Montreal's BLACKGUARD have checked in with the following update:

"We are very pleased to announce our signing to Victory Records!

At first (and second) glance this might seem like an odd pairing, but Victory is a very hard working label that we are all 100% behind. The Victory staff has welcomed us with open arms and are committed to pushing our next release to its full potential. It's no secret that we've been touring extensively this past year and a half , and it's comforting to know we have a label backing us that are willing to work and put in as much effort as we have for the release of our third record (2nd under the name Blackguard).

That being said we are hard at work completing our next record which has a tentative release date for April. The release will coincide with a North American tour that isn't announced yet , but when it does it's going to turn heads.

Now for a bit of sad news.

For those of you who have seen us play recently with LEAVES' EYES and on the NEVERMORE tour, you have no doubt noticed the absence of our keyboardist Jo. We're sad to say that Jo has officially left the band to pursue other endeavors.

There's no drama here and we're all still good friends. Jo simply felt his time with the band had come to an end and we have amicably parted ways . Blackguard will remain a 5 piece for the foreseeable future .

We're currently having a blast on the Nevermore tour! There's been some great shows and sharing the stage with so many great bands has been a pleasure thus far. HATESPHERE, WARBRINGER and Nevermore are bringing it every night so this is not a tour you want to miss. Our run on this tour goes all the way to Nov 5th so check our tour dates and come out.

After this we go right back at it again with our good friends EPICA , SCAR SYMMETRY and The AGONIST all the way to mid December. Then we get to kick off the New year with DEICIDE , BELPHEGOR, NEURAXIS and PATHOLOGY from February 15th to March 10th .

Take care everyone , and we'll see you on the road."

Click here for the band's complete schedule.