NEW YORK:
After more than four decades of breaking boundaries, Madonna is returning to where it all began.
The best-selling female artist of all time announced on Thursday that she will release a new dance album next year under Warner Records, the label behind her earliest hits such as Holiday and Like a Virgin.
The 67-year-old pop icon described the reunion as a homecoming of sorts. “I am happy to be reunited and look forward to the future, making music, doing the unexpected while perhaps provoking a few needed conversations,” Madonna said in a statement.
The record will mark her first studio album in seven years, following 2019’s Madame X. It will also reunite her with DJ and producer Stuart Price, who crafted her 2005 fan-favourite Confessions on a Dance Floor, a record often hailed as one of her finest.
The announcement instantly set fan forums and social media ablaze with anticipation, many hailing the collaboration as a long-awaited sequel to her peak dance-floor dominance. Warner Records executives Tom Corson and Aaron Bay-Schuck welcomed Madonna back.
They called her “the blueprint, the rule-breaker, the ultimate cultural juggernaut.” They described her signing as “a historic, full-circle moment” for an artist who has sold more than 400 million records worldwide and reshaped the sound and style of global pop.
The deal also closes the loop on Madonna’s long journey through the music industry. She released her self-titled debut in 1982 on Sire Records, a Warner subsidiary, and stayed with the company until 2008’s Hard Candy.
She then moved to Live Nation and Interscope in a three-album arrangement that ended in 2020. The return to Warner signals both nostalgia and reinvention — two qualities Madonna has long balanced with trademark defiance.
Hints of the new project surfaced last year when she shared Instagram clips from the studio, showing her writing, dancing, and recording vocals with Price at her side. Her boyfriend Akeem Morris, twin daughters Estere and Stella, and longtime manager Guy Oseary also appeared in the footage.
The posts were flooded with excited fan comments: “This is FANTASTIC NEWS!!! Craving for new music from you like crazy!!” wrote one. Another added, “Yeaass mama. Can’t wait. This will be epic I’m sure.”
Madonna herself teased that the upcoming album would embrace her instinct for reinvention. The project has no confirmed release date, but industry watchers expect it to land in 2026. For Madonna, returning to Warner isn’t just about revisiting her past — it’s about once again bending the future of pop to her will.
