What Do We Know About The Next Nightwish Album? + 3rd Trailer

Nightwish's next album is sure to be a huge event in symphonic metal history. So it's time to get excited, and take a look at what we know about the upcoming record...   

- This will be the first Nightwish album with Floor Jansen and Troy Donockley as official members.

- Sadly, Jukka Nevalainen will not be drumming on the album - he is taking a break due to suffering from severe insomnia. Instead the band welcomes Kai Hahto (Wintersun, Swallow the Sun) to the drumkit.

- There will be 12 songs altogether. Tuomas Holopainen finished writing the tracks in May with some help from Marco Hietala. It isn't a concept album, but there is an overall theme. It will also include the longest Nightwish song ever written - provided it doesn't get split into two, as happened with the tracks Song of Myself and Imaginaerum.

- Floor will not write any of the songs (as she has said she is content to write her own work for ReVamp) but will help with vocal arrangements and so on.

- In July the band entered their summer camp in Finland for 3 months to work on the new material...

- But they aren't hard at work all the time!

- The album will be more band-focused but there will still be an orchestra (most likely the London Philharmonic who the band regularly work with). Traditionally, Nightwish do their main recordings at Finnvox Studios before relocating to Abbey Road studios in London to record the orchestra and choirs. Pip Williams is overseeing the orchestrations as usual. 

- At time of writing, Pip has worked on arranging 4 of the songs for the album. As per his tweets, he has described them as....

Song 1:  "A great rocking track that will make you shudder"

Song 2: "Brutally heavy [...] really interesting choir stuff [...] epic, Mahler-like chorus!"

Song 3: "Dark and mysterious, with a really memorable film-worthy main melody [...] in stark contrast to the first two songs, very slow and dark with an amazingly infectious main melody." He also mentioned that the song would include "an assortment of exotic percussion" and that Troy would "put his stamp on this one".

Song 4:   "A driving, typically Nightwish fast affair, perfect for Floor's great rock delivery, with a bonkers chorus!" And he added, "wait 'til you hear what we're doing with the Metro Voices choir on this one- some manic stuff!"

- The album should be finished by the turn of the year.

- If everything goes to plan, the world tour will begin in the USA in April 2015, include summer festivals and finish at the end of 2016.

- The band have not yet decided whether to have an anniversary concert or not (2016 marks 20 years of Nightwish), but they are considering it, stating it would have to be something really special and not just be the same as other bands' anniversary events.

If all that isn't enough to prepare you for the next album, there's also the latest episode of the 'Making Of' trailer. Tuomas discusses the songwriting process in the video below.


Nightwish - Making of the new album 2015; Episode 3