ex-Kiss, ex-Meat Loaf), Arjen Lucassen (Ayreon), Bob Catley (Magnum), Russell Gilbrook (Uriah Heep) and more.
12.04. B Moens – PPM Festival
13.04. CH Pratteln – Z7
14.04. CH Pratteln – Z7
16.04. I Mailand – Alcatraz
18.04. D Ludwigsburg – MPH Arena
19.04. D Kaufbeuren – All-Karthalle
20.04 D Fulda – Esperanto Halle
22.04. D Berlin – Tempodrom
23.04. D Hamburg – Große Freiheit
25.04. D Oberhausen – Turbinenhalle
26.04. D Lichtenfels – Stadthalle
10.05. NL Amsterdam – Melkweg
31.05. ES Madrid – Sonisphere
01.06. ES Barcelona – Sonisphere
08.06. S Sölvesborg – Sweden Rock Festival
21.06. F Clisson – Hellfest
23.06. RU Moscow – Milk
25.06. ARG Buenos Aires – El Teatro
27.06. CHI Santiago de Chile – Teatro Caupolican
29.06. BRA Sao Paolo – HCBC Hall
03.07. CRC San Jose – Peppers
05.07. MEX Mexico City – Circo Valador
10.07. J Tokyo – Shinagwa Prince Stella Ball
13.07 D Ballenstedt – Rock Harz
14.07 CZ Zlin – Masters Of Rock
08.08. SLO Snina – Festival Rock Pod Kameňom
10.08 UK Derbyshire / Catton Park – Bloodstock Festival
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Composer and vocalist with both EDGUY and AVANTASIA, Tobias Sammet is one of Germany’s biggest artists in recent music history. Just prior to leaving for the next leg of the tour to South America with his all-star rock opera, AVANTASIA, Metal Shock Finland‘s Senior Manager Ali Blackdiamond caught up with Tobias for an interesting and amusing chat about his latest offering “The Mystery Of Time,” Bloodstock Festival and more.
Click image to watch the video
Metal Shock Finland (World Assault ) 