Hey there readers, it looks like the tour dates and bands that are coming our way here in the states are really amping up before the summer even begins. I say that because we just received the press email about the return of Blind Guardian and Grave Digger which is absolutely awesome. We caught them late last year and it was a crushing display of Power Metal that needs to be seen to be believed. Take a look at the new poster and the press copy, tour dates and then I will return with more thoughts. See you soon.
The Press Release:
Holiday treats are arriving early this year as BLIND GUARDIAN has announced they are returning to North America this fall for the second leg of the Beyond The Red Mirror tour! Before they start the tour, they will make a stop at Prog Power Festival for a special performance on Thursday, September 9th. The following day they will kick-off their highly anticipated 19-date tour at The Orpheum in Tampa, Florida with none other than German metallers GRAVE DIGGER. Their trek will include one Canadian date as well as stops in Worcester, Milwaukee, and conclude on October 5th at The Fillmore in San Francisco!
BLIND GUARDIAN will be touring in support of their tenth album Beyond The Red Mirror which was the highest first-week U.S. sales numbers for the band. It debuted at #132 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, #3 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart, and #6 on the Top Hard Music chart. In Canada, BLIND GUARDIAN nearly doubled their first-week numbers from 2010, resulting in Beyond The Red Mirror debuts at #49 on the Top 200 and #4 on the Top Hard Music charts.
Watch the music videos for “Twilight Of The Gods” as well as the trailers for Beyond The Red Mirror on the Nuclear Blast YouTube channel. Tickets go on sale on this Friday, May 6th at 10 AM local time.
The Tour Dates:
09/09/2016: The Orpheum – Tampa, FL
09/10/2016: Revolution – Fort Lauderdale, FL
09/12/2016: Ziggy’s By The Sea – Wilmington, NC
09/13/2016: Cats Cradle – Chapel Hill, NC
09/15/2016: Webster Hall – New York, NY
09/16/2016: The Palladium – Worcester, MA
09/19/2016: London Music Hall – London, ON CANADA
09/20/2016: The Crofoot – Pontiac, MI
09/22/2016: Sokol Auditorium – Omaha, NE
09/23/2016: The Rave II – Milwaukee, WI
09/24/2016: Pierre’s Entertainment Center – Fort Wayne, IN
09/26/2016: Warehouse Live – Houston, TX
09/27/2016: Gas Monkey Live – Dallas, TX
09/29/2016: The Summit Music Hall – Denver, CO
09/30/2016: The Complex – Salt Lake City, UT
10/01/2016: House Of Blues – Las Vegas, NV
10/02/2016: Observatory North Park – San Diego, CA
10/04/2016: The Fonda Theatre – Los Angeles
10/05/2016: The Fillmore – San Francisco, CA
ABOUT BLIND GUARDIAN:
Even before the dawn of our space age, humanity had the audacity to conceive of ourselves as a life form not bound to the planet that birthed us. More than anything, leaving terra firma required all of our amassed knowledge, talent, and imagination. Such is the case with BLIND GUARDIAN, a band from Krefeld, Germany that refuses to be bound to the genre of music that spawned them and whose accumulated knowledge, talent, and imagination have created portals into senses beyond the five we experience in common, ordinary life.
With that background established, prepare yourself for a trip that will overwhelm all your known senses and reveal something truly extraordinary.
Greatly inspired by life experience, world myths, legends, and their own fervent creativity, metal’s most epic storytellers BLIND GUARDIAN continually aspire to define themselves on a whole new level. With their highly-anticipated, orchestral tenth studio album Beyond The Red Mirror, they have successfully captured the scope of their essence with unprecedented accuracy.
By far, the most important fact about the new album is this: there are no compromises. Not one.
These ten new tracks will transport the listeners – via a mysteriously powerful red mirror – into an otherworldly dimension that includes tyrants, gods, and the Holy Grail. And it’s no coincidence that Beyond The Red Mirror bears strong lyrical ties to 1995’s Imaginations From The Other Side, for we are reunited with the young protagonist we first met twenty years ago in the songs ‘Bright Eyes’ and ‘And The Story Ends’ who stood before a magic door, unsure whether to make the leap into a new, unknown world or to stay in his own. Now an adult, the impact of this important moment in the protagonist’s life is the launching point for the entire album.
With the support of one of the most loyal fan bases in the worldwide heavy metal community, Beyond The Red Mirror, the tenth studio album by epic metal’s most exalted storytellers BLIND GUARDIAN, attained the highest first-week U.S. sales numbers for the band in the history of their existence and debuted at #132 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, #3 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart, and #6 on the Top Hard Music chart. In Canada, BLIND GUARDIAN nearly doubled their first-week numbers from 2010, resulting in Beyond The Red Mirror debuts at #49 on the Top 200 and #4 on the Top Hard Music charts.
Four-and-a-half years in the making, Beyond The Red Mirror was recorded at Twilight Hall Studio in Grefrath, Germany and produced by Charlie Bauerfeind (SAXON, HAMMERFALL, HELLOWEEN). The album’s spellbinding tracks showcase BLIND GUARDIAN’s long-awaited collaborative work with three different classical choirs from Prague, Budapest, and Boston, plus two grand orchestras – each featuring 90 musicians. An endeavor demanding that attention be paid to the lyrics as much as to the music, Beyond The Red Mirror is not only a milestone in the band’s career, but a desperate search for truth, an exploration of the relativities of good and evil, a testimony of the consequences of lost opportunities, a glimpse into a distant universe’s dystopian society, and a story about a prophecy, a promise of revolution, a plot for revenge, and a miracle machine with powers far beyond what mere mortals could have dreamed possible.
BLIND GUARDIAN members include: HANSI KÜRSCH – Vocals, ANDRÉ OLBRICH – Guitars, MARCUS SIEPEN – Guitars, FREDERIK EHMKE – Drums
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PiercingMetal Thoughts: Alright I have to say that this one is a no-brainer. It’s amazing to find these two bands returning so quickly after their last visit because neither of them had been here in quite a few years before that. Blind Guardian I believe was at a six-year absence while Grave Diggers was a few years more. These are the bands that you need to see in concert and be purchasing the albums of. It’s that simple. Stop pining for the same old stuff over and over again because we are finding many of the legendary bands making their exit from recording and touring more often than we are not. You can ALWAYS listen to bands like Black Sabbath (who are themselves aiming steadily at that career ending show) and not sacrifice an ounce of your Metal cred by listening to outlets like mine that try to guide you to the stuff you have only a limited background in. I am sure going to be at the Webster Hall show for the second go round even though I would have preferred that the return went to the Playstation Theater for a different vibe as a photographer. What do you readers think about this tour announcement and if you went the last time will you be returning? Let me know in the comments section below. See you next time.
Official Websites:
Blind Guardian: http://www.blind-guardian.com
Grave Digger: http://www.grave-digger.de