BIOGRAPHY

Maldito’s story is one of four musicians from Trøndelag who went to Liverpool, built a band on the road, accidentally found themselves in the blues world, turned down Paul McCartney for a German tour and eventually found their own version of rock music.

Maldito was formed in Liverpool in 2015 while Vegard Ring, Bendik Brevik, Gard Rognskog and Jon Olav Alstad were studying at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA). What started with a shared love of blues and guitar-driven rock quickly developed into something broader. The band began playing clubs around Liverpool and Manchester before taking the music onto the road in Norway and Germany. Those early years established something that would remain at the centre of Maldito: four musicians developing songs by playing together, on stage and in the rehearsal room. Then came a decision that has followed the band ever since.


Paul McCartney or the road? In 2017, while studying at LIPA, Maldito were offered the opportunity to write songs with Paul McCartney. There was just one problem. The band already had a German tour booked. Maldito chose the tour. In hindsight, the decision says quite a lot about the band. Maldito has always been built around playing together, developing on the road and following the music wherever it leads.

“Maldito is the band that turned down an opportunity to write songs with Paul McCartney because they thought it was more important to continue their tour in Germany instead of cancelling. That deserves respect.” Øyvind Rønning, Dagbladet, 2024

Into the blues

2017 – 2019

That road unexpectedly took Maldito deep into the Norwegian blues scene. After winning the Union Blues Cup, the band became Norway's Union Blues Band and played around 50 concerts during their year as ambassadors for Norsk Bluesunion. The period eventually took them all the way to Memphis, where Maldito represented Norway at the International Blues Challenge in 2020, competing against more than 250 acts from around the world. They didn't advance from the preliminary rounds, but by then the blues circuit had given Maldito something far more important: hundreds of hours together on stages, in vans and rehearsal rooms. They played for thousands at Notodden Blues Festival and appeared at festivals including Øyafestivalen and Eutin Bluesfest, as well as Norwegian Blues Adventure in London. But there was always a slight contradiction.

DEBUT ALBUM - Heartlands
2020 – 2022

In 2020, Maldito entered Brygga Studio in Trondheim with producer Pål Brekkås to record what would become their debut album, Heartlands, released in 2021.

The record brought together different parts of the band's story. Walk Away and Story the first song Maldito ever wrote dated all the way back to their Liverpool days, while much of the remaining material had been written collectively during the years spent touring Norway, Germany and beyond.

Heartlands still carried much of the blues-rock DNA of Maldito's early years, but there were already signs of a band searching for something beyond it. Songs such as River Blue, Dig the Rhythm of Your Heartbeat, Clocktower and Heartlands saw the band experimenting with a broader sound without abandoning the energy and interplay that had defined them on stage.

Frontline and Clocktower also found their way onto German radio through Deutschlandfunk, becoming some of the band's most played and streamed songs in Germany.

“This album, Maldito's debut, is never boring. It pins you to the wall with a nerve and a quest for something unique and ‘new’ that is admirable.” Johnny Andreassen, Blues News, 2021

But Heartlands arrived at a strange time. With the pandemic putting touring on hold, Maldito like so many bands temporarily traded stages for streamