On January 25th (February 9th in North America) Israel’s ORPHANED LAND will release their fourth studio opus, The Never Ending Way Of ORwarriOR.

Mixed by Steven Wilson (PORCUPINE TREE, OPETH), who is also responsible for several keyboard parts on the new album, it turns out to be a sophisticated concept album taking Orphaned Land’s unique brand of exotic, heavy music to soaring new heights in terms of complexity and catchiness.

Parallel to revealing the album’s cover artwork the band presents you its newly redesigned website, so pay a visit to www.orphaned-land.com and check it out. Stay tuned to this site for further information regarding The Never Ending Way Of ORwarriOR.

Kobi Farhi (vocals) comments the artwork by Zen Two & Native as follows: “Even in the album’s artwork we combined Hebrew and Arabic, regardless of the fight between Jews and Muslims. I found a Jordanian guy, specialized in calligraphic artwork. He took letters from Hebrew and Arabic and moulded them in his art to create a symbol of peace. The whole artwork is mainly hand made as we are tired and a bit sick of too much photoshop works. I truly believe that the work these guys did for us is something really special and we are very lucky to have it. You will soon see that simply every page of the album’s booklet is a masterpiece!”

Furthermore, a brand-new webisode allowing a look behind the scenes of the photo shooting for the band’s striking new promo pictures has been posted. Check it out below.

On the new promo photo and the resulting reactions Kobi Farhi states: “It's been 2 weeks since we launched our very controversial band photo - most reactions were simply great and I've noticed more than a few discussions on it all over the net. However, I also noticed that some people found it offensive or they just didn't like the idea, I must tell you this - this is the best band photo we ever did, finally our concept and music also was reflected visually. We will never offend any culture and our main thing is to unite people who are different, to let them realize that we are all the same, all one. Please think about the place we come from, then look at the photo again - this is Orphaned Land"

All German Orphaned Land fans can already look forward to see the band live during the upcoming festival season. So far, the renowned Rock Hard festival in Gelsenkirchen (May 21st – 23rd, 2010) and Summer Breeze festival in Dinkelsbuhl (August 19th – 21st, 2010) have been confirmed! More touring and festival updates will be announced soon.

The Never Ending Way Of ORwarriOR is an audible manifest that the time has come for Middle Eastern metal to take over!