ZYKLON/EMPEROR Guitarist SAMOTH Launches New Project

ZYKLON/EMPEROR guitarist Samoth (real name: Tomas Haugen) has issued the following update:

"New year, new challenges? and man, does time go fast! I thought it was about time to drop a few notes about what's going on.

"2008 has been sort of a quiet year for me in the public eye. But with a new baby in the house [Samoth and his Canadian wife Erin welcomed their first child, Lily, on April 23, 2008 — Ed.], it's been crazy on the home front, I tell you! Nevertheless, I've had time to fuel my creativity and I'm actually quite pleased with the direction things are going at the moment.

"I guess since we dropped the news that ZYKLON was taking a break, there was talk about a new project. As of today, ZYKLON is still on a break, and the future is left hanging. Destructhor [guitar] is still out working hard on the road with MORBID ANGEL, and will be for a while, I think. What the future will bring on that front remains to see.

"For now, I'm now excited to announce a new band project. I've been working on material for a while, and spring '08 I hooked up with Cosmo (MINDGRINDER),and together we laid down the outline for a new band project. Through the year we've pretty much written and demoed a complete album. There's still many loose ends, however, like getting a drummer and a vocalist to match. As of now this is an unnamed project, but we hope to announce a name and more concrete plans in the not-too-distant future. What style, ye say? Extreme metal is what runs in my blood, so extreme metal it is! Actually, deathrash was the blueprint Cosmo and I had set when first starting to work on it. It's less extreme than ZYKLON, but still elements of death metal, lots of thrashy elements, old school and new school, catchy groovy hooks, some melodic atmospheric stuff, some eerie stuff. Still a bit hard to put a tag on it I think, and we're so in the middle of making the feast now, we've not yet been able to fully taste it, if you know what I mean. But, as they say, we'll keep ya up-to-date.

"Another thing that kept me busy during '08 was the EMPEROR live reunion releases. That's pretty much done now, and we're all psyched about finally getting it all released. It's coming out on Candlelight Records in April. Check their website for info and how to pre-order certain limited items. There's a limited box set with free T-shirt, limited 7" EP, etc.

"On my label, Nocturnal Art, there are new releases confirmed for '09 as well. Oslo thrashers BLOOD TSUNAMI and the mighty LIMBONIC ART both have new albums. The BLOOD TSUNAMI album looks like an April release. LIMBONIC ART is currently recording and no release date is scheduled yet."