Svalbard find new home for their third album following Holy Roar exit

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Svalbard’s new album When I Die, Will I Get Better? will be released on new record label founded by Employed To Serve’s Justine Jones

Svalbard standing on a bridge
(Image credit: Holy Roar)

Following their departure from Holy Roar in the wake of the sexual assault allegations made against label owner Alex Fitzpatrick, Svalbard have revealed that they will release their third full-length album When I Die, Will I Get Better? on Church Road Records.

The newly-formed independent label is run by Employed To Serve’s Justine Jones who resigned as label manager of Holy Roar upon learning of the allegations made against Fitzpatrick.

“We are fortunate to have worked with Justine for many years, her passion, dedication and label knowledge has been instrumental in our growth as a band. She’s a person in the music industry who genuinely cares,” say Svalbard in a statement.

“Justine is doing everything she can to keep the release on track, however please be patient if minor delays occur along the way or if things continue to appear online under the Holy Roar label during the transition period – we will keep everyone informed via our socials of all developments.”

“We would like to say a huge thank you to our fans for being understanding, supportive and patient – and to Justine and Sammy at Church Road Records for all their hard work ensuring our album still gets released.”

Svalbard will donate a portion of each sale of When I Die, Will I Get Better? to Rape Crisis. The album will be released on Church Road Records on September 25.

We are very happy to announce that we will now release “When I Die, Will I Get Better?” via Church Road Records - the new venture of former Holy Roar label manager, Justine Jones. The release date remains 25th September and pre-orders are now available from svalbard.bandcamp.com and the link in our bio Translation Loss will release the album in North America and Tokyo Jupiter will release the album in Japan, neither label having any affiliation to Holy Roar so all aspects of their release remain unchanged. We are fortunate to have worked with Justine for many years, her passion, dedication and label knowledge has been instrumental in our growth as a band. She's a person in the music industry who genuinely cares. We are proud to be releasing this record on Church Road Records. Justine is doing everything she can to keep the release on track, however please be patient if minor delays occur along the way or if things continue to appear online under the Holy Roar label during the transition period - we will keep everyone informed via our socials of all developments. We will be donating a portion of each record sale through Church Road to Rape Crisis. We have chosen to support this charity as their centres, helplines and campaign for change against sexual assault are so desperately needed. Thank you for being understanding, supportive and patient - and to Justine and Sammy at Church Road Records for all their hard work ensuring our album still gets released. (In the interest of complete transparency, the stock that Through Love, Evil Greed and ourselves are selling was manufactured by Holy Roar and purchased from the label at cost price but will have the logo stickered over. If we did not use this stock we would have to delay the album until next year, the already pressed CDs and LPs would have to be destroyed which would be terrible for the environment and could have ended up costing us thousands of pounds. We hope you agree that this is the best course of action to help us move forward without hindrance.) SVALBARD

A photo posted by @svalbard on Sep 18, 2020 at 2:10am PDT

Svalbard third album

(Image credit: Church Road Records)

Read a full interview with Svalbard’s Serena Cherry in the new issue of Metal Hammer, on sale now. 

(Image credit: Future)
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