Therion mainman Christofer Johnsson has revealed that the group's current North American trek may indeed be their last, citing "massive" financial costs. Also, the Swedish group's two scheduled shows in Philadelphia, PA and Detroit, MI have now been cancelled. Therion was due to play Philadelphia's Theatre of Living Arts on November 3rd, although issues with the promoter affected the date. Meanwhile, no reasons have been disclosed for the cancellation of Therion's scheduled Detroit show (supporting Brooklyn metal act Type O Negative).
In a statement published via Therion's official website,
Johnsson said;
"Philadelphia show is now cancelled. There was this known issue with the promoter announcing the wrong date. It was too late to correct the date to the same venue, but we tried to book it into some other place instead. This didn't work, so today we received the final decision that Philadelphia is off the schedule. New York City and Springfield is in the near, so it shouldn't be a big deal for you guys in this area to catch up with any (or why not both?) shows over there."
"The Detroit show was never any regular Therion show. Instead of having a day off we would be playing before Type O Negative, before their opening acts, and play some 30 min set or what ever. Due to what ever reasons, this won't be happening now and we'll have a day off and drive to the Niagara Falls instead."
"The tour we did in 2005 was not very successful due to us being overbooked with shows in areas where we don't do too well (which I pointed out before the tour, but I was talked into doing it) plus the fact that our tour bus broke down and we lost a bunch of shows."
"This time we tried a new concept (with a more professional American booking agent) and do only shows in areas where we do OK or good. We've had fun shows so far, but economically it isn't working this way either, the initial costs (work permit, visa, flights etc) are spread over too few shows and the budget was on the limit already when being planned. As unexpected costs always tend to pop out, the tour will now have a bit of minus and thus also this concept turned out to be not working. This means that unless the tooth fairy decides to sponsor us or some festival decides to pay us sick amounts of money to bring us over and carry the massive costs, this will likely be your last opportunity to see the band perform in USA/Canada. This decision is also pushed by the fact that we are becoming more and more of a show band and we don't play many venues over here in a size where the European production would fit. Starting from the next World Tour 2010, we want to standardize things and have an identical stage set up no matter where we play in the world."
For a list of upcoming Therion tour dates, click here.
Therion recently released a music video for the song "Son Of The Staves Of Time". The track comes off the Swedish band's latest studio album, the dual-disc "Gothic Kaballah", which was released in North America on February 6 via Nuclear Blast Records.
Therion and The Vision Bleak will team up for a European tour in December.
Therion earlier in the year announced the departure of vocalist Mats Leven (Yngwie Malmsteen, Krux, Treat, At Vance), which took effect prior to the band's appearance at this year's Wacken Open Air festival in early August. His replacement in the group is Thomas Vikstrom, who is best known to metal fans as the voice behind Candlemass' "Chapter VI" album (1992).
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