Official press release:
Hells Headbangers is proud to announce the signing of Italy’s Barbarian. The first fruit of this unholy union shall be the band’s highly anticipated third album, Cult Of The Empty Grave, which will be released during the first quarter of 2016. Since 2009, the power-trio have been killing it in the metal underground, culminating in 2014’s classic Faith Extinguisher on the highly respected Doomentia label. Now, with the backing of longtime fans Hells Headbangers, the true Barbarian are poised to hail and kill, far and wide, wherever the mighty hooves of the Apocalypse take them, and Cult Of The Empty Grave shall be the soundtrack to that domination. The Barbarian sound is one that’s both ancient and fresh, and has been firmly in place since the beginning. Imagine a sweat-drenched symbiosis of early Running Wild and ’80s Manowar with the panache of classic Venom: Cult Of The Empty Grave eclipses such a hypothesis, but is rendered with the now-trademark Barbarian touch, one that’s boisterous and bloodlusting and unapologetically OTT. In the wise words of one Cult Of The Empty Grave track, it’s verily “Absolute Metal”. Total fun done with total seriousness and with total intolerance for posers (leave the hall!), Barbarian hail the banner of heavy metal and beckon you to enter the Cult Of The Empty Grave!
A statement from the band reads as follows:
“Barbarian was formed in 2009, and the lineup has never changed – and that’s kinda awesome already – with the core being Borys Crossburn, L.B. Steamroller, and D.D. Prowler. After six years, Cult Of The Empty Grave is the album that eventually nails it for us. It sounds very natural and dynamic – no overproduction of any sort, and no loudness-wars madness. The songs have a very distinctive trait, at the heart of heavy metal – raw, natural, and arrogant, because that’s the only way we know and we are able to. It’s REGRESSIVE METAL because we don’t care about what is fancy or whatever. HEAVY METAL IS EVIL, HEAVY METAL IS UGLY, HEAVY METAL IS THREATENING, and that’s the Barbarian way.”
Cult of the Empty Grave track listing:
1. “Bridgeburner”
2. “Whores of Redemption”
3. “Cult of the Empty Grave”
4. “Absolute Metal”
5. “Supreme Gift”
6. “Bone Knife”
7. “Remorseless Fury”