See Avenged Sevenfold's Cirque du Soleil production come to life for first time at show

January 9, 2017

[Photo via Twitter.]

In December of last year, frontman M. Shadows revealed that Avenged Sevenfold would be taking the name of their new album, The Stage, to the next level at upcoming shows—partnering with theatrics giant Cirque du Soleil for the production.

Avenged Sevenfold unveiled that production for the first time this weekend at their Jan. 7 show in Dublin.

“A lot of bands live, breathe and die the 2016 metal scene, but we just live in our own world and try to do things different than everyone else,” Shadows says to Metal Hammer.

He continues, “The production that's being built is different for us, different for anyone I've ever seen, the people we've hired don't do tours, they do Cirque du Soleil.

“This is gonna be drawn out into different types of touring, we're not going on tour for six months, it'll be two weeks on, two weeks off. It'll be a longer cycle but we're gonna roll with the punches.”

Thank you Dublin! It was an honor to have the opportunity to debut our new production for #thestageworldtour for all our fans in Ireland! �� pic.twitter.com/juWErpVR6C

— Avenged Sevenfold (@TheOfficialA7X) January 8, 2017

According to The PRP, Avenged Sevenfold also debuted new songs from The Stage at their Dublin show, including “Paradigm,” “Angels,” “God Damn” and “Sunny Disposition.” Check out footage below.

“Paradigm”

“Angels”

“God Damn”

“Sunny Disposition”

Avenged Sevenfold are touring with Disturbed and In Flames in Europe and the UK.

The Stage was surprise released on Oct. 28. On why they surprise-dropped the album, Shadows says to Rolling Stone, “Everyone else is dropping the breadcrumbs, having four or five singles before their record comes out. It completely takes away the mystique of the record; by the time it actually comes out, you've already done 50 interviews about what the record's about and is going to sound like. It's 2016; people's attention spans are so short at this point, who has time for three months of lead-up?”

The Stage—an AI-themed record—would go on to chart at No. 4.

“We wanted to write about artificial intelligence, not really in a sci-fi way, not in a Terminator sort of way, but in more in, like, a scientific way. The album is talking about things that are right around the corner that could potentially be changing the world,” Shadows continues to Rolling Stone. “We have this yearning to know the answers to the big questions about space and why we're here; we can't evolve fast enough to figure these answers out on our own, but we can do it through artificial intelligence. But there's also some very scary downsides that could come if we don't put the right safety precautions in there.”

Upcoming Avenged Sevenfold UK/European tour dates:

Jan 10: Glasgow SSE Hydro, UK
Jan 12: Newcastle Metro Radio Arena, UK
Jan 13: Birmingham Genting Arena, UK
Jan 15: Sheffield Arena, UK
Jan 16: Manchester Arena, UK
Jan 18: Nottingham Motorpoint Arena, UK
Jan 19: Cardiff Motorpoint Arena, UK
Jan 21: London O2 Arena, UK
Jan 22: London O2 Arena, UK
Feb 12: Frankfurt Festhalle, Germany
Feb 13: Hamburg Sporthalle, Germany
Feb 15: Berlin Arena, Germany
Feb 16: Dusseldorf Mitsubishi Electric Halle, Germany
Feb 18: Amsterdam Ziggo Dome, Netherlands
Feb 20: Stuttgart Schleyerhalle, Germany
Feb 21: Milan Forum, Italy
Feb 23: Vienna Wiener Stadthalle, Austria
Feb 25: Munich Zenith, Germany
Feb 26: Zurich Halle 622, Austria
Feb 28: Lille Zenith Arena, France
Mar 01: Luxembourg Rockhal, Luxembourg
Mar 02: Paris AccorHotels Arena, France
Mar 04: Copenhagen Valby Hallen, Denmark
Mar 07: Helsinki Hartwall Arena, Finland
Mar 09: Stockholm Ericsson Globe, Sweden
Mar 10: Oslo Telenor, Norway