Dutch death metal dominators THANATOS have re-released their third album, Angelic Encounters. Released back in 2000, this album shows a bigger picture of Thanatos’ abilities of combining excellent musical skills with complex yet straight-forward songs that perfectly blend the ferocity of riff-oriented thrash metal with the sheer brutality of death metal.

The sound on this re-release has been remastered by Dan Swanö. Thanatos’ members Stephan Gebédi (vocals, guitars) and Paul Baayens (lead guitars) have contributed liner notes to this release and as an extra bonus the CD version includes all tracks of the rare Beyond Terror MCD.

Angelic Encounters is available as a standard jewelcase CD, offered for midprice, as well as on limited vinyl. Be sure to get your hands on the super-rare blue vinyl version, of which only 100 copies have been made. This version is exclusively available at www.cmdistro.com – and almost sold out by now.

Tracklisting (CD):

'Angelic Encounters'

'In Utter Darkness'

'Sincere Chainsaw Salvation'

'Infuriated'

'The Howling'

'Gods Of War'

'The Devil's Concubine'

'Speed Kills'

'Thou Shalt Rot'

'Corpse Grinder'

Tracks from the Beyond Terror MCD:

'L'Aldila - Beyond Terror'

'Devour The Living'

'Rites Of Retaliation'

'Angelic Encounters 2002 AD'

'Satan's Curse'

'Into The Crypt Of Rays'

Tracklisting (LP):

Side A

'Angelic Encounters'

'In Utter Darkness'

'Sincere Chainsaw Salvation'

'Infuriated'

'The Howling'

Side B

'Gods Of War'

'The Devil's Concubine'

'Speed Kills'

'Thou Shalt Rot'

'Corpse Grinder'

Century Media Records recently announced the signing of Thanatos. Thanatos is not only the Greek God of Death, but one of the oldest (if not the oldest) and longest running extreme metal bands from the Netherlands. Founded in 1984, Thanatos have released numerous highly acclaimed albums during their career. Be it the infamous debut album, Emerging From The Netherworlds, the equally great second output, Realm Of Ecstasy (both re-released on Century Media Records on CD and LP in 2012) or the band’s last studio work, Justified Genocide, Thanatos have always managed to deliver high-class death metal laced with a lethal dose of thrash.

Already being in close connection with Thanatos’ long time guitarist Paul Baayens due to his involvement in ASPHYX, Century Media got in touch with Thanatos in early 2012.

Philipp Schulte, A&R; and product manager at Century Media, comments: “I remember talking with Stephan of Thanatos about the band’s back catalogue. Back then we simply wanted to work with the band on their previous albums, not really knowing they intended to record a new studio album. When Stephan and Paul visited the CM headquarters in Dortmund in autumn last year, they told us about their plans to record a new album which they’d like to release in 2014, the year of Thanatos’ 30th anniversary. Of course we wanted them to release it on Century Media. Thanatos is without a doubt of the most legendary bands from the heydays of the death metal scene and we strongly believe their sixth studio album will bolt you down with pure withering death/thrash metal violence.”

Asked about the signing of the deal, Thanatos’ vocalist and guitarist Stephan Gebédi answers: "Even after being in ‘the business’ for so many years, we’re really excited to become part of the Century Media family, which is without any doubt one of the best and most important labels for metal today. We can’t wait to start working on new material and it’s our intention to record an absolute death/thrash metal monster to coincide with our 30th anniversary in 2014! We come from an era when there was no strict boundaries between thrash and death metal which resulted in masterpieces like DARK ANGEL’s Darkness Descends and POSSESSED’s Seven Churches and it’s our mission to transport the legacy of those albums to 2014 and beyond…”

Thanatos lineup:

Stephan Gebédi – vocals, guitars

Paul Baayens – guitars

Marco de Bruin – bass

Yuri Rinkel – drums

More on Thanatos at this location.