Alright my brethren,



I will give you the scoop now. Sorry for the delay in the news but the studio tugs at me every minute of my life and it is hard to say no.



Manilla Road - Playground of the Damned track listing:



1. Jackhammer

2. Into the Maelstrom (supposed to be a couple of dots over the o in maelstrom but I don't know how to get my keyboard to do that, duh).

3. Playground of the Damned

4. Grindhouse

5. Abattoir de la Mort

6. Fire of Asshurbanipal

7. Brethren of the Hammer

8. Art of War



The whole project was recorded at Midgard Sound Labs in Wichita, KS (which is my studio hehe. I just love saying that). I have to give special props to Derek Brubaker for all the great engineering he did with us on this album. He also was a big inspiration for some of the concepts and lyric ideas in this project.



Band Line-up:



Vince Golman - Played bass on the last 2 songs. These songs were recorded first actually, while Vince was in some serious pain because of physical problems he was having with his hand which resulted in him giving up his position as bass man for Manilla Road.



E.C. Hellwell - Played bass on all the other songs. Ernie (he hates it when I call him that) and I were getting ready to start working on a project together and even though he considers himself a keyboardist he has considerable prowess as a bassist also so we decided to use him for the rest of the album. Due to other obligations he could not sign on with the Road as our touring bass man though. So Joshua Costillo has joined MR as our new bass player since the recording of the album.



Cory Hardcore Christner - Played totally awesome skins (drums) on the whole project.



Bryan Hellroadie Patrick - Sings lead and backing vocals on the album.



Mark Shark Shelton - (sort of strange referring to myself in the third person) Guitars & lead and backing vocals.



Every album the Road does turns out a bit different than the others while oddly enough retaining a certain amount of familiarity with the bands overall style which has taken three decades to to create. This album follows that path as well as any other that we have done. It is not really a concept album even though some of the songs could be considered inter-related. I think this is the best production we have achieved yet in Midgard Sound Labs and I am more than proud to put my name on this project.



Playground of the Damned will be released on High Roller Records for the LP version and Shadow Kingdom Records for the CD version.



The only touring that we are planning at the moment for 2011 will be the Hammer of Doom festival in Germany in October. This will be a special show where we shall play primarily songs from the first two eras of Manilla Road. Andreas Neurdith will be our special guest drummer at this event.



In the interim I am working on a new project with a new band called Hellwell. Yes E.C. is in the band and it was all sort of his idea therefore the name. Joshua Costillo is also working on this project with us and Hellroadie too. So you say well that is almost like having another MR project. It does have a bit of the road sound to it but very different because of keyboards and synthesizers being used. It is really heavy artistic and epic though. Plus we have a different drummer for this project as well...Jonny Benson. So even though you can catch a tinge of the Road in it there is quite a difference as well.



I guess that is enough for you to assimilate at this time. I will post more info as time rolls on.



Up The Hammers

Shark