July 27 — Fans of U.D.O. got their latest preview of the band’s new album, Touchdown, this week.
The latest preview came Thursday in the form of the video for the album’s title track, which is also the record’s second single. The two-part video is a familiar style presentation. One half of the video features the band performing its new single on a sound stage designed to look like a stage setting for the group. The other half of the video features footage of the German football (actual football, not soccer) team, the Nuernberg Rams facing off against members of the Cologne Crocodiles and Landsberg X-Press. The band’s driving, upbeat single plays over the whole as the footage plays.
U.D.O. drummer Sven Dirkschenider (front man Udo Dirkschneider’s son) talked about the creation of the song and its video during a recent interview.
“The song but also album title began to take root when we were sitting in a sports bar in São Paulo, Brazil where a football game was shown,” Sven said. “The word that came out of the speakers the most and therefore was remembered the best afterwards was simply ‘Touchdown.’ That’s why my dad [Udo] suggested that it should become the name of our new album – and a touchdown is also what we have created musically with our new songs in my opinion.”
Sven continued, “We’re very happy with the results! The title track deals, of course, with nothing but the type of sport itself, and it also represents us as a band very well: We’re a team that enters the stage together evening after evening to win the crowd. That’s what we do; highly motivated, in a way aggressively but powerful too — qualities that can be found in football and a bridge to our music.”
U.D.O. debuted Touchdown‘s lead single, ‘Forever Free‘ and the song’s lyric video late last month. Touchdown is scheduled for release Aug. 25 through Atomic Fire Records. The record will be the band’s 18th and will come less than two years after the release of the band’s then latest album, Game Over.
In other news, U.D.O. is in the midst of a tour in support of Touchdown. The tour’s current schedule is noted below.
U.D.O. / DIRKSCHNEIDER Live:
8/12/2023 Leyendas del Rock – Villena, ES *
8/16/2023 Summer Breeze Open Air – Dinkelsbühl, DE
8/17/2023 Rock Castle Open Air – Moravský Krumlov, CZ
8/20/2023 Rock The Lakes – Vallamand (VD), CH
8/25/2023 Baltic Open Air – Haddeby, DE
9/16/2023 Beast Of Rocks @ Stadthalle – Tuttlingen, DE
10/07/2023 Keep It True Rising III @ Posthalle – Würzburg, DE *
10/22/2023 Wildstyle & Tattoo @ Tabakfabrik – Linz, AT
10/29/2023 Wildstyle & Tattoo @ Messezentrum – Salzburg, AT
5/10-11/2024 Rock in Rautheim – Braunschweig, DE
*as DIRKSCHNEIDER
More information on Touchdown and U.D.O.’s new tour dates is available along with all of U.D.O.’s latest news at:
Website: https://www.udo-online.de
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/udoonline
