End of the roll? Rammstein’s new album reportedly held up by paper shortage

In recent months, it's become common for releases to get held-up by backlogs at vinyl production facilities, but the new album by German metal icons Rammstein has reportedly been delayed due to a shortage of another material... paper.

The German industrial band’s as-yet-untitled eighth album was recorded during lockdown and guitarist Richard Kruspe had previously said it would be released before their forthcoming world tour commences in May.

However, composer and Rammstein collaborator Sven Helbig has revealed that the album is currently delayed due to production issues. Asked by German news site Sächsische.de when the record will arrive he replied (as translated via fanpage RammWiki): 

“The band itself doesn't know at the moment. The trivial reason: lack of paper. They need to be able to send out a large number of CDs and records, i.e. lots of booklets and covers, worldwide at one go. And that's probably not feasible right now.”

Helbig does go onto to explain that the album is tantalizingly close and the group are, understandably, frustrated by the delay. 

“My work is finished. Two weeks ago I finally delivered,” he said. “For the band, this hang-up is annoying now. The six of them don't know when the album is coming, they don't know if the tour is going to happen this year. They want to move forward, they want to play, but instead, like almost all musicians, they're sitting there wringing their hands, waiting for decisions to finally be made.”

Perhaps Rammstein should have taken a leaf out of Jack White’s book. He’s branded his forthcoming round-the-world jaunt the Supply Chain Issues tour…