VENIA (FINLAND) signs with Open Grave / NePlusUltra Music

Open Grave Records & NePlusUltra Music are proud to announce the signing of Finland's Female Fronted Melodic Metal band VENIA.

VENIA got their start in 2002 when guitarists Viktor and Jere started jamming together and seeking more band mates. The lineup was finally completed in the spring of 2004, and a demo was recorded titled, "Genesis".

In 2005 VENIA recorded their first offical studio recording, a MCD entitled "In Our Weakness", which was released via Bombworks Records.

Now in 2009 the band is set to release their debut full-length album titled, "Victory by Surrender". "Victory by Surrender" will be a co-release between Open Grave Records and newly founded NePlusUltra Music. A world wide release date has been scheduled for April 14th.

Viktor of Venia states in regards to the new album, "It's another big step forward for us as we set the bar very high. It includes 11 songs; two instrumentals, six songs in English and three in Finnish. Four of the songs are new and much improved versions of songs that were on our first demo. Musically it will be sort of a blend of the "Genesis" demo and "In Our Weakness"; the thrash and power elements are still present, but everything has a bit of a classic heavy metal feel to it with plenty of galloping rhythms and dual leads. I'd say it's more melodic and catchy than "In Our Weakness" but just as heavy. Oh yeah, we have also included a lot more violin than before."

For more information on Venia visit them at:
http://www.myspace.com/veniaband
http://www.veniaband.com

Wow, is that cover art cheesy!

Is that a question? The answer is yes. Yes, indeed. Haha. It actually reminds of artwork for old NES role-playing games.

In the contest to who has the cheesiest album cover Killen or Venia, Killen are still ahead by two

I still want to know who started the trend of band name logos that are impossible to read. I was looking through the metal section at a local store today, I swear I couldn't read the names of half the bands in that section.

....and that cover art looks like something from a dime store book of fairy tales.

detuned wrote:

.and that cover art looks like something from a dime store book of fairy tales.

What!!!! How can you say such a thing, nothing says metal like armor plated wearing angels carrying swords and protecting Mr Ed and his faithful champion Wilbur on the way to Narnia.

Cool! I was wondering when they would resurface again! I will own this.

I thought that the Once Dead CD was to be the last Open Grave release? Did that change?

Appparently

manny wrote:

detuned wrote:

.and that cover art looks like something from a dime store book of fairy tales.

What!!!! How can you say such a thing, nothing says metal like armor plated wearing angels carrying swords and protecting Mr Ed and his faithful champion Wilbur on the way to Narnia.

The 2 angels are actually Cronos & Mantis...they're getting ready to decapitate the dude with the tattered flag.

Eyesore wrote:

Is that a question? The answer is yes. Yes, indeed. Haha. It actually reminds of artwork for old NES role-playing games.

If this was artwork for a limited edition digipak EP for the true believers of the band, it might pass, as bad as it is, but for a full-length album, the cheese-o-meter is off the scale.

Why don't you check out their music instead of just commenting on the art work? The art work is along the lines of some of the old school metal albums. If you don't like it, that's fine. But maybe try listening to their music instead of focusing on the one factor that you don't like?

opengraverecords wrote:

Why don't you check out their music instead of just commenting on the art work? The art work is along the lines of some of the old school metal albums. If you don't like it, that's fine. But maybe try listening to their music instead of focusing on the one factor that you don't like?

And why don't you trying joining a conversation here instead of just spamming us?

SAXON1500 wrote:

opengraverecords wrote:

Why don't you check out their music instead of just commenting on the art work? The art work is along the lines of some of the old school metal albums. If you don't like it, that's fine. But maybe try listening to their music instead of focusing on the one factor that you don't like?

And why don't you trying joining a conversation here instead of just spamming us?

I have joined in conversations

I think I've only ever made 2 threads.

I'm kinda getting tired of this types of bands.

opengraverecords wrote:

Why don't you check out their music instead of just commenting on the art work? The art work is along the lines of some of the old school metal albums. If you don't like it, that's fine. But maybe try listening to their music instead of focusing on the one factor that you don't like?

I have checked out their music from their "In Our Weakness" EP days back in 2005 on Bombworks and didn't particularly like it myself, so I gave up on the band, but that's just me. I am very familiar with them, just because I said nothing about the music don't assume I don't know them. This is a Metal board, and most of us are pretty knowledgable about music and bands.

I was just making an observation on the horrid artwork. We make all types of comments and observations on this board, and even step on each others toes for fun, that's why this board is different. Maybe if you hadn't plastered the cover on the thread, I wouldn't have made any comments at all. Happy ing on the other boards.

Man, it's not like we're trashing the band, like would happen on most forums.

I was only asking about checking out the music, because the only thing commented on was the cover.

opengraverecords wrote:

I was only asking about checking out the music, because the only thing commented on was the cover.

cause it sticks out like a giant at midget land.

Somebody put a lot of thought into that flag...........I can tell.


Anyways, I would think that having half the album in finnish and half in english would be a little distracting, but maybe not.

Customer:
Morning,

Waitress:
Morning.

Customer:
What have you got?

Waitress:
Well, there's egg and bacon,
egg sausage and bacon
Egg and spam
Egg, bacon and spam
Egg, bacon, sausage and spam
Spam, bacon, sausage and spam
Spam, egg, spam, spam, bacon and spam
Spam, sausage, spam, spam, spam, bacon, spam tomato and spam
Spam, spam, spam, egg and spam
Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, baked beans, spam, spam, spam and spam.

Come on guys. Cut him some slack. James is not spamming. He's been here before. Many of us know him from this board and from others. He doesn't post here a lot, but I have no problem with him promoting his bands here.

As for this release, I gave it a listen, but my computer has crappy speakers. I need to be able to hear it on good speakers. Sounded good from what I could hear. Really liked the music. Sort of a mixture of power metal and some death metal influences.

Not so sure about the female vocals, but I've never been a big fan of female vocals in metal. Bands like Nightwish never appealed to me because of the vocals, but I would imagine there is a big market for this, since those types of bands are so popular right now.

James; if you're gonna plug your bands, you must know that people online are gonna comment. Just rise above it! And let me know if you can find ANY other metal discussion board that are less critical than this one. Good luck!

I own all of Venia's releases. I've even had the priveledge to meet Viktor. So rest assure, some of us are fans of this band!

ultmetal wrote:

Sounded good from what I could hear. Really liked the music. Sort of a mixture of power metal and some death metal influences.

Not so sure about the female vocals, but I've never been a big fan of female vocals in metal. Bands like Nightwish never appealed to me because of the vocals, but I would imagine there is a big market for this, since those types of bands are so popular right now.

That's been my problem with the band exactly Ult. The female vocals never did not do anything for me, that's why I gave up after the EP release and basically forgot about this band.

kmorg wrote:

James; if you're gonna plug your bands, you must know that people online are gonna comment. Just rise above it! And let me know if you can find ANY other metal discussion board that are less critical than this one. Good luck!

When I reviewed for metalreviews.com, any time a band/indie label would plug their stuff, people would trash them. What we have here is not anywhere near that. Despite those of us working for the zine trying to get people to change, they never did. And these kinds of threads will always appear to be inappropriate spam to people. So we created a Promote Your Band forum. That basically made spamming okay. Some people still trashed things, but that forum was full of idiotic kids.

Might be something to consider here.

Quote :

I own all of Venia's releases. I've even had the priveledge to meet Viktor. So rest assure, some of us are fans of this band!

I listened to the songs last night, and I dig them.