Nelson heavy metal fans are in for an early Christmas present from Savage Blade.
The local quintet — formed by Eric Hoodicoff, Chris Rand, Chris Killeen, Marc Hamelin and ex-Mormon wildchild vocalist Nikko Forsberg — have just finished recording their sophomore album, Angel Museum, and will give their friends at home the first chance to hear it front to back at a listening party at The Royal tomorrow night.
Savage Blade bassist Chris Rand said the new album will bring more of the classic heavy metal sound the band is known for.
"It's very similar in terms of tone and style to the debut record," Rand says. "If anything's different, the production is much bigger and stronger than our first release."
As well, on first album just a few members of the band wrote the songs, while this time around Rand says it was more of a collaborative effort.
"Having more ideas to draw from, it helped us come up with more complex and interesting arrangements than maybe we've done in the past."
Angel Museum won't be officially released until late-January or February, but everyone who comes to the listening party will be given a promotional code to download it free. 
Rand says the band is still trying to decide what record label to put the album out on. They're in the fortunate position of having multiple offers.
In the New Year, Savage Blade plans to hit the road to promote their new offering and have a big European tour in the works. Besides a strong continent of local supporters, the bulk of their fans are overseas.
"Germany is ground zero for us. They're big, big supporters of traditional heavy metal — which is what we are," Rand says. "Fans have written to tell us about our album being played between acts at some of the larger festivals there and people singing along and things like that."
The band has been featured in numerous international magazines including Britain's Classic Rock Magazine (circulation 300,000) and Heavy Magazine, both of which have hailed Savage Blade as leaders of the new wave of traditional heavy metal.
The listening party at The Royal goes Saturday, December 22 at 9:30 p.m. sharp. After they'd played the album, local punk rock band Drunk Uncle will take the stage, then Savage Blade will play a set that mixes some of their new songs (played live for the first time) with old favourites.
Tickets are $15, available at available at the Royal, Urban Legends, The Music Store and liveattheroyal.com Doors open 8pm.