Heart Healer - The Metal Opera by Magnus Karlsson - CD

Frontiers Music Srl is pleased to announce the signing of Danish vocalist Ronnie Atkins to a solo deal. The acclaimed Pretty Maids and Nordic Union vocalist will release his new solo album, "One Shot," on March 12, 2021.

"To be honest, I initially had no intention to do a solo album to begin with, but for various reasons and in particularly my own personal health situation I finally decided to have a crack at it," says Atkins.

"Around Easter 2020 and only some six weeks after I was told that everything seemingly looked very positive for my health, I was unfortunately diagnosed with stage 4 cancer and told it was incurable, which was devastating news for me. Needless to say, that was a total game changer and I went into kind of a panic situation for a while! But when the dust had settled. I realised there were two ways to approach the situation. I could sit down, accept the facts, and feel pity for myself or I could pull myself up, set some goals, pursue my dreams, and carry on living! And with fantastic back up from my family and true friends, I went for the latter!" continues Atkins.

With the global pandemic shutting down touring for the foreseeable future, Atkins knew a tour promoting the latest Pretty Maids album, "Undress Your Madness" (2019) was not going to be in the cars anytime soon. Suddenly, the timing for working on a new solo album seemed to have presented itself.

"Well, I couldn’t change the facts by any means. The whole world was on a lockdown and the future prospects of concerts were very uncertain and still is to this day! Basically, that meant that if I was gonna carry out the idea of a solo album, it had to be now since I don't necessarily have all the time in the world. I had all these ideas recorded on my iPhone that I felt were too good to never see the light of day and I was writing a lot at the time to help ease my frustrations," tells Atkins.

Ronnie's next step was to connect with producer (and Pretty Maids bandmate) Chris Laney to begin the work of putting these ideas together into songs. Chris is overseeing production, Jacob Hansen will mix, and musicians appearing on the album include, in addition to Laney, Allan Sørensen, Morten Sandager, Pontus Egberg, Anders Ringman, Pontus Norgren, Kee Marcello, Olliver Hartmann, John Berg, Linnea Vikström Egg, and Björn Strid.

"Not being able to handle the recordings myself since I’m old school and a complete idiot when it comes to IT, Pro Tools, etc. I hooked up with my PM friend and firesoul Chris Laney, who literally cheered me up and convinced me to go ahead with it. So, I decided to get moving and literally recorded my ideas on either piano or guitar and with a mellotron click to keep the beat and the accompanying vocal. Then I would send these along to Chris, who did the instrumentation in Stockholm and would then send back demos to me. Then, I recorded the vocals first, which is totally the opposite of what you’d normally do, but based on the uncertainty of my health situation, I wanted to get them down. After that we did the basic tracks, drums, guitars, keys, backing vocals, etc. Odd way of doing it, for me at least, but it worked. And so, this procedure slowly moved on during the summer and finally turned into an album of 12 new songs," explains Atkins.

"I wouldn’t have been able to carry out this project without the enthusiasm of Chris, who has been my constant partner in this project from day one. On top of that, I had the pleasure of working with a variety of great musicians/singers such as Pontus Norgren, Kee Marcello, Olliver Hartmann, Pontus Egberg, Linnea Vickström Egg, Björn Strid, and at last, but not at least, my PM relatives Allan Sørensen and Morten Sandager," continues Atkins.

"Musically and lyrically this album has been a different process for me, considering everything going on. Musically, it could have gone in various directions. It’s always a question of what you want it to be. A good song is a good song, so it’s really a matter of how it is packaged. But I decided to make it appeal to the fans, the supporters who’ve been following me for almost 40 years, so this is basically a melodic rock album with a heavy twist. Lyrically, it also has a different approach. I found it hard to write about sex, drugs, and rock’n’roll, etc. due to the situation I’m wrapped up in, so I guess it turned out a bit more personal and maybe melancholic at times. But it reflects my thoughts at the given time these lyrics were written," concludes Atkins.

While the creation of "One Shot" is bittersweet for a variety of reasons, it's nonetheless another thoroughly wonderful melodic hard rock offering from one of the masters of the genre. Look for it in March 2021!