APOCALYPTICA has completed work on the long-awaited follow-up to its 2015 album, "Shadowmaker".

The Finnish cello rockers recorded the new all-instrumental disc over a three-month period at Sonic Pump studios in Helsinki.

In a brand new interview with Ghost Cult, APOCALYPTICA drummer Mikko Sirén said that "it's been really fun to go back" to the band's roots with the new LP, explaining that APOCALYPTICA's musical direction has been influenced by the ongoing tour behind the re-release of its epic debut, "Plays Metallica By Four Cellos".

According to Sirén, APOCALYPTICA's last three studio albums — "Worlds Collide" (2007), "7th Symphony" (2010) and the aforementioned "Shadowmaker" — "are siblings to each other" in the sense that "they follow each other the same kind of a way," with the band releasing "a lot of singles, doing radio stuff, playing radio festivals, then after a tour, going back to the studio, writing music again. And it was fantastic, and we really think they are great albums, but then, all of a sudden, to have a break from all that — it was a four-year gap between the latest studio [album] until now — it's kind of like a breath of fresh air and it really impacted a lot to the way we wanted to compose the new album," he explained.

"Shadowmaker" was APOCALYPTICA's first album to feature just one singer — former SCARS ON BROADWAY guitarist Franky Perez — instead of guest collaborators. The disc was recorded with Grammy Award-winning producer Nick Raskulinecz (FOO FIGHTERS, DEFTONES, MASTODON).

Prior to enlisting Perez, APOCALYPTICA released eight albums that melded the classically trained cello mastery of the three core bandmembers with the harder elements of the rock world, including drums and guest vocalists, such as Gavin Rossdale from BUSH and Corey Taylor of SLIPKNOT and STONE SOUR fame.

Last July, APOCALYPTICA's Eicca Toppinen stated about the band's decision to make an all-instrumental album at this point in the group's career: "On the previous ones, we always combined the instrumental songs with the vocal songs, and it was great to have the featuring artists, it was great to work with Frank Perez for the 'Shadowmaker' album. But then, on the other hand, it became a bigger interest for us, like, okay, it would be interesting to make a full instrumental album, so there's no compromise with anything. So maybe it's gonna be something really, really crazy… that nobody did before."