Frontiers Records will release the fifth album from Swedish hard rockers The Poodles, "Tour De Force", on May 17 in Europe and May 22 in North America.

"Tour De Force" is the eagerly awaited follow-up to The Poodles' Swedish No. 1 album from 2011, "Performocracy". Behind the wheel, taking on the duties of producer for a fourth time, was Mats Valentin and once again, the band wishes to underline with the album title their superb entertaining abilities both as a hard-rocking studio unit and as live act.

"When writing and creating music, we try to do something that we would love to listen to ourselves. It's always been important for us to do music close to our hearts," says bass player Pontus Egberg. "I do feel, however, that there's a newly found playfulness about a lot of the tracks. I'm not quite sure what it is myself, but it's great!"

With songs like "Shut Up", "Happily Ever After", "Kings And Fools" and "Going Down", The Poodles stay true to their legacy of powerful, melodic metal while at the same time stretching into a new, more playful arena, flirting with influences from the past but always with a watchful eye on the present and in to the future.

In May 2013m the World Championships of Ice Hockey will be held in Stockholm, Sweden and the official theme song for the Swedish team will be performed by The Poodles!

"The Swedish team wanted a great song to help cheer the team and the fans on during the games," says Pontus. "Apart from a great song, they also needed an artist/band to perform the song that could put some fire in to it." A fruitful collaboration between songwriters Anders Wikström (Treat) and Fredrik Thomander (Scorpions, Treat, Gotthard) and The Poodles came about and it resulted in the powerful sing-along, raise-your-fist-in-the-air rocker "En För Alla För En", which will be impacting at Swedish radio and Tv on March 27 and is an exclusive bonus track for the physical edition of the album. Another single from "Tour de Force" — "40 Days And 40 Nights" — a song which promises to entice both The Poodles fans and anyone with a passion for rock 'n' roll will impact at radio and available for digital sales on April 26.

"Tour De Force" track listing:

01. Misery Loves Company
02. Shut Up!
03. Happily Ever After
04. Viva Democracy
05. Going Down
06. Leaving The Past To Pass
07. 40 Days And 40 Nights
08. Kings & Fools
09. Miracle
10. Godspeed
11. Now Is The Time
12. Only Just Begun
13. En För Alla För En (bonus track – physical edition only)

The Poodles will be on the road to promote the new album. "We are kicking off the tour by doing three dates in Spain April 25-27," says Pontus. "Then we are going to start touring mainly in Sweden in May and all through the summer. We are playing the H*E*A*T festival in Germany in November and we are working on more European dates during the fall."

Pontus is looking forward to rocking The Poodles fans all over the world.

"We love you, missed you, it's been far too long, we hope you'll love the new album as much as we do and we are looking forward to seeing you all soon on tour!" he says.

The Poodles is:

Jakob Samuel - Vocals
Pontus Egberg - Bass
Christian Lundqvist - Drums
Henrik Bergqvist - Guitar