News :

March 10th, 2010 - Hansi in guest-star of Grave Digger at Wacken Open Air!

Last year Hans was invited to celebrate the twenty-five years anniversary of Rage at Wacken Open Air (Hansi with Rage at Wacken Open Air), this year it's the turn of Grave Digger to celebrate his thirtieth years on the same festival. For the occasion, the German heavy metal band will play their album Tunes Of War entirely. Hansi who has participated to this album, will be invited by the group for play with them on stage.

It will not the only guest, Doro Pesch and Van Canto are also part of the guests!

On the news for the future album of Blind Guardian, I remind you that the news which listing the songs that will probably appear on it is regularly updated, so feel free to follow the site ;)

(Talk about it on the forum)

March 09th, 2010 - Some songs of the forthcoming album are unveiled!

Blind Guardian has recently made profiles on Facebook and Twitter to post daily news on their progress on the upcoming album (you can also follow the latest Facebook messages on the right column, to insert "Live from Twilight Hall Studios")and it's good for us because we must admit that the official site isn't updated frequently. And now a high-quality news for fans that we are has been posted because it contains two new song titles!

We'll list here all the titles that will be announced and the news will be updated whenever necessary! Here are the titles:

• Sacred (a longer version, that's Hansi says)
• Curse My Name
• Wheel Of Time
• Tanelorn (Into The Void)
• Valcyries
• A Voice In The Dark
• War Of Thrones
• Control The Divine
• A cover song unknow for the moment

Another new for the orchestral project this time, it will not be completed until 2012 at least! Three songs are finished yet and Hansi says they are awesome.

Update on march 9th, 2010

(Talk about it on the forum)

February 25th, 2010 - The orchestral project's songs coming!

One week ago, the titles of some songs from the upcoming album are starting to be unveiled (Some songs of the forthcoming album are unveiled!), it's the turn of the orchestral project to begin to reveal its secrets!

The first song that Hansi and Charlie work has therefore the provoking title of Moria! Obviously the list of songs to be unveiled will be updated here so you don't miss anything about this.

For memory, the project will not be release until 2012, it goes without saying that we have much time before we had more concrete news!

(Talk about it on the forum)

February 10th, 2010 - All kinds of info about the new album!

Today Hansi has posted a lengthy news about the new album on the official website! Here is what he says:

Some important words right at the beginning: A small step for mankind, but a gigantic one for me. "It is finished" as people with a more pathetic attitude probably would say. For the first time in my long life I finally managed to complete a computer game!!! I have to admit that I more or less only assisted my son throughout the whole journey and all in all was of little help, but that's of minor importance I have to say. Brave and courageous I stood by his side throughout the whole quest. Such complexity, such passion, such grandeur and beauty all in one story... What an overwhelming feeling, after all. Why didn't anyone tell me before? Yes, André and Marcus tried to convince me here and there, but they should have tried harder!!! Very soon they will taste my revenge, I tell you. I am intending to play "Guitar Hero" next and once I am better than Marcus and André (shouldn't take too long) ... they are history. The game which got me hooked? "Rabbids Go Home" of course. Who needs "WOW"?

For those who are not interested in computer games (even though I doubt the existence of such silly people) I also would like to tell you what is going in the Guardian camp. We are progressing quickly! Even I, who is always last in line, can sense the end of the recording session is close at hand. Maybe another four weeks and we should be done with all recordings.

Apart from some minor guitar, bass, percussion, flutes and effect parts the time mainly will be used for vocals. I have to sing two more songs, which would be "Curse my Name" and "Song 12". As some of you figured already this hardly will be the title of the song once vocals are finished, even though we have had a live album, which carries the provoking title "Live"...

Back to "Song 12". After counting all songs (and I did that again and again) I finally figured we only have worked on eleven in total. Don't blame me, blame André. He has called it "Song 12". What can I do? Well, I do have two choices. I either call it "Song 11" from today on or I keep it as it is. To create no further confusion I call it the "Eleventh song which is called Song 12" for now. It is another nice one, to say that much.

To finish the "still- to-do-list": We will end up recordings with some gigantic choir sessions, which will take some time to be completed. :-) Anyway, the stuff so far turned out even better than expected. Keep in mind it is me saying that and I partly have been involved. By now I assume it is no secret anymore that we twice have traveled to Prague during the last months for orchestral recordings. What can I say? It sounds brilliant. We have heavily used orchestration in "Sacred" (yes, the song will be on the album in an even longer and certainly better version) and naturally for "Wheel of Time" as well as in some other parts on the album. As probably said before, this will be our most bombastic and epic album so far. Whether there will be 8 or 9 songs on the album I do not know, by now. But each and every song has a completely different approach in comparison to each other and one compliments the other in a perfect way. Except probably for "Song 5" and "Song 10". Or was it "Song 10" and "Song 8"? I can't remember. So it won't matter, right? September you will know what I mean. :-) We may show mercy and provide you with some small samples, before. If I don't forget. What was I talking about?

As you may have noticed we have finally started to establish our Facebook profile. For us it is the easiest way to provide you with current information in a constant mode. The page is now run by our webmasters who do have the privilege to get some first hand information directly from the studio while accompanying us or directly communicating with us via Skype (yes, I do know this modern tool, too). For us it is really impressive to see how many people have joined us within such a short amount of time. Thanks for supporting us.

