Dark Funeral - Where Shadows Forever Reign

Monday, New week, the Swedish National day (: and the Record of the Week.

For this week we will present the Swedish masters of black metal, DARK FUNERAL's latest release "Where Shadows Forever Reign".

Six years have past since the release of their latest album, finally the release of their new last friday (June 3rd) via Century Media Records. The album was recorded at the Dugout Studios in Uppsala, Sweden and produced by Lord Ahriman and Daniel Bergstrand (IN FLAMES, BEHEMOTH, DIMMU BORGIR). The amazing artwork was created by Necrolord (Behind album covers of bands like DISSECTION, AT THE GATES among many others).

"Where Shadows Forever Reign" is a strong refreshing album, where the balance between the melodic harmonies and the complex arrangements is done with an fabulous vitality. Lord Ahriman's caffeine rushed guitar work is the very blood that flows through the album along with the rhythms of Chaq Mol riffings, Ahriman's bass lines, roaring Heljarmadr’s strong dynamic vocals and Dominator’s whizz defined drumming's. The album deals with self-sacrifice and will take you on the ride through ancient realms so forlorn and cold, the majestic realm where shadows forever reign. The production is very crisp and clear, nothing seams to be lost in the mix, in other word, a triumphant release.

The album opens up with "Unchain My Soul", a mystic guitar intro, with a dark spiritual voice until it's kicks on, the riffs, the drums and vocals roars true the darkness so that every dead souls awakens. "As One We Shall Conquer" is great blast beat where the band put's in a high gear to force true the untruthful souls that stands in the way to the one and only fiendish! The album continues to line up strong tunes like "Beast Above Man", "The Eternal Eclipse", "To Carve Another Wound" and the two tunes that have been released before, the catchy "Nail Them To The Cross" and slower black metal ballad "Temple Of Ahriman". "As I Ascend" is an epic piece along with the title track "Where Shadows Forever Reign", one of the strongest tunes, where Ahriman and Heljarmadr really peaks with fantastic like a cogwheel in the flowing melody.

Sum: There is no doubt that DARK FUNERAL is back!

"Where Shadows Forever Reign" is available as Ltd Gatefold LP, Ltd CD Digipak in Slipcase, Jewelcase CD and digital album.

The Digipak folds out as an inverted cross and includes not just the regular booklet, but also a 4-page poster booklet featuring the cover artwork.

The Gatefold LP will be available in the following vinyl colours:

- Black vinyl (unlimited)
- Transparent blue vinyl (limited to 100 copies, exclusively available at CMDistro EU)
- Clear vinyl (limited to 200 copies, exlusively available at Sound Of Records, Sweden)
- Clear-blue-black splatter vinyl (limited to 1000 copies, 700 copies (Europe) & 300 copies (USA) available at CMDistro and Nuclear Blast)
- Transparent red vinyl (limited to 200 copies, only available in North America)

Today's tune "Unchain My Soul", is the second single taken from the album "Where Shadows Forever Reign".



More info @

Official Dark Funeral Web

Listen to ”Dark Funeral - Unchain My Soul" on Spotify here!

Follow tuneoftheday.blogspot.com on Spotify here!

Dark Funeral - Goddess of Sodomy

Again, it was time for a little trip with Dark Funeral (DF), this time was the sights set on Falun and RockStad Falun where DF would headline the first festival day. The journey through Dalarna went excellent, nothing strange at all, almost too quietly, I must say. Once in place, it was time to set up and it did not go so well, it turned out that there was no place to make a pre-rig for the show, so we had to sneak in between the bands, which meant that it took lots of time to fix all. Too bad I did not have time to take a picture, then you would have realized how crowded it was.

DF lined up on a signing and the queue wriggled far, there after we had dinner at the hotel and then back to the area.

One of the DF's guests was none other than "Masse" (Emperor Magus Caligula) who was curious about the DF new lineup, which meant that both Zornheym & Nachtgarm was a bit nervous before the evening show, especially Nachtgarm which one can truly understand.

When it was time to get up on stage, a slightly delayed but well acceptable waiting for the audience. When the band comes into play , then they encounters a technical problem after the first notes, sad, really sad, but the problem is solved quickly and DF restart from the beginning, tough as hell for the band, not easy to create the magic after restarting, but DF is so experienced that it is barely noticeable that it had been a technical hassle. "Stigmata" is the first song out, is played in a brilliant way, even Masse who had sneaked up on stage did stomp his foot. Then they burn of songs like "atrum Regina", "Vobiscum Satanas", "Open The Gates", "Goddess Of Sodomy", "Hail Murder" among others. The band gave everything live, a concert filled with bombs and grenades, fire and sparklers to warm up a cold night in Falun. See full set list below.

Here are some pictures:

Todays tune "Goddess of Sodomy" taken from the third studio album "Diabolis Interium" (Latin for "devil within"), released on 24 September 2001.



Live St.-Petersburg, Arctica club, 15.4.2012



Setlist in Falun:

Stigmata
The Secrets Of The Black Arts
Arrival Of Satan's Empire
Atrum Regina
Vobiscum Satanas
An Apprentice Of Satan
Open The Gates
Goddess Of Sodomy
Hail Murder
Dawn No More Rises
My Funeral


More info @

Official Dark Funeral Web

Listen to ”Dark Funeral - Goddess of Sodomy" on Spotify here!

Follow tuneoftheday.blogspot.com on Spotify here!

Dark Funeral - Atrum Regina

 

I close the report from Sweden Rock Festival with the band I travel with, Dark Funeral, Stockholm-based black metal band. An incredibly interesting journey, some new experiences and lots of new friends. There is so much to tell about this and I do not really know where to start, so I keep this as short as possible.

