Bloodstock have confirmed that Finnish Metallers Wintersun are set to play, as a UK Exclusive, at next years Bloodstock Open Air 2009. This will coincide with the band's long awaited new album tentatively entitled Time which will also be out in August 2009 .

Wintersun is the new project of singer and multi instrumentalist Jari Maenpaa, who recently left his former band Ensiferum. Powerful and majestic with a lot of energy, the music of Wintersun mainly flows with great melodies influenced by folk and Scandinavian traditional music. If you enjoy bands like Amorphis, Children Of Bodom, Fintroll or Ensiferum, "Wintersun" is the right choice for you! Lyrically the album deals with mastermind Jari's life, feelings, emotions, hallucinations and dreams, facts that make the record a very personal piece of work.

Beside Jari, drummer Kai Hahto from the Finish Grindcore/Death Metal band Rotten Sound plays on "Wintersun" and provided the album with a hellish pummelling in all or more of the right parts.

The rest vocals, guitars, bass and programming was done completely by the perfectionist Maenpaa. They both managed to create a diversified song spectrum from speed metal tracks over heavy guitar tracks to bombastic mid tempo opuses. While fast songs like opener 'Beyond The Dark Sun' and 'Winter Madness' stress out the high technical abilities of Wintersun, epic songs with big choruses like 'Sleeping Stars' and 'Death And The Healing' show the unique feeling of Jari for emotional and melancholic melodies. The vocals always fit perfectly to the present mood Jari masters everything, no matter if you take melodic clean vocals, brutal screams or Viking-like chants.

The band is delighted to be performing at next years Bloodstock Open Air Festival this will be a long overdue UK appearance for Wintersun and will be their ONLY UK show for 2009!

Bloodstock takes place on Friday 14th, Saturday 15th and Sunday 16th August at Catton Hall, Walton on Trent in Derbyshire.

Norwegian black metallers Satyricon are to issue a digital single ahead of the release of their new album, entitled  "The Age Of Nero", which is scheduled to hit stores on November 3rd via Roadrunner Records.

The single, which will be titled "Black Crow On A Tombstone", will be released on all the usual platforms on October 20, and you will be able to premier the track at the web site of the UK branch of Roadrunner on October 6.

"The Age Of Nero" will be released on November 3 via Roadrunner Records. The track listing for the album is as follows:

01. Commando , The Wolfpack, Black Crow On A Tombstone , Die By My Hand , My Skin Is Cold, The Sign Of The Trident, Last Man Standing  and Den Siste

Sworn Amongst are a UK metal four-piece who have been rewarded for their increasingly well-attended live shows by signing with Rising Records, and released their debut album for the label, And So It Begins, in March. The band made many fans when they beat nearly 3,000 other acts from Europe and the UK in the Kerrang!/Snickers Unsigned competition, resulting in them performing at Download, and they also played Bloodstock.

Sworn Amongst have now been confirmed as support for the Thrashing Like A Maniac European and UK tour, UK dates as follows:

October 12th - Nottingham Old Angel
October 13th - Sheffield Corporation
October 14th - London Camden Underworld
October 16th - Bristol Bierkeller
October 17th - Wolverhampton Little Civic
October 18th - Huddersfield The Parish

"The Roundhouse Tapes", the long-awaited new DVD from Opeth is scheduled to be released on October 27th via Peaceville Records.

The Roundhouse Tapes set contains the critically acclaimed Opeth performance from the Camden Roundhouse, London in 2006 and sees the band in scintillating form playing a selection of classics from their illustrious career. A mini-site featuring a trailer for the DVD, info on the release, downloads and more is now online @ www.peaceville.com/opeth/theroundhousetapes

1,000 copies of the special edition of the DVD, packaged in a deluxe rigid digibook inside a hard slipcase, includes postcards of each band member, an exclusive art booklet featuring the work of Travis Smith (renowned OPETH sleeve designer) and "The Roundhouse Tapes" booklet, is also available to pre-order from the mini-site.

The full track listing for the live set from The Roundhouse Tapes is as follows:

When, Ghost Of Perdition, Under The Weeping Moon, Bleak, Face Of Melinda, Night And The Silent Water, Windowpane, Blackwater Park and Demon Of The Fall

Frank Turner releases the incredible new single ‘Long Live The Queen’ on 20th October 2008 through Xtra Mile Recordings.

‘Long Live The Queen’ is a heartfelt, poignant story of a close friend passing away from breast cancer. Though a hard subject, Frank has written the song as a way of celebrating his friend’s life and the legacy she has left behind. Lexi tirelessly campaigned and fundraised for breast cancer charities and it’s with this inspiration that Frank and Xtra Mile Recordings will be donating proceeds from the sale of the single to the Breast Cancer Campaign charity.

As October is Breast Cancer Awareness month – this single couldn’t be released at a more important time and together with Breast Cancer Campaign, Xtra Mile will be working towards raising as much money and awareness as possible. Already, the single has been picked up by XFM, 6Music, and by long time supporters Mike Davies and Zane Lowe on Radio 1. Jo Whiley (and now Sara Cox who is covering Whiley’s maternity leave) is also a recent Frank convert, playing previous single ‘Reasons Not To Be An Idiot’ a couple of times on the Radio 1 daytime show leading to plays of Long Live The Queen over the next few weeks.
The video is also gaining some attention. It went in at Number 3 on MTV2’s Myspace Chart and it getting played on NME TV, TopShop and other places.

Frank goes on his biggest tour to date the day after the single is released – and will be playing to over 6000 people. The dates are:

OCTOBER
21The Cockpit, Leeds
22 The Duchess, York
23 Oran Moor, Glasgow
24 Academy 3, Manchester
25 The Barfly, Birmingham
26 The Phoenix Arts, Exeter
27 Wedgewood Rooms, Ports
28 The Ansom Rooms, Bristol
29 The Scala, London *
30 Tower Arts, Winchester
31 The Rescue Rooms, Notts
NOVEMBER
2 The Barfly, Liverpool
3 Roisin Dubh, Galway
4 Cypress Avenue, Cork
5 Auntie Annies, Belfast
6 Crawdaddy, Dublin

Pain are to release their new album, entitled "Cynic Paradise" on October 31 via Nuclear Blast Records. The follow-up to "Psalms of Extinction"  features "eleven tracks offering a vast variety of styles and influences which are even new for Pain. Nightwish vocalist Anette Olzon makes a guest appearance on two tracks — "Follow Me" and "Feed Us" whilst he artwork was created by renowned artist Travis Smit.

The full track listing for Cynic Paradise is as follows:

I'm Going In, Monkey Business, Follow Me, Have A Drink On Me, Don't Care, Reach Out (And Regret), Generation X, No One Knows, Live Fast - Die Young, Not Your Kind and  Feed Us.