Far away from the here and now
“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the secrecy!” stated the world famous physicist and Nobel prize winner Albert Einstein (1879-1955). And he is right: Usually it’s the mysterious, the incomprehensible and the storied that entraps and casts a spell over us. Without doubt, there are only a few musicians on this planet that have the talent to create fantastic journeys into mysterious other worlds and to resurrect abstract parallel dimensions and epic legends from forgotten times – seemingly without any effort. Those virtuous magicians that catapult time and space as well as the here and now are incredibly rare!

Absolute perfection
BLIND GUARDIAN are one of those unique and special bands that stand for absolute perfection, creativity and passion since they formed in 1984. Delivering a fascinating mixture of opulent bombast, progressive complexity and symphonic beauty. BLIND GUARDIAN established their style a long time ago but have never stagnated – always remaining open-minded and adventurous. This is why BLIND GUARDIAN are always ahead of the times!

»Beyond The Red Mirror«
The group has already released ten strong studio albums, with each one being unique, breathtaking and special. Their latest record entitled »Beyond The Red Mirror« tied in with their 1995 masterpiece »Imaginations From The Other Side«. “The two worlds described therein have changed dramatically for the worse since then. While there used to be several passages between the worlds, there is only one gate left now: The Red Mirror. It has to be found at any cost”, asserts mastermind Hansi. That’s why the ambitious group made a journey into their past; to connect with the future in an imposing manner. Blind Guardian collaborated with three big, international choirs for the album, creating a monumental piece of work! “We want to surprise and impress with our music”, explains guitarist André Olbrich. “Nowadays, music tends to be arbitrary and predictable. But we want to keep developing our music.”

»Live Beyond The Spheres«
Now, there is some big news coming from BLIND GUARDIAN: The Progressive Power Metal pioneers are incredibly pleased to announce the release of a new 3-CD package which will be entitled »Live Beyond The Spheres«! This release will include material from numerous shows recorded during their European tour in 2015 – it will include old classics, recent tracks as well as songs that are very rarely played live. “I’m completely satisfied with the songs we’ve chosen and with the way we’ve presented the album in sound and technique”, reflects vocalist Hansi Kürsch: “Even though we compiled »Live Beyond The Spheres« with songs from more than ten different shows, the result sounds really uniform. This has been a long journey but the effort was all worth it. Our fans will love it!”

Rough diamonds
During the European tour in 2015, 30 shows were recorded in total, with an average length of 2 hours, 15 minutes per show. “In addition to that, there is also the same amount of concerts we recorded afterwards during the worldwide shows”, reflects Hansi. “This was a really hard task because we already had ten recordings from the European tour which you could release as high-quality bootlegs. Those recordings were all already nearly perfect. This high quality was the decisive reason for us to only use songs from this first part of the tour. Let’s see if we will also use the rest of the material in the future. We’ve got a lot of rough diamonds in our live archives!”.

An endless story
Above all, Hansi is still a perfectionist: 'In general I would say that we've had a really good run throughout this tour and that nearly every show was perfect. But when you listen to the live-recordings in the studio you realise that almost every evening, at least one member of the band had a bad day. We switched constantly”, laughs Hansi. “At the end of the day, after every one of us had checked through every single song and concert of those 30 shows again and again, there was only something like two or three versions of each song that were suitable to be used for an album. We then had to decide between those final versions; which one the most impressive one was. This was a nearly endless task!'

'Sometimes there's something at a show, let's call it magic…”
Regardless of those challenges, the effort was all worth it because the final chosen songs have such an incredible energy, “Those small mistakes seemed to be unimportant in the final evaluation”, explains the charismatic vocalist. “As soon as you listen to the songs, you will know what I mean.' Everyone who knows BLIND GUARDIAN knows that this band creates magical moments. 'Sometimes there's something at a show, let's call it 'MAGIC', that gives us all a shiver up our spine. You can’t forecast such moments and they’re not restricted to certain songs”, reflects Hansi. In the end, he sums up: “We are really satisfied when people sing along with us, have a good time and go back home happy.' So there’s nothing more to add except that one should look forward to the most monumental live experience of the whole year – to quote Hansi: “It sounds colossal!”