Hot off the presses! Here is Queen of Hell: Initium #4 page 26 by Mike Ratera! (This is the final page of the issue, but Mike still has to go back and finish a large two-page spread which he saved for last.)
Friends & Family Kickstarters! (And some cool music campaigns to boot!)
Just sharing some love for campaigns by ASoT friends & family...plus a few that just look cool! Let us know if you have a campaign coming up!
Click the images to link to the campaigns!
Charon 13 (ending in less than 24 hours!):
Black, White & Bloodshot (ending in less than 72 hours!):
Seven Years in Darkness:
Galactic Cowboys:
Legends of the Desert:
The Art of the Hand of Doom (Monsters, Magic & Metal!):
That's it for today, Legion! See ya soon!
Cheers,
Nina, Josh, Jesse & Justin
Vinyl is in!
4 months ago
– Thu, Aug 01, 2024 at 11:00:16 AM
HAIL, LEGION OF THUNDER!
Vinyl is in, Jesse is back (sort of), and things are in motion! We'll run down everything in text below, but first here's the video version from Josh:
Here's a rundown of what's up!
"Why is this project so late?" If you've missed previous updates, the short answer is 1) the comic book artwork is running a year and a half late; 2) the vinyl factory was backed up; 3) the band fell apart!
Fortunately 1) our artist is doing fabulous work and has only four pages (of 92 total) left to complete on the entire project; 2) the vinyl is now in hand, and; 3) we put the band back together! (Details in the video.)
If you have questions or concerns please feel free to message us directly. Josh will write you back or video chat with you!
Jesse is back! We hung out and met his beautiful daughter Olivia. We have not rehearsed as a full band yet. Jesse is currently down with Covid, and Nina is in Catalonia visiting her grandfather who is ill. We still expect to begin full band rehearsals before the end of August!
Some basic rewards should still be ready to ship by late August or early September. However many items will not be in hand yet, so if you have a more complicated package you'll need to wait a little longer.
The long-promised secondary Kickstarter campaign in the comic book category will finally launch in mid-September! This project will offer new exclusive covers for issues #1 & #2, plus all covers for #4 which were not available before as the final issue was not funded on the original campaign.
The first new single with Justin on drums will be attached to the upcoming Kickstarter.
We'll have a booth at Baltimore Comic-Con, Sept. 20-22, where we'll be promoting the comic Kickstarter and offering some convention exclusives!
Our first concert with the new lineup will be Friday, November 22nd in northern Virginia! Official announcement coming soon!
We're hoping to make this first concert a live stream, but this is not confirmed yet. We'll keep you updated!
CHECK OUT THE VINYL!
Blank sketch variant (limited to 100 copies) and main record jackets for Queen of Hell: Initium!
Queen of Hell: Initium vinyl colors: trans-red w/ black splatter, green glow-in-the-dark, metallic splatter, and solid red.
THE LATEST COMIC ART!
Queen of Hell: Initium #4 page 24 artwork by Mike Ratera.
Queen of Hell: Initium #3 excerpt, artwork by Mike Ratera, colors by Diego L. Parada.
That's it for today, Legion! We'll be back with another update soon, and hopefully we'll see some of you in person starting in September!
Cheers,
Nina, Josh, Jesse & Justin
The Thunder-Child Arrives! Vinyl tests approved! New art!
6 months ago
– Wed, May 22, 2024 at 09:57:27 AM
HAIL, LEGION OF THUNDER!
Greetings everyone! We realized that most backers are not receiving the Kickstarter updates, so today's video is a little shorter and intended for all our socials. We'll go into more detail below!
Congratulations to our bassist Jesse on the birth of his first child Olivia! The Thunder-Child is born! (If anyone would like to send him a baby shower gift he has a baby registry here including a diaper fund at the bottom of the page. )
Jesse & Olivia pwning noobs.
Vinyl test pressings for Initium recently arrived and they sound great! We've approved these tests which means the plant will go ahead and press the real records in the next few weeks. They then have to be shipped to us from the Czech Republic. We expect to have them in hand in July, just in time for Jesse to return and autograph them with the rest of the band!
Artist Mike Ratera is making good progress on the fourth and final issue of the Initium comic. He has just finished page 17 of 26. Having finished the most complicated pages (large battle scenes with many characters) he is telling us he should be able to speed up and finish the final 9 pages by mid-July. Here's the latest page!