A journey that began early on Thursday, which took us from Stockholm to Sölvesborg and Norje-Boke. Unfortunately, I sucked at taking pictures along the way, as a few funny things happened during the trip, as for example, our GPS broked during the trip, It turned out that the lighter socket that provides GPS with power did not work, so it went off when the battery ran out. The car in front of us had to act and take the lead, it went a bit so-so with that :) We got a little off the rails and got to go on some small roads, we passed by a place called "Bögarehult"(Gays holt)* which kept the mood up a good long time.

*Hult is the Swedish spelling variant of holt and may refer to: Holt, an area of woodland, e.g. a grove or copse, especially as a place-name in Great Britain, Scandinavia, Iceland, and Germany (with variant spellings). Also a common surname derived from place-names in these cultures.

Once we arrived at the festival, it was a relaxed time, walked around and watched some bands, say hello to some friends and ate a good dinner at the Sweden Rocks Restaurant that was placed backstage. As the darkness began to fall, it was soon time for the guys to get up on stage. Thomas Sjöholm had prepared the pyro, Chris Entee have fixed in the perfect sound, but had a tough task to overpower Soundgarden, that was playing simultaneously on the festival scene.

The show was performed exemplary, everyone in the band was really on it and gave it all, Steve (Nachtgarm) sang like a god, in other words, an awesome replacement of Emperor Magus Caligula. Dominator banged on his drums like never before and did a really great gig, got up a couple of drummers who wanted to see him in Action, which was really fun to see, behind the drum monitor stood two moderately famous drummers, with their mouth wide open and a big question mark over the head, wonder how in the hell he can keep up the tempo and still keep it tight as shell.

Lord Ahriman held the banner high in the band, with his technical details he nailed up the coffin for all those who doubted on the new line of Dark Funeral. He made a brilliant effort and shows that he is one of the absolute foremost guitarists in black metal. Even Chaq Mol was alert and showed where the cabinet was buried. With his high thundering riffs that cut through the night like a cheese slicer. New addition on the bass Zornheym, was a real adrenaline rush to the band, running around on stage like a scalded rat is probably exaggerating, but not far from :), his effort was really good and gave an awesome heaviness to the band. This promises really well for future material that slowly builds up in the shadows.

After the gig we traveled to the hotel, where we met up with Exodus and Pentagram. A little chit chat and then sleep. The next day we hanged around a bit on the festival, saw a lot of bands playing that you could read about yesterday, until it started raining then we had it and packed up our van and went to Stockholm through small villages with both horses and cows ... haha.

Here are some pictures from the gig.

Thomas Sjöholm

Dominator

 

Zornheym

Lord Ahriman

Nachtgarm

Nachtgarm

Chaq Mol

Nachtgarm

Lord Ahriman

Todays tune "Atrum Regina" is taken from the fourth full length studio album."Attera Totus Sanctus" (intended Latin translation of "Destroy All the Holy"). It was released on October 24, 2005.

Atrum Regina (live in Athens 2012)



Atrum Regina (live in Paris 2008)



Dark Funeral Tour Dates:
Jun 22 - 15 ANS TOUT A FOND, Montpellier, France
Jun 29 - XIX With Full Force - Summer Open Air, Lobnitz, Germany
Jul 31 - The Total Metal Festival Open Air 2012, Bari, Italy
Aug 04 - Wacken Open Air 2012, Wacken, Germany
Aug 06 - METALCAMP 2012, Tolmin, Slovenia
Aug 10 - Carpathian Alliance Festival, Ukraine
Aug 16 - Rockstad Falun 2012, Falun, Sweden
Sep 08 - StormCrusher Festival 2012, Waldsassen, Germany

US tour with MORBID ANGEL, Grave and VadimVon

Sep 21 - Atlanta, GA - The Masquerade
Sep 22 - Louisville, KY - Headliner's Music Hall
Sep 23 - Columbus, OH - Screamin Willie's
Sep 24 - Washington, DC - Howard Theater
Sep 26 - New York City - B.B. King's
Sep 27 - Pittsburgh, PA - Altar Bar
Sep 28 - Philadelphia, PA - The Trocadero
Sep 29 - Worcester, MA - The Palladium
Sep 30 - Montreal, QUE - Club Soda
Oct 1 - Toronto, ONT - Opera House
Oct 2 - Cleveland, OH - Peabody's
Oct 4 - Joliet, Il - Mojoe's
Oct 5 - St. Paul, MN - Station 4
Oct 6 - Des Moines, IA - Peoples Court
Oct 7 - Englewood, CO - Gothic Theater
Oct 8 - Salt Lake City, UT - The Complex
Oct 10 - Seattle, WA - El Corazon
Oct 11 - Portland, OR - Hawthorne Theater
Oct 12 - San Francisco, CA - Slim's
Oct 13 - Sacramento, CA - Ace Of Spades
Oct 14 - Anaheim, CA - The Grove
Oct 15 - Tempe, AZ - Marquee Theatre
Oct 17 - Dallas, TX - Trees
Oct 18 - Houston, TX - Scout Bar
Oct 19 - San Antonio, TX - Backstage Lounge

Australia Tour

Nov 22 – The Hi Fi, Brisbane QLD, Australia
Nov 23 – Factory Theatre, Sydney NSW, Australia
Nov 24 – The Corner Hotel, Melbourne VIC, Australia


More info @

Official Dark Funeral Web
Official Dark Funeral Facebook

Listen to ”Dark Funeral - Atrum Regina" on Spotify here!

Follow tuneoftheday.blogspot.com on Spotify here!