Guitarist Hank Shermann of influential Danish Metallers MERCYFUL FATE has confirmed that he is working on the first new music from the band in more than two decades. Speaking about how the coronavirus crisis has affected MERCYFUL FATE’s touring plans, Shermann told Australia’s Heavy Μagazine: “This totally knocked out all shows for 2020, I predict, and as it looks now, all MERCYFUL FATE shows look to be canceled. We might have an option in November to do something, maybe, but who knows how it looks at that time?”

Asked if he is using the coronavirus downtime to work on new music, Shermann said: “First of all, King(Diamond, vocals) is living in Texas, in the States. I’m living here north of Copenhagen, in Denmark. The drummer (Bjarne T. Holm) is also here, so I work with him in the rehearsal room shaping the new songs. The other guitar player (Mike Wead) is in Stockholm, Sweden, and our new bass player (Joey Vera) is in Los Angeles. So everything is being done via Dropbox or e-mails.”

He continued: “I have been working at least the last one and a half years on new MERCYFUL FATE songs, and I think there’s about six or seven tracks that are about to be ready. The first song has been sent to King after it’s been mixed and all the guys played on the song. So I sent the files to Joey in Los Angeles; he did the bass. And then I sent the same files to Mike in Stockholm; he did his solos. And now King has the first song, evaluating for the vocals to be added. And then we will rearrange certain parts to be twice as long and stuff like that.”