Swedish metallers SOILWORK have completed work on their eleventh album at Nordic Sound Lab studios in Skara, Sweden with producer Thomas "Plec" Johansson. The follow-up to 2015's "The Ride Majestic" is tentatively due in late 2018 or early 2019 via Nuclear Blast Records. Singer Björn "Speed" Strid told Australia's Sticks For Stones about SOILWORK's new disc (hear audio below): "It [turned out] really, really great. I'm really, really pleased with it. And it's gonna be released at the end of the year or the beginning of the next. That's all I can say right now. But I'm very thrilled about it." "The Ride Majestic" was SOILWORK's last album to feature longtime drummer Dirk Verbeuren, who left the band in July 2016 to join MEGADETH. He was replaced in SOILWORK by Bastian Thusgaard of THE ARCANE ORDER. Strid told Sticks For Stones about Thusgaard: "That was his first recording with the band. He's been playing with us live for quite some time, but [it was his] first real recording, and he did really, really good. It's awesome." SOILWORK is now a quintet, following the departure of bassist Markus Wibom in late 2016 due to "other commitments." He has since been replaced by touring bassist Taylor Nordberg (THE ABSENCE). Strid recently said that the recording sessions for the new SOILWORK album "have been different from anything we've done before. Everyone's been very involved in the whole process, and we've allowed ourselves to experiment more and take more chances sonically," he explained. "Bastian brought another dimension to our sound, and he made the rest of us step up our game as well. And working with producer Thomas 'Plec' Johansson (The Panic Room) has been a real pleasure. Even though we've been through a lot over the past years, we feel more like a unit than we've done for a long time. "We, as a band, are far from done exploring our creative and musical abilities and we want to bring back SOILWORK to the masses," he added. "Our fans around the globe can expect that promise to get fulfilled when our touring cycle starts in promotion of our coming album." Thusgaard stated about his contributions to SOILWORK's upcoming disc: "I'm so proud of my achievements on this album. I was given a great amount of freedom both in writing and recording. Obviously, I wanted to honor the 'drum vibe' that has developed in the band through time. At the same time, I'm very aware of the fact that I'm a different drummer to my predecessors. This is something I really wanted to showcase by adding my own vibe to the band's sound." Strid added: "On this new album we have gone back to classic heavy metal basics but with a twist of our own legacy of sound, with soaring melancholic melodies at a sometimes-furious tempo and great diversity. People will recognize the vibe that we've had on the latest two albums, but we feel that we've taken our sound even further, with more energy, darker elements but uplifting structure." In 2016, SOILWORK released a special collection of rarities titled "Death Resonance" via Nuclear Blast. SOILWORK is: Björn "Speed" Strid - Vocals Sven Karlsson - Keyboards David Andersson - Guitars Sylvain Coudret - Guitars Bastian Thusgaard - Drums Strid's THE NIGHT FLIGHT ORCHESTRA side project will release its fourth studio album, "Sometimes The World Ain't Enough", on June 29 via Nuclear Blast. Photo credit: Stephansdotter Photography
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