SVARTSOT / Blog
Danish tour announced
We can now officially announce the tour of Denmark which starts on September 2nd and will take place on various weekends throughout the remainder of 2011. The tour has been given the name the “…Og Landet ligger så øde hen”-tour (for English-speakers the tour title is “…And the Country is so Desolate”), and comprises of 9 dates at the present time, although there will almost certainly be added more dates over the next few weeks. So far the tour schedule is this:
September 2nd – Harders, Svendborg with Heidra (DK), Rarefaction (DE) and Fejd (SE) September 3rd – Musikhuzet, Rønne with Sylvatica (DK) September 17th – Studenterhuset, Copenhagen with Sylvatica October 14th – Tante Olga, Randers with Heidra and Fairytale Abuse (DK) October 28th – Paletten, Viborg with Phonomik (DK) and Heidra November 11th – Pavillonen, Grenaa with Sylvatica and tba November 12th – Magasinet HM88, Nakskov with Sylvatica and tba November 25th – Vershuset, Næstved with Heidra and Sylvatica November 26th – Studenterhuset, Aalborg with Heidra and Sylvatica
Album teaser online!
A teaser form the new album, maledictus eris, can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fno5XWlt3Gk
Pre-order maledictus eris now!
It is now possible to pre-order the new Svartsot album, maledictus eris, on Napalm Records' online store. The order can be made here: http://tiny.cc/ianmp. The first 250 orders placed will receive a limited free A2-sized cover poster with their purchase!
Album details
We’re proud to be able to release the cover artwork and tracklist for the third Svartsot album; maledictus eris.
As previously announced, the album recounts the tale of the Black Death’s incursion into Danish history from 1349 to 1350. The album begins the tale from just prior to the plague’s arrival through to when the first bout relinquished its grasp, and focuses on the way the epidemic affected the population – from victim to survivor. We have taken more inspiration from medieval music than on previous albums, and the feel of the album in general has taken a darker and more emotive turn on this recording.
We are extremely satisfied with the way this album has turned out and hope that the fans – both old and new – will take kindly to it. But at the same time, we should also make clear that this album is somewhat different to its predecessors, and not for the worse as far as we’re concerned.
We have a series of live dates in Denmark lined up for after the release, and hope to be able to add more European dates to the list soon. News on dates and leading up to the release will be posted as soon as we have it.
The tracklist is as follows:
Staden… Gud giv det varer ved! Dødedansen Farsoten kom Holdt ned af en Tjørn Den forgængelige Tro Om jeg lever kveg Kunsten at dø Den nidske Gud Spigrene …Og Landet ligger så øde hen
And the release dates are:
27.07.2011 ESP/FIN/SWE 29.07.2011 G/A/S, Benelux, ITA 01.08.2011 Rest of Europe 09.08.2011 USA/CAN
Til vores danske fans
Så er vi ved at komme ud af vores vinterhi, og de første af vores forårskoncerter er lige om hjørnet! På fredag (d. 8. april) spiller vi på Fermaten i Herning (sammen med Forcentury fra København og Battery fra Aabenraa), og det bliver en ekstra speciel koncert for os. Ikke nok med, at det bliver første gang vi spiller ”herhjemme” i Jylland siden 2008, så bliver det også første gang den nuværende line-up spiller i Jylland. Og så kan vi nu offentliggøre vores nye live guitarist! Det er Uffe Dons (eks-Unbelief, eks-Modra). På lørdag (d. 9. april) tager vi så til Uffes hjemby, Odense, og spiller på Kansas City (sammen med Forcentury og Sylvatica fra Fyn). Vi glæder os til at se så mange som muligt til begge shows.
Change in support band for the show at Klauzdal in Herlev
Forcentury will be replacing Illnath as the support act for our show at Klauzdal in Herlev (DK) on April 29th. Our decision is based purely on the fact that Illnath has already played a show at the same venue in March this year (less than one and a half months prior to our show). We therefore no longer feel that Illnath are a suitable support act due to the short space of time between the two shows. Any rumours that there should be any other reason behind the decision are unfounded. We apologize to any Illnath fans who had been planning to attend the show.
Show at Kaiserkeller cancelled
With great regret, we have to imform that the show at Kaiserkeller in Hamburg on Thursday March 10th has been cancelled. The reasons for this are bad ticket pre-sales combined with the decision of one of the support acts to drop out, leaving us with no backline. Instead, we will be concentrating on the recording of the new album, which is currently taking place at LSD Studios in Lübeck under the careful guidance of Lasse Lammert.
