EPICA To Release 'The Solace System' EP In September

With their latest masterpiece, Dutch symphonic metallers EPICA set new standards. 2016’s “The Holographic Principle” is the most epochal, multi-layered, courageous and successful record of the band, reaching top 10 chart position entries in the German, Dutch and Swiss album charts. Accordingly, all the tracks written for the album process are high quality, but not all songs have been put on the album. “This is only based on the fact that the record should not exceed 76 minutes,” explains guitarist/vocalist Mark Jansen. Since the band didn’t like the idea of a double CD, they finally decided to release an EP with six brand-new numbers, which were created during the creative phase of “The Holographic Principle”.

“The Solace System” EP will be released on September 1 via Nuclear Blast.

The track listing is as follows:

01. The Solace System
02. Fight Your Demons
03. Architect Of Light
04. Wheel Of Destiny
05. Immortal Melancholy
06. Decoded Poetry

Mark states about the songs: “The listeners can expect a high-quality EP — with songs that are far too good to use them only as bonus tracks. We wanted to publish these songs together in a context. It is always hard to decide at the end of a recording process which songs will be on the album, because this means that you have to miss some songs with best quality, just because they do not fit quite well into the overall flow of the record or because there are other songs that are more suited to the lyrics.”

The video for the title track, “The Solace System”, can be seen below. The clip was produced by anime master Davide Cilloni. The splendid artwork is once again by the hand of Stefan Heilemann.

“The Solace System” was recorded, mixed and mastered by Joost van den Broek and Jacob Hansen.

EPICA vocalist Simone Simons comments on the EP: “During the early writing process of ‘The Holographic Principle’, we found out that we were blessed with a huge amount of songs. The songs that didn’t fit on our album are now available for you on this special EP! I hope you guys will enjoy these songs as much as we do!”

And if that wasn’t enough, you’ll be also able to purchase the new EP, “The Solace System”, together with the CD of their recent studio album, “The Holographic Principle” as a box set. It will be called “The Holographic Principle – The Ultimate Edition”.

In other news, Nuclear Blast will re-release two ancient albums of EPICA, “Design Your Universe” and “The Divine Conspiracy”, on vinyl on August 18. Each album is available in two different colors, the pre-order has already started last week.

Photo credit: Tim Tronckoe