It's Official: PRETTY MAIDS To Return With New Studio Album In 2027

Frontiers Music Srl has announced the return of legendary Danish hard rockers PRETTY MAIDS, who are officially working on a brand-new studio album, set for release in 2027.

The upcoming record will be the band's first new studio album since 2019's acclaimed "Undress Your Madness" and marks the beginning of an exciting new chapter in the career of one of Europe's most enduring and distinctive hard rock bands.

Built around the unmistakable creative partnership of Ronnie Atkins and Ken Hammer, PRETTY MAIDS has spent more than four decades forging a sound of its own, combining crushing guitar riffs, powerful melodies, atmospheric keyboards and huge, instantly recognizable choruses.

Across a career stretching back to the early 1980s, the Danish band has delivered a catalog that includes such landmark albums as "Future World", "Jump The Gun", "Pandemonium", "Motherland" and "Kingmaker", establishing PRETTY MAIDS as a formidable and enduring force in melodic hard rock and heavy metal.

Following a five-year hiatus, PRETTY MAIDS returned to the stage in 2024. The chemistry and energy within the band proved impossible to ignore, and what began as a return to live activity has now evolved into something fans around the world have been hoping for: brand-new PRETTY MAIDS music.

The new album will be released in 2027 via Frontiers Music Srl and will be produced by acclaimed Danish producer Jacob Hansen, whose credits include AMARANTHE, VOLBEAT, EPICA, PRIMAL FEAR and EVERGREY.

Further details about the album will be revealed in the coming months.

PRETTY MAIDS 2026 is:

Ronnie Atkins - Vocals
Ken Hammer - Lead Guitar
Rene Shades - Bass
Chris Laney - Rhythm Guitar/Keyboards
Allan Tschicaja - Drums

PRETTY MAIDS played its first concert in nearly five years on June 16, 2024 at Forbrændingen in Albertslund, Denmark. The band was billed as KINGMAKERS for the "secret" performance, which served as a warm-up gig for PRETTY MAIDS's official return to the live stage on June 20, 2024 at the Copenhell festival in Copenhagen.

In December 2023, Atkins, who is battling stage four cancer, told Jorge Botas of Portugal's Metal Global about the band's return: "Yeah, well, we were planning on a few selected PRETTY MAIDS shows. It's not gonna be a hell of a lot, I think. We're gonna do maybe five, six festivals during the summer or something."

He continued: "I know there's a lot of fans out there that wanna see the band again, at least to make some kind of closure. It all ended in a wrong way because I got sick, and while I was sick, I couldn't do shit for six months. And in that time, we released a new album. We never had the chance to tour with it. Then came the lockdown. So we just wanna go out and play a couple of shows. How much it's gonna be, I don't know. I don't know how much more we're gonna do. We might continue. I don't know. It all depends a little bit on my health as well. You know. So, now I've been releasing a lot of [solo] music for the last couple of years, and now I feel like I intend to do a lot more live shows. I really love to do that. 'Cause I like the close encounter with the fans, whether it's a big festival with 50,000 or it's 200 people in a club, I don't care. I mean, I like them both, actually. But let's see."

Formed in early 1982 by Atkins and Hammer, PRETTY MAIDS' second album, 1987's "Future World", is still today regarded as a classic.During the ensuing years, PRETTY MAIDS continued to release albums usually followed by European and Japanese tours.

PRETTY MAIDS' latest album, "Undress Your Madness", came out in November 2019 via Frontiers Music Srl.

"Future World" was released by CBS in 1987. By 1990, the album had sold 300,000 copies worldwide. The album charted at No. 165 on the Billboard 200 in the United States.

"Future World" was produced by Eddie Kramer, who was reportedly fired during the recording sessions. The band then finished the LP with engineer Chris Isca, who was credited as co-producer on the album. Mixing duties were shared between METALLICA, RAINBOW and MORBID ANGEL producer Flemming Rasmussen, and Kevin Elson, known for producing multi-platinum albums by JOURNEY, MR. BIG and EUROPE.

After being diagnosed with lung cancer in 2019, the now-61-year-old Atkins underwent at least 33 radiation and four chemotherapy treatments in the fall of that year before being declared cancer-free. In October 2020, he announced that his cancer had returned.

In a 2013 interview with Myglobalmind, Atkins joked that the secret to keeping his voice in shape was "twenty cigarettes a day and little drink now and then."

Ronnie's third solo album, "Trinity", was released in October 2023 via Frontiers Music Srl.

Photo credit: Andrew West