Away Team

Legendary Brazilian/American thrashers SEPULTURA, will return to the US for a massive headlining tour next April/May in support of their upcoming Nuclear Blast Records debut! Joining them will be a veritable united nations on metal in the form of Austria’s BELPHEGOR, Norway’s KEEP OF KALESSIN, Poland’s HATE, Montreal Canada’s NEURAXIS, and California based thrashers BONDED BY BLOOD. Starting May 23 Seattle Washington’s own insanely heavy, melodic metal kings NEVERMORE, will replace bondage obsessed blackened death metallers BELPHEGOR to finish out the tour.

“We are very happy to play once again in the US, especially after a long time away from the American and Canadian stages,” commented guitarist Andreas Kisser. “We’re also excited to start working with our new label Nuclear Blast. They have a rich history in the heavy music business and we are honored to have such a partner. We are currently working on a new record, that will be released together with the American dates, so it will be our first tour for the new album. Hope to see you all at the shows! We will play the whole history of the group and we’re going have a blast! See you on the Sepultour 2011!”

Confirmed North American shows for 2011 are as follows:

SEPULTURA, ANGRA
1/13/11 House of Blues – Anaheim, CA
1/14/11 House of Blues – Hollywood, CA

SEPULTURA, BELPHEGOR, HATE, KEEP OF KALESSIN, NEURAXIS, BONDED BY BLOOD
04/18/11 The Opera House – Toronto, ON – CANADA
04/19/11 Imperial de Quebec – Quebec City, QC – CANADA
04/20/11 Club Soda – Montreal, QC – CANADA
04/22/11 The Palladium – Worcester, MA
04/23/11 Starland Ballroom – Sayreville, NJ
04/24/11 The Trocadero – Philadelphia, PA
04/25/11 The Gramercy Theatre – New York, NY
04/26/11 Tremont Music Hall – Charlotte, NC
04/27/11 The Club at Firestone – Orlando, FL
04/28/11 Culture Room – Ft. Lauderdale, FL
04/29/11 The Masquerade – Atlanta, GA
05/01/11 Clicks – Tyler, TX
05/02/11 Scout Bar – Houston, TX
05/03/11 Trees – Dallas, TX
05/05/11 Jake’s – Lubbock, TX
05/06/11 Sunshine Theater – Albuquerque, NM
05/07/11 The Clubhouse – Tempe, AZ (w/ D.R.I.)
05/08/11 Club DV8 – Tucson, AZ (w/ D.R.I.)
05/09/11 House of Blues – San Diego, CA
05/10/11 The Knitting Factory – Reno, NV
05/11/11 The Grand Ballroom at Regency Center – San Francisco, CA
05/12/11 Hawthorne Theater – Portland, OR
05/13/11 El Corazon – Seattle, WA
05/14/11 The Knitting Factory – Spokane, WA
05/16/11 Gothic Theater – Englewood, CO
05/18/11 Station 4 – St. Paul, MN
05/19/11 Reggies Rock Club – Chicago, IL
05/20/11 Blondie’s – Detroit, MI
05/21/11 Montage Music Hall – Rochester, NY
05/22/11 Peabody’s – Cleveland, OH

SEPULTURA, NEVERMORE, HATE, KEEP OF KALESSIN, NEURAXIS, BONDED BY BLOOD
05/23/11 Expo Five – Louisville, KY
05/24/11 The Rave – Milwaukee, WI
05/26/11 The Zoo – Winnipeg, MB – CANADA
05/27/11 The Exchange – Regina, SK – CANADA
05/28/11 Dickens – Calgary, AB – CANADA
05/29/11 Starlite Room – Edmonton, AB – CANADA
05/31/11 Rickshaw Theater – Vancouver, BC – CANADA

SEPULTURA have now added a special event VIP ticket for a pre-show meet-and-greet to take place one hour before doors. Each night, fans will get to meet and greet SEPULTURA. VIP and reduced service charge tickets on sale now exclusively through Enterthevault.com until December 28, at which time they go on sale through all other normal ticketing systems.

SEPULTURA recently inked a worldwide deal with Nuclear Blast Records. The band will enter the studio before the end of the year to begin work on a new studio album for a 2011 release.










For more SEPULTURA click here.

