AHAHAHAHA! AT LAAAAAAAAAST! A RELEASE DATE FOR SONATA ARCTICA'S NEW ALBUM! AND NOT ONLY A RELEASE DATE, AN EPIC TRACKLIST AND EPIC ALBUM ART AS WELL! AND THEY'RE RELEASING A SPECIAL 2-DISC EDITION WHICH I WILL BUY EVEN IF IT'S THREE TIMES AS EXPENSIVE!

September 18th. Sep-tem-ber-ei-ght-eenth. Doesn't it just roll off your tongue? Two months and eight days from now, I will be listening to SONATA ARCTICA'S NEW ALBUM. Actually, let's face it, I probably won't, because I will have DIED OF HAPPINESS when I see it delivered.

Anyway, tracklist:

01. Everything Fades To Gray (Instrumental)
02. Deathaura
03. The Last Amazing Grays
04. Flag In The Ground
05. Breathing
06. Zeroes
07. The Dead Skin
08. Juliet
09. No Dream Can Heal A Broken Heart
10. As If The World Wasn't Ending
11. The Truth Is Out There
12. Everything Fades To Gray (full version)

Even the names of the tracks are beyond awesome. I'm guessing that track 9 will be a ballad, and possibly also track 11. Track 1 might be similar to Gravenimage if they're releasing an instrumental version, which would be good. Track 6 catches my attention for some reason - I predict that it will be one of my favourites. Colours might well be the predominant theme (or at least, shades of grey), in the same way that dreams was the predominant theme of Unia.

Oh alright, perhaps I'm a little over-excited, especially given that it's still quite a long way off. But still, Sonata Arctica are responsible for my entire music taste, in that every band I like now came from looking for similar bands to Sonata, or looking for similar bands to a band that was similar to Sonata (etc.), or as a recommendation from someone who liked Sonata or someone who liked a band that came from Sonata (etc.). They have been my favourite band for absolutely ages, and I still enjoy listening to them hugely, even though I have listened to some of their tracks probably several hundred times, and even The Gathering, who I have apparently listened to over a thousand times in the last 3 months, have not come close to taking the title of the most awesome band ever from Sonata.

Anyone who's made it this far is probably now convinced that I am significantly less sane than they thought I was. Ah well.