MICHAEL SWEET: For The Next 3 STRYPER Albums "I'm Going To Write a Song a Day, Until I've Got 33 Songs"
In an interview at the Bowl For Ronnie (Nov 12, 2026) with Neil Turbin at The Metal Voice, Stryper frontman Michael Sweet discusses the band's latest album, Throne of Thorns, their ambitious plans to record three new albums in January, his time singing with Boston and the challenges of maintaining his vocal range after decades on the road.
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When asked about Stryper's latest release and what's coming next,
"The new album is out. Throne of Thorns, number 18, and it came out in September, and we're getting ready to start on a new album. We're planning to go in and do three albums. And we're going to try to get to 21 albums. So, we want to get the three albums recorded while we can still do what we do now."
When asked whether the three records would form a connected trilogy
"They will be connected in the sense that they'll be recorded at the same time. But it's not like a trilogy. There's no concept to each album. It's just we're going to go do what we do. We're going to try to make each album very different. See how that goes."
When asked how he intends to approach writing three albums simultaneously
"I'm just going to go home and start writing after this. So, on Monday, I'll start writing and I'll write a song a day until I've got 33 songs and then we go in and record January, the first week of January. "I never give it much thought. I don't sit down and try to break it down into this album needs to sound like that and this album needs to sound like that. I just, if I'm feeling the song, I run with that."
When asked about the challenges of maintaining his voice after decades of performing
"The voice changes as we age and there's not a lot you can do about that. You can take care of it, eat right, sleep right, take care of yourself, but it's a muscle, and it's going to change as you age, especially on the road. My voice has changed a lot. But I've been able to kind of figure out a way around it and choose my battles. Somehow, over the last few years, I've gained back a lot of my high range, my high notes. And so I'm doing that a lot more often. There was a time when I couldn't, you know, five years ago, six years ago, I couldn't hit any high notes."
When asked whether he would continue performing if he reached a point where he could no longer deliver the vocals he expects of himself
"Now, if that day comes when I can't, I'm getting out. I'm not going to end on a low note. I'm going to end on a high note. I get why they (Bands, artists) don't because this is what they do. It's all they know, and it's their livelihood. So I get that. But man, I don't want to be that guy."
When asked about the difficulty of performing Stryper's extensive catalogue night after night,
"The thing about the Stryper catalog is it's not easy to pull off. The only way I could explain that is for someone to come up and try it, you know, come sing it. It's not an easy catalog to do. There's a lot of really high notes and, you know, from here to here, and just all kinds of styles, ballads, metal, mid-tempo. It's just all of the above."
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