UNEARTH have tapped KILLSWITCH ENGAGE guitarist and renowned producer Adam Dutkiewicz to helm their next studio album, tentatively due in early 2011 via Metal Blade Records. The pre-production phase of the process officially started last week.

As previously reported, UNEARTH has recruited drummer Branden Morgan of MISERY SIGNALS to sit behind the kit for the band’s upcoming European dates as part of the Persistence Tour. The group says, “Branden is a great drummer and has been nailing all the tunes in rehearsal. Everyone headed to the Persistence Tour can expect UNEARTH to be as solid as ever during this run.”

The Persistence Tour — which also features SICK OF IT ALL, D.R.I., BLOOD FOR BLOOD, EVERGREEN TERRACE, CRUEL HAND, CASEY JONES and VERA CRUZ — will kick off on December 3 in Deinze, Belgium.









For more UNEARTH click here.

EARLY MAN checks in from the road currently on tour with EVILE and BONDED BY BLOOD with the following band member changes:

“Hello shredders! I hope you’re all well.
I’m writing to you from a classy Holiday Inn in the always exciting city of Newport News, Virginia. We are currently 1 week into our US tour with EVILE and BONDED BY BLOOD. I haven’t had a chance to get to a computer until now so here’s a much needed update for you.
It’s been a crazy few weeks to say the least. About 5 days before this tour started I made the decision to part ways with Adam, our drummer of the past 7 years. A plethora of things were taken into consideration before making this difficult decision but as the leader and founding member of the band it is my responsibility to make decisions based on what I feel is best for myself and the band in both the short term and long term. I wish Adam the best in the future and have some fond memories of his time spent in the band.
That being said, my number one interest as always is to take Early Man to the next level, and that process continues. Early Man has been my musical creative outlet for nearly 15 years, the band is essentially an extension of me. As always, the creative vision and everything that the band has been about since it’s inception continues to be steered by me and remains unchanged. There have been numerous musicians involved with the band over the years and there will be more in the future and I appreciate the time spent with all of them. For me, the beat goes on. I’ve already recently turned my attention to writing songs for the next Early Man record and am eagerly looking towards the future with new found interest.
Speaking of time, I realize parting ways with a band member 5 days before the start of a US tour is far from ideal, but it is what it is. We’ll soon have another permanent drummer.
In the meantime and in order to salvage this tour, I found a drummer through a good friend by the name of Jabari Parker in Los Angeles who learned 6 of our songs in one day, something that I would’ve thought was impossible when I started spreading the word that I was looking for a fill in for this tour. Rather than cancelling any dates, I practiced with Pete (our other guitarist) and the new drummer for about 5 hours and then we got into a van and drove 24 straight hours to Tulsa Oklahoma to start our current tour.
We played 4 shows without a bass player and then we picked up an old friend of mine in Austin Texas who is the guitarist and singer of a band called Lions of Tsavo to play bass. Although it’s been a whirlwind of insanity, we are having a fucking blast! I honesty haven’t laughed this much in years. I can’t remember a time in the recent past where I was having this much fun on a tour, something that has been missing in the band at least for me for many years now. Everyone from the fans to the bands have been such a huge support and they’ve made it easy to keep the fire burning. So if we’re hitting your city over the next few weeks, come out and say hello, share a drink and bang your head.
I apologize for the fact that we are playing an abbreviated set (6-8 songs a night) but the important thing is we’re making it happen and to be honest, it sounds pretty goddamn amazing given the circumstances, which attests to the talent and ability of the the fill in drummer and bassist.

Listed below are our remaining tour dates for this tour, along with our January/February 2011 US Tour with Death Angel. Thanks again for all of the support, we’ll see you out there!”

October (with Evile, Bonded By Blood)
7 – Sonar – Baltimore, MD
8 – Championship Bar and Grill – Trenton, NJ
9 – Rocko’s Rock Club – Manchester, NH
10 – Europa – Brooklyn, NY
12 – Sneaky Dee’s – Toronto, ON
13 – Broadway Joe’s – Buffalo, NY
14 – Peabody’s -Cleveland, OH
15 – Blondies – Detroit, MI
16 – Mad Planet – Milwaukee, WI
17 – Reggie’s Rock Club – Chicago, IL
18 – The Riot Room – Kansas City, MO
19 – Larimer Lounge – Denver, CO
20 – Club Vegas – Salt Lake City, UT
22 – Dante’s – Portland, OR
23 – El Corazon – Seattle, WA (with GAMA BOMB)