Svartsot returns to the studio
After spending the past year or so on writing new tracks, we will be heading back into the studio from the second week of March to record our third album. The recording will once again take place at Lasse Lammert’s LSD Tonstudio in Lübeck, Germany, and will include around 10 tracks of the strongest material we’ve written so far. The theme of the album is based on the plague epidemic that swept through Europe during the middle of the 14th century, and that would later become known as the Black Death. We feel that this lyrical concept aptly fits the way the music has turned out for this album – so more medieval flavours and intricacies can be expected this time round. A July release for the album is expected, and we will post updates over the next few weeks as work on the album progresses. So stay tuned for more news.
Change of support act for the show in Herning
Unfortunately, Fairytale Abuse has had to cancel their performance at the show at Fermaten in Herning on April 8th. The reason is that one of the band members has to work that day. But we have been fortunate enough to secure the thrash band Battery from Aabenraa as worthy replacements for that show. The roster is now: Battery Forcentury Svartsot The doors will open at 21:00, and the ticket prices are 100 kr. in pre-sale and 120 kr. at the door. We’re looking forward to seeing as many as possible at our first show in Jutland since 2008!
A look back over the year 2010
The year 2010 has been an exciting year for Svartsot. Starting back in February, we could celebrate Svartsot’s fifth anniversary – something that some may have believed would never have happened following events at the end of 2008. We celebrated by playing a fifth anniversary concert at The Rock in Copenhagen. Prior to the release of Mulmets Viser in March, we were asked at short notice to make guest appearances at two Paganfest extended shows in Stuttgart (DE) and Tilburg (NL). We gladly accepted the offer, even though we had to play minus a member. Instead, we kidnapped our producer, Lasse Lammert, taught him a couple songs in the bus, and drove through the night from Lübeck to Stuttgart in a snowstorm, passing countless snow-related accidents on the way. We made it, and we played two awesome shows and met a load of new people in the process. A HUGE thanks goes out Lasse for allowing himself to be kidnapped :)! The end of March saw Mulmets Viser being unleashed on Europe and a few days later, in the beginning of April, across the Atlantic too. The album received a varied reception. Many fans have told us that the album has grown on them over time – which was pretty much our intention. Thanks to reviewers such as The Angry Metal Guy who actually took the time to try to understand the album. And the less said about those who merely copy-pasted unrelated chunks of press material the better. Following the release of Mulmets Viser, we were offered various shows. Some of the high points have been playing some dates with Negură Bunget and ending that minitour with a show at Napalm Records’ fifteenth anniversary show at Metalfest Austria; playing alongside Fejd (SE) and Valravn (DK) at WGT in Leipzig; and, of course, performing at Wacken Open Air. We would like to take the opportunity to say thanks to ALL of the bands we have played with over the past year – you have all been cool – and all of the organisers and fans for making the shows great experiences for us! Following disastrous coordination leading up to W:O:A and a general dearth of concerts at home and abroad, Svartsot decided to discontinue working with our booking agents from August onwards. For the next couple of months Svartsot took over our own booking duties, but we could announce a new booker earlier this month. So far, the new collaboration seems to be bearing fruit, with a handful of shows already announced and certainly more shows to be announced over the next few months. With the exception of a few shows, the second half of the year has generally been a “busy behind the scenes” period for Svartsot. We were visited by a film-crew from German TV back in August, who filmed footage of us for a documentary. We have been working intensively on new material – the writing process of which has been ongoing throughout most of the year. At the time of writing these words, the final touches are being laid to the last of the new tracks. We will undoubtedly post more news on studio and release plans over the next few weeks or so. It was also during the preparatory work on the new material that we were forced to make the decision to ask our rhythm guitarist since the start of 2009, Cliff Nemanim, to leave the band. Svartsot wishes Cliff the best of luck with his future projects. The band has been in contact with a few other guitarists, and we may well be making announcements about this in a couple months time or so. But we should be up to full numbers for the announced shows... Finally a matter that the majority of our Danish fans (and some of our international fans) have noticed: Hans-Jørgen’s appearance on a TV commercial in Denmark for a mobile phone provider. We’re not quite sure what we should write about this, but it should all be above board now. So all that is left to be said is a big thanks to everyone, who has helped, supported and worked with us over the past year. We hope to see you all next year. Cheers!
