During the recent Wacken Open Air festival, Germany's Metal Hammer met up with NEVERMORE guitarist Jeff Loomis to talk about the band's forthcoming album, The Obsidian Conspiracy.

Loomis reveals how he wants to leave more space for vocalist Warrel Dane and how the 12 songs will sound different than before. In addition, he pays his tribute to German rock vocalist DORO PESCH.

Check out the video interview at this location.

As previously reported, in a new studio update singer Warrel Dane says that the band are recording two cover songs for this session: 'The Crystal Ship' by THE DOORS and 'Transmission' by THE TEA PARTY. Check out video footage below.

Commented drummer Van Williams: "Who do you call when you need a master drum tuner in Seattle? Why Greg Keplinger of course! Not only a fantastic drummer in his own right, he can also come down to the studio and fine Tune drums! It was an honor for me to meet the man with many awesome stories from his time on the road and music in general. I urge you to do some googling on him and visit his site if you do not already know who he is. And he makes snares! www.gregkeplinger.com."

BraveWords.com caught up with Nevermore bassist Jim Sheppard at Germany's Wacken Open Air Festival and he provided the following exclusive update about the band's forthcoming album, The Obsidian Conspiracy.

"It's pretty much been created," Sheppard says about the follow-up to 2005's This Godless Endeavor. "Jeff has completed the record and has delivered to Warrel (Dane - vocals) to work on the lyrics and the vocals. I'm actually blown away. Listening to it, it sounds so inspiring, it sound fresh and it sounds new. We're out touring now becoming a band again. We played the Zwarte Cross Festival in Holland and then we went to Tel Aviv and I can't say enough about the fans in Israel. Of course Wacken - brilliant.

And now we are going to go home in two weeks and record the drums in Seattle for the new record. And then we'll fly out to North Carolina. Peter Wichers from SOILWORK is going to produce, and he's rented a cabin on a lake in North Carolina close to Asheville. We're going to take more time than we ever to work out he vocals, guitars, bass. Everyone is going to be busy. Jeff is going to go out and some guitar clinics with Schecter Guitars. And we also going to go to England with Andy Sneap (MEGADETH, ARCH ENEMY, EXODUS) who's going to do the mixing and mastering. And we're looking at a release date of January, 2010."