AURI, the project featuring NIGHTWISH mainman/keyboardist Tuomas Holopainen and his wife, popular Finnish singer Johanna Kurkela, has inked a deal with Nuclear Blast. AURI's debut album is tentatively due in early 2018. AURI begun its life with three people, united through their shared need to hear a kind of a music which can't be described by words alone. A magical kind of sound to be heard whilst falling down Alice's rabbit hole. The first song born of this mindset, "Aphrodite Rising", appeared in 2011. And slowly the earth has cracked open again and ten more tracks have emerged out of the soil's dust. Thus the trio was formed. Kurkela lent her unique voice, while Holopainen and English composer and multi-instrumentalist Troy Donockley (also of NIGHTWISH) cast their spells with various other instruments. Using selected guest musicians and friends, the album finally takes its ultimate form under the direction of sound engineer Tim Oliver, all within the pastoral splendor of Real World studios in Southern England. AURI put the "drink me potion" to its lips, grew to full size, and is now ready to slay the Jabberwocky. Hand in hand with Nuclear Blast, they lead their listeners into the shadows behind the mirror, and their debut album will evoke ghosts of an ethereal sphere. AURI is: Johanna Kurkela: Voices, viola Tuomas Holopainen: Keys, backing voices Troy Donockley: Acoustic and electric guitars, bouzouki, uilleann pipes, low whistles, aerophone, bodhran, keys, voices Holopainen and Kurkela have been married since October 2015. Photo by Tim Martindale
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