January (with Death Angel, Lazarus A.D., Bonded By Blood, Hexen)
30 – Volume 11 – Raleigh, NC
31 – The Cabsbah – Charlotte, NC

February (with Death Angel, Lazarus A.D., Bonded By Blood, Hexen)
1 – Jaxx – W. Springfield, VA
2 – Crazy Donkey – Farmingdale, NY
3 – Rocko’s – Manchester, NH
4 – Club Hell – Providence, RI
5 – Montage Music Hall – Rochester, NY
6 – Mod Club – Toronto, ON
7 – Peabody’s – Cleveland, OH
8 – Blondie’s – Detroit, MI
9 – Reggie’s Rock Club – Chicago, IL
10 – Phoenix Hill Tavern – Louisville, KY
11 – Riot Room – Kansas City, MO
12 – Conservatory – Oklahoma City, OK
13 – Numbers – Houston, TX (+ D.R.I.)
14 – Emo’s – Austin, TX (+ D.R.I.)
15 – White Rabbit – San Antonio, TX (+ D.R.I.)
16 – Rail Club – Ft. Worth, TX
18 – Club DV8 – Tucson, AZ
19 – Clubhouse – Tempe, AZ
20 – Chain Reaction – Anaheim, CA
21 – Cheyenne Saloon – Las Vegas, NV
22 – The Key Club – Hollywood, CA
23 – Brick By Brick – San Diego, CA
24 – The Boardwalk – Orangevale, CA
25 – Lost on Main – Chico, CA
26 – Slim’s – San Francisco, CA

For more EARLY MAN click here.

Members of METALLICA, MACHINE HEAD, DEATH ANGEL, FORBIDDEN, SKINLAB and D.R.I., as well as former members of EXODUS, OVERKILL, S.O.D., POSSESSED, SACRILEGE B.C. and STEREOMUD, are among the musicians who made an appearance at a special event to celebrate the life of Debbie Abono, a well-respected and much-loved manager and promotional machine behind some of San Francisco Bay Area’s strongest metal bands (POSSESSED, FORBIDDEN, EXODUS, VIO-LENCE, SKINLAB), who passed away on May 16 after a battle with cancer. She was 80 years old.

According to an obituary published in the Contra Costa Times on May 30, 2010, “Debbie was in her mid-fifties when she plunged into the Bay Area’s heavy metal/thrash metal music scene. She quickly [started working with] some of the Bay Area’s strongest metal bands (POSSESSED, FORBIDDEN, VIO-LENCE, EXODUS, SKINLAB) as well as Chicago’s BROKEN HOPE, Florida’s OBITUARY and CYNIC, Ohio’s SPUDMONSTERS, and from Texas SKREW. Many of these members who have gone onto further success with their careers with Debbie‘s constant guidance. She is known around the world not only for the work she has done for countless musicians, band crew members and their families, but more so for her heart and generosity and her ability to uplift, motivate and empower all those around her to always be honest and to be their best.

“After recently learning that Debbie was gravely ill, James Hetfield of METALLICA, another Bay Area legend, gave a verbal tribute before singing the hit song ‘Nothing Else Matters‘ at a performance in Belfast, Ireland. Alex Skolnick, guitarist for TESTAMENT, posted the following statement: ‘In the mid-1980s when most folks over forty were afraid of metal, there was Debbie Abono, a kind, sophisticated woman in her 50s. She saw right through the pentagrams, upside-down crosses, leather and spikes and recognized that some kind souls lay underneath the anger reflected much younger, often-misunderstood group of metalheads and became manager to some of the heaviest bands. By doing so, she helped us realize that older people weren’t so bad either.’ TESTAMENT also dedicated the song ‘Alone In The Dark‘ [to Debbie] during the band’s May 16, 2010 performance in Enschede, Netherlands.”

Debbie‘s love for music from Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin through METALLICA and MACHINE HEAD inspired her to set up a music scholarship through Mechanics Bank.

Donations can be made through this web site and via check payable to “East Bay Community Foundation” and should be accompanied by a note designating that the gift is for the Debbie Abono Memorial Fund for Music. Contributions should be mailed to The East Bay Community Foundation, Attn: Giles Miller, 200 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza, Oakland, CA 94612.