HUNTRESS Forced To Pull Out Of AVATAR Tour

Los Angeles-based, occult-themed traditional heavy metal band HUNTRESS has been forced to cancel its previously announced participation in the U.S. tour featuring AVATAR, GEMINI SYNDROME and FIRST DECREE.

Comments HUNTRESS singer Jill Janus: “Two months ago, I had major surgery and ever since I have been eager to get back on stage.

“On August 26th, HUNTRESS played a sold-out show in Los Angeles at Loaded. The performance was incredible, my voice is strong, and I felt so happy to be back on stage. After the show, I had complications from surgery that left me in severe pain.

“Although I am now cancer-free, I am clearly not yet healed properly. Due to doctor’s orders, HUNTRESS will be unable to join the tour we were so looking forward to this September with AVATAR, GEMINI SYNDROME and FIRST DECREE.

“In one month, I will celebrate the return of my beast mode on the MOTÖRHEAD‘s MotörBoat cruise 9/28-10/2, as it will take one more month to properly heal from surgery.

“I’m so excited for the release of our new album, ‘Static’, on September 25 and the amazing music video debut of ‘Sorrow’, coming in a few weeks.

“HUNTRESS will announce new tour dates soon and I can’t wait to meet our fans at many more shows to come!”

Janus recently revealed to Revolver magazine that she was diagnosed with uterine cancer. She said: “During the process of writing and recording our third album, I began to feel like something bad was growing within me. When we were on tour with AMON AMARTH, I started to bleed heavily between my periods. I had a procedure, and my doctor found early stages of cancer in my uterus. I know I’ll survive. I’ve survived much worse.”

Janus also spoke about her lifelong battle with mental illness. She said: “I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder first, when I was 20. I started to show signs of it when I was 13, though, and I struggled with it through high school. But it started to get dangerous in my early teens. By the time I was 20 and living in Manhattan, it was very, very difficult for me. That’s when I was admitted into a mental health facility and was diagnosed bipolar with schizoaffective disorder, which progressed into schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder.”

She added: “I was suicidal constantly. I was very suicidal early on in my life. Then in my mid-20s, it shifted to full-blown mania, where I can’t really remember much of my 20s. I can’t remember anybody from high school, either. I lost my long-term memory and can’t remember names, faces, or even places. We’ll be at a venue on tour and Blake [Meahl, HUNTRESS guitarist] will be like, ‘We’ve played here two times before,’ but I’ll have no recollection.”

HUNTRESS‘s third studio album, titled “Static”, will be released on September 25 via Napalm Records. The CD was produced by Paul Fig (Grammy-nominated engineer who has previously worked with ALICE IN CHAINS, DEFTONES, TRIVIUM, GHOST) and Jim Rota (FIREBALL MINISTRY, executive producer for “Sonic Highways” series and producer of “Sound City” movie), and was engineered and mixed by Fig.

Vance Kelly (SLAYER, ALICE IN CHAINS, EVANESCENCE, GHOST) has once again delivered stunning album artwork for HUNTRESS. The band’s creative unity with Kelly remains strong, with Vance having also created album covers for HUNTRESS‘s previous CDs “Spell Eater” and “Starbound Beast”.