We, of course, still check the forum to see what is going on there. As there were many questions about where and when we play which country on the next upcoming world tour I can only say this much: The announced shows will only be the beginning of an extensive tour marathon. Our intention for sure will be to play all continents, again. I am very positive about a Northern American tour in late 2010. But nothing is yet confirmed. As usual you will find all necessary information with regard to tour dates once they are confirmed on the homepage. As for our friends in these European countries where no shows are announced for 2010: Patience is a virtue! Do not worry we will come by in 2011. That's for sure. We of course will do everything possible to visit our friends in Asia, South America , Australia and Africa sometime in 2011 as well. But unfortunately you will have to wait for announcements a little longer, I suppose. It's just a matter of time, I promise. As for the set list and the general live production I can promise this much: we will perform a lot of stuff from the new album and we are working on some very spectacular visual effects. To be more precise: We have people working on visual effects. :-)

Album title and album cover? We worry when we get there...

That's it from my side. Next infos will be provided by André.....just joking.

Hansi

Oh, by the way, did I say "A Happy New Year"? It's not too late, now, is it? "A HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL OF YOU"

In addition, the band will be hosting a meeting and a listening today for people of Nuclear Blast

(Talk about it on the forum)

February 02nd, 2010 - Empty Hollow available for listening!

Empty Hollow, the song of the new Rage album where Hansi appears (Hansi works again with Rage: Strings To A Web) has just been posted on the official MySpace! For your convenience we offer you directly here:

On this beautiful song that starts with a melodic intro, you can hear Hansi among the choruses, the appearance may be less noticeable than the previous with the group but it is there! Strings To A Web was registered in the Twilight Hall Studios (the studio of Blind Guardian) by Charlie Bauerfeind who is working with the group for over 10 years.

A limited digibook version of this album will be release with a bonus DVD which will contain the show at Wacken Open Air 2009 where Hansi (and Jen Majura) appears, here is the setlist:

1. Carved In Stone
2. Higher Than The Sky
3. Set This World On Fire (featuring Hansi Kürsch)
4. All I Want (featuring Hansi Kürsch)
5. Invisible Horizons (featuring Hansi Kürsch)
6. Lord Of The Flies (featuring Jen Majura)
7. From The Cradle To The Grave (featuring Jen Majura)
8. Prayers Of Steel (featuring Schmier)
9. Suicide (featuring Schmier)
10. Down (featuring Schmier)
11. Soundchaser

Rage : Strings To A Web

Click on image to order the limited version!

(Talk about it on the forum)

January 25th, 2010 - A very busy weekend for Blind Guardian

After a weekend that seems to have been hard we are entitled to a little news from the official Facebook group probably held by Hansi (this looks very much like his writing style), so here is what he said:

The weekend was a busy time. We had a tour preproduction meeting to discuss things. This was followed by filming for an online autograph session (more on this to follow later) and a photosession with the whole band. Hopefully we can share some of these photos with you soon. Today Frederik and Charlie will do drum recordings for the song "Curse My Name".

(Talk about it on the forum)

January 17th, 2010 - More confirmed tourdates!

New dates have been confirmed for the European tour of Blind Guardian at the end of the year, these are the following dates:

• October 19, 2010 in Warsaw
• October 22, 2010 in Göteborg
• October 23, 2010 in Stockholm

Obviously we will certainly make you know any new confirmed date and the sale of tickets for these.

And the second part has also been confirmed, it's the Swedish group Enforcer. And just for fun, here's a little picture of this group of heavy formed in 2004:

Last little item on the site this time, a new style is available from the two already existing, a style the colors of the single The Bard's Song (In The Forest)! Simply select the menu from right and refresh your cache :-)

(Talk about it on the forum)

January 01st, 2010 - Happy new year 2010 :-)

The en.Blind Guardian.fr team wish you all a happy new year 2010! We hope it will be rich and happy for you all!

And of course we also hope it will be productive for our favorite band! We already know that a new album, with a single, will be released and will be followed by a European tour (dates are available on the topic of the tour 2010 / 2011 on the forum with links to tickets where they are available for purchase). Three dates, two in Sweden and one in Poland, are still to be confirmed, however, and of course others will follow, those announced are just the beginning of this tour!

December 24th, 2009 - Merry Christmas 2009 :-)

The en.Blind Guardian.fr team wish to his followers bards a Merry Christmas 2009 :-)

On the site, we remember that you can follow all the news of it by subscribing to our Twitter page and by joining the Facebook group.

And finally, here's what Hansi had promised in his last news (Some news about the upcoming album: Frederik's set): a small series of photos of their work commented by Hansi: Christmas 2009 with Blind Guardian.

December 10th, 2009 - Release date of the next album officialised

While the dates of the next European tour are officially confirmed (others in Sweden and Poland are to be confirmed though), Nuclear Blast diffuse discreetly in the news of these tour dates the release date of the successor of "A Twist In The Myth", which shall then be released September 4th, 2010, 4 years day-to-day after the release of their latest album.

I remind all those who want to go see the band in Germany next autumn they will pay their ticket 30 EUR instead of the 35.25 usual on metal-Tix until January 10 next, for the links directly to these places, go to the topic of the tour 2010 / 2011 on the forum.

(Talk about it on the forum)