News from the studio

The recordings of the second Altaria album, Divinity, are going very well. All the drum tracks and almost all basses have already been recorded. Lead vocals have been recorded for four songs. Currently Altaria is having a small recording break because of the Christmas and New Year's Eve celebrations, but the recordings will continue in the very beginning of January.

For Finnish people: There's Altaria ringtone available at buumi.net. The polyphonical version of Fire & Ice can be purchased from their website.

Advance tickets to Tavastia gig

The advance tickets for Altaria's gig at Tavastia (January 22th) have been released for sale. You can buy or mailorder your tickets from Tiketti. The price is 8 euros. Grab your tickets now!

www.sonataarctica.info

Short non-Altaria but Altaria related newsflash: Sonata Arctica's webpage is from now on - and finally - located at www.sonataarctica.info so please update your bookmarks and do spread the address along people you know.

Gig at Nokia added, Kouvola date changed

Altaria plays live in Nokia, Iisoppi in January 16th 2004. The additional date is held because the gig at Kouvola was forced to be moved for the next free slot (meaning the Divinity tour, summer 2004) by the venue - Altaria couldn't do anything about the cancelling, but they agreed to conquer Kouvola later on. The cancelled show was immediately replaced by gig in Nokia.

All live dates confirmed

All tour dates have been now confirmed. No more live shows will be added to the Invitation Tour. After January, the next live dates will be during the summer 2004 when Altaria is touring again for supporting their 2nd album Divinity.

Live dates updated

Tourdates updated. A show in Tavastia Club, Helsinki, Finland, is also confirmed - it's the first time for Altaria to play in the most legendary rock club in Finland. There will be also a warm-up band which will be announced shortly.

Live dates & updates

Tour dates, band & history sections are all updated. Also, photos of Taage added to the layout, too.

Altaria live: January 2004

Altaria will handle the second leg of Invitation Finnish Tour in January 2004. The Live section is now updated with the already confirmed tour dates. Lots of more tour dates will be revealed as soon as they have been fully confirmed by the band and the venue.

Altaria in studio

Altaria goes to studio in the following Saturday (October 10th) to begin the recordings of the follow-up album for Invitation. Tentative title for the second album is Divinity. Divinity will include 12 songs and released in May 2004. Some track titles are: Prophet Of Pestilence, Darkened Highlight, Try To Remember, Crucifix, Final Warning, Will To Live and Haven. Two of these songs were already performed live during Altaria's gigs in September, and the audiences really seemed to like the new material.

Tour dates coming closer

The forthcoming Altaria live shows are just around the corner, so remember to check out the live dates! The setlist for the forthcoming gigs might well contain some new, yet unreleased Altaria songs, so do remember to check the band live near you! Since Nightwish are having two gigs at Russia at the same time with Altaria shows, Emppu is unable to join Altaria for these shows - he's busy training, traveling and touring with Nightwish. Emppu is being temporarily replaced by Michael Wik. Michael is a good friend of the band and has earlier been playing in Blindside with Marko and Tony. He's also been co-writing two songs of the debute album Invitation. The change is not permanent, it's just for these three gigs where Emppu is unable to participate due the Nightwish activities. Altaria wants to offer a full live show experience for people attending to see the band playing live, so the gigs won't be cancelled nor played with one guitarist only - the audience will get everything they deserve, including the double guitars, even if Emppu is forced to retreat from the shows. The next live date: Club 25, Vaasa, September 20th 2003 - be there!

Line-up change

Altaria has parted ways with vocalist Jouni Nikula. The departure was made in good terms and with mutual agreement. Altaria wishes Jouni all good in the future! Currently Jouni is in studio recording the second Requiem album. Permanent replacement for Jouni has already been chosen. The new singer is Taage of Kilpi fame. (Detailed information of the new vocalist coming online soon.)

First Altaria live show featuring Taage on vocals will be in Club 25, Vaasa, September 20th 2003. With Taage as a singer Altaria is able to move even closer to its roots, towards traditional heavy metal & hard rock of the eighties without forgetting the fresh view and inspirations from the new millennium. The line-up change doesn't affect the forthcoming gigs in any matter - all of the live shows will be made and there will be no cancellations due the singer replacement.

Altaria is currently working hard rehearsing the live set with Taage and writing new killer songs for the second (yet unnamed) Altaria album which will be released in April/May 2004 via Metal Heaven.

Altaria will do a minor Finnish tour during September. Some live dates have been added, possibly more to come when the dates are 100% confirmed.

A brand new merchandise section is now opened! From now on you can buy Altaria related items (shirts, CDs...) directly from Altariamusic.com!

Attention, Finnish people: there will be Altaria interview at YleX's Metalliliitto on Sunday (June 8th). Metalliliitto is on air during 20:00-22:00 Finnish time (GMT+3). There's Real Media and Windows Media Player streams available in case of you don't have a radio. The transmission frequencies in Finland can be found from YleX's www page.

The debute album Invitation is now distributed also in Sweden by Sound Pollution.

The renewed Altaria Homepage has been now officially opened. Also, a brand new Altaria Discussion Forum is open. Welcome, everyone!

Also, the debute album Invitation can be bought from www.aorheaven.com. Invitation is released by Metal Heaven, a sublabel of AOR Heaven, on April 28th. So far the confirmed distributors are:

Germany - Point Music
Switzerland - Musikvertrieb
Austria - Musikvertrieb
Benelux - Rock Inc.
Finland - Kråklund Records
Italy - Frontiers
UK - Cargo
Spain - Avispa
France - Musea
South Korea - Sail Production (week 20)
Brazil - Megahard *
Japan - Disk Heaven *
* = release date: t.b.a.

Also, the promotional copies of Invitation should be supplied soon to the media so soon there might be some reviews at www.altariamusic.com. Stay tuned.

Also, prior to release date, the website of Altaria will be completely renewed. There will also be a merchandise section and a message board.

Now it's time for some additional recordings and other small details and minor fixes. The mixing of the album will start January 21st at Sonic Pump Studios.

Also, a live review from Altaria's show at Turku (26.10. 2002) available at Sue Magazine. The text is in Finnish.

Short clip translated into English: "Altaria show the full power since the beginning. Nowadays you rarely find new bands who can make as good impact as Altaria did. The band blew me away like a tornado." (Kimmo Jaramo / Sue Magazine)