The 2008 Hole In The Sky festival is scheduled for August 27th - 30th in Bergen, Norway. Organizers have issued the following update:

"Greetings everyone. Over the years it seems that time is flying by at an increasing pace. It’s only been an odd six months since we closed the doors of the last festival and here we are again, ready for yet another adventurous dive into the world of metal.

At the time of going to press, nearly half the tickets for the Garage club shows are gone, and that without announcing more than a few of names. I guess that proves that we are in an extremely fortunate position where our audience has granted us with a generous portion of trust. Thank you all very much, we really appreciate it!

If you take a quick glance at the program for 2008, you will see that we’ve headed for slightly different approach this time around. Hole In The Sky has always had strong focus on extreme metal, and being a Norwegian festival, black metal has always been a cornerstone of our legacy. In order to keep things fresh you have to opt for alternatives. We still cherish the spirit and cultural movement that the genre represents, but we’ve also tried to dig a little deeper. The ninth edition of Hole in the Sky showcase a lot of younger and up & coming acts such as INQUISITION, LOBOTOMIZED, OLD, TYRANT, URGEHAL, DEAD TO THIS WORLD along with established and highly prominent favourites as BEHEMOTH, DISMEMBER, PRIMORDIAL and KEEP OF KALESSIN.

With the current revival of classic American thrash metal we felt time was right to do a massive dig into that eventful chapter of metal history, something that has brought us to a great selection of new and old favourites. MUNICIPAL WASTE, TOXIC HOLOCAUST and 3 INCHES OF BLOOD has made a huge impact on the scene over the last few years and it is with great pleasure we present these fine bands alongside legends as EXODUS, NUCLEAR ASSAULT and POSSESSED. And to top it of you have exclusive one-offs from the groundbreaking and recently reunited pioneers AT THE GATES and CARCASS. Hole In The Sky also presents a string of rare live performances from acts such as GEHENNA, MESHUGGAH, BRUTAL TRUTH, ELECTRIC WIZARD, SADISTIC INTENT and ASPHYX.

It is by far the most exotic line-up we have presented to date and following the string of previous «bloody» monikers; Blood And Thunder (05), Blood Fire Death (07), what is more fitting parole than Bonded By Blood? It kind of puts us where we want to be. No explanation needed. We hope you will enjoy the festival just as much as we’ve enjoyed putting it together. See you in August."

Hole In The Sky 2008 running order:

Wednesday, August 27th:

DISMEMBER

TOXIC HOLOCAUST

URGEHAL

OLD

INQUISITION

Thursday, August 28th:

EXODUS

3 INCHES OF BLOOD

DEAD TO THIS WORLD

TYRANT

LOBOTOMIZED

Friday, August 29th:

AT THE GATES

MESHUGGAH

BEHEMOTH

NUCLEAR ASSAULT

MUNICIPAL WASTE

ASPHYX

BRUTAL TRUTH

Saturday, August 30th:

CARCASS

POSSESSED

KEEP OF KALESSIN

PRIMORDIAL

ELECTRIC WIZARD

GEHENNA

SADISTIC INTENT