There are few groups as storied and influential to their respective genres as Swedish House Mafia, and yet, the electro dance music group has never released a full-length album in well over a decade of existence. Until now. In addition to dropping a new music video for “Redlight,” their song with Sting, SHM members Steve Angello, Sebastian Ingrosso and Axwell announced Thursday (March 3) that their debut LP Paradise Again will arrive April 15.
In a SPIN profile, SHM revealed the new record will have at least 14 songs and is aesthetically/thematically akin to Dante’s Inferno, reversed. “When you listen to this album, listen from start to finish,” Sebastian Ingrosso told the publication. “I don’t care if it has 50 streams. I don’t give a f–k. We just feel like we still have something to say, and that’s why we’re saying it.”
After setting the standards for dance music as it flourished in the 2010s and becoming the first EDM group to book top billing at Coachella, Swedish House Mafia famously split up in 2013 at the peak of their Everest-sized success. The trio first revealed details of their new album to Billboard last year, talking at length about navigating their joint return to a music scene that looks a lot different from the one they left.
“It was just like, ‘What the f–k do we do? How do we come back? Do we just give them another [version of] what we’ve done before?’ ” Ingrosso told Billboard at the time. “I was like, ‘F–k that; it’s depressing to go back. It’s disgusting to go back.’ ”
Accompanying the album announcement is an on-the-nose music video for the band’s song “Redlight,” which features Sting weaving in the most iconic lines from his band The Police‘s 1970s classic “Roxanne.” The demonic video shows what looks to be possessed and zombified partygoers dancing around as crimson lights strobe around them.
This new SHM album era kicked off with the July 2021 release of Paradise Again‘s lead single, “It Gets Better,” which preceded their collaboration with The Weeknd on “Moth to a Flame.” And in a move that feels like a full-circle moment, Swedish House Mafia will return to the desert for a spotlight performance at this year’s Coachella. From there, they’ll embark on a world tour that will mark their first proper run since before their split.
Watch Swedish House Mafia’s new “Redlight” music video featuring Sting below:
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