Queen of Hell: Initium #4 page 17, artwork by Mike Ratera
Colorist Max Bayo will begin coloring the final issue in June so that she will be caught up as Mike is finishing the last page or two. That way we won't have to wait for her to do all 26 pages after Mike finishes his final page.
Once the comic art is all done we still need to have the final issue lettered (you know, the dialogue balloons and captions, etc.), but this process is significantly faster than the art and should only take a week or two.
We are planning a separate single release (a new song, not Queen of Hell related) featuring our new drummer Justin in October!
We have our first concert with Justin booked for November 22nd in northern Virginia! Save the date! This will be an extended set with favorites, closet classics, and new tunes!
We haven't just been sitting around waiting for art and vinyl. We've written a bunch of new songs for the next album to come out between Queen of Hell chapters!
Everything finally seems to be coming together for Queen of Hell: Initium to be ready just as the band is fully operational again in the late summer/fall. Jesse will be back, we'll be recording, playing shows, getting new photos, hopefully shooting a music video, and amidst all this we'll be shipping your Kickstarter stuff!
As we mentioned in the last update, the band essentially fell apart and reformed during the course of this Kickstarter project. We know it's been a lot longer than planned. Thanks so much for hanging in there and supporting us as we continue our metal journey into new and uncharted territory! It looks like we'll be at it for a good long while yet!
Cheers,
Nina, Josh, Jesse & Justin
"Blood Red Skies" Single Out Now!
8 months ago
– Tue, Mar 26, 2024 at 07:55:54 AM
HAIL, LEGION OF THUNDER!
Our new single "Blood Red Skies" is out now!
As we retool and prepare to relaunch the band, we thought it was important to put something "new" out into the world and let all the "normals" (read: streamers/non-backers) know we are still alive.
If you could spare a minute please give "Blood Red Skies" a few plays, playlist it, and share it! It helps us a lot! (We'll reach a lot of people with the streaming single, but more importantly a small handful of them will cross over to supporting us on Kickstarter!)
For those who weren't around, "Blood Red Skies" is not a new recording but was originally a Kickstarter bonus track from 2017/2018. The song was only sent to backers of the It Was Metal campaign on the Kickstarter-exclusive Second Lives CD EP. We figured after 6+ years it was time to let the rest of the world hear the song!
If you'd like to get the track in physical format, you can now grab one of the remaining copies of the Second Lives CD EP on our store. They're pretty cool as we autographed and hand-signed all of them, then took them back to the factory to be shrink-wrapped, so they are signed, numbered, and sealed! Grab one here: https://asoundofthunderband.com/product/259246
Other than the new single, we are still waiting on the vinyl test pressings of Queen of Hell: Initium to arrive from the factory any day now. Mike Ratera is hard at work on the next hellish page of the comic. And we had an unbelievably great rehearsal with our new drummer Justin this past weekend. Things are looking up!
Cheers, Nina, Josh & Jesse
"Blood Red Skies" streaming Friday + video update + new page of QoH art!
8 months ago
– Tue, Mar 19, 2024 at 07:02:32 AM
Hey, Legion!
Josh writing to you today! We owe you a longer more detailed update. Today I am slapping together a quick one for you because I am flying out of town for a minor family emergency. Everything will be fine, but I wanted to get you what I could while I can!
So...
Our cover of "Blood Red Skies" hits streaming platforms this Friday, March 22nd! If you use Spotify, do us a favor and pre-save it! (They will ask for some scary sounding permissions, but all it means is they will add this song to your library and will follow us!) CLICK HERE TO PRE-SAVE!
Vinyl test pressings are being made now! We expect to get a shipping notice any day now. Assuming the test pressing is good, we expect to have the real thing in our hands in May at this point. This is the first real movement we've had on the vinyl and the plant tells us they have cleared most of the back-log and we are finally near the front of the line. Yay!
Mike Ratera is working away on Queen of Hell: initium #4. Here is his latest page. Check out this Hieronymus Bosch level mayhem! You can see why it is taking a lot of time...
Finally we have a video update that we filmed two weeks ago and didn't get around to posting because we had some audio problems. (This includes the test episode of Thunder-Stuff that we mention, which was not good enough to post.) But we talk about lots of band stuff!
Ok, I'm off to the airport so that'll have to do for today! Thanks so much for your patience, everyone! It wasn't planned this way, but on this project you'll have hung with us from the end of one lineup to the rebirth of ASoT with a new drummer! Huzzah!
