WELSH heavy metal warriors Bullet For My Valentine follow up the August release of their fifth studio album, Venom, with an autumn tour.

The Bridgend band took to the road on September 28 with new bass player Jamie Mathias, setting their satnav for York Barbican on Friday night.

Produced by Carl Bown and Colin Richardson at Metropolis Studio in London, Venom is Bullet For My Valentine's most unrelenting, fierce and heavy record to date, with a typically powerful delivery by singer and guitarist Matt Tuck, ferocious riffs by guitarist Michael “Padge” Paget and rapid-fire rhythms courtesy of drummer Michael “Moose” Thomas.

“It's pretty hard to sum up an entire record after spending so much time writing and recording it and all the blood, sweat and tears that have come with this one especially,” says Tuck. "It wasn't easy revisiting some very dark places to come up with lyrical content for this one, but once I knew where it was heading and I was comfortable with letting certain things out, all hell broke loose.

"It's easily the most aggressive record we've ever done and lyrically it will no doubt touch a nerve with a lot of people that listen to it. I cannot express enough how proud I am of it. We've reinvented who we are and are ready to take on the world once more.”

Bullet For My Valentine’s progression to a harder delivery and more complex song structures is typified by No Way Out. "To write this track, I had to put myself into a very dark place, a place I hadn't been to for a while mentally because of how my life is now, compared to what it was before the band exploded,” Tuck says.

“It's one of, if not the heaviest tracks we've ever recorded musically and lyrically. I've lived with it for a while now but still every time I hear it, it gives me chills. Hold on tight, it's a hell of a ride.”

Song titles such as Army Of Noise, You Want A Battle? (Here's A War), Harder The Heart and Hell Or High Water are further testimony to how wild that ride will be on Friday night.

After selling ten million albums and touring the globe countless times, the band spent this summer on a headline tour of South America. Now Bullet For My Valentine are spreading their Venom around Britain until October 22, with York as their only Yorkshire destination.

Doors open at 7pm and support spots go to While She Sleeps and Coldrain. Tickets remain on sale at yorkbarbican.co.uk and on 0844 854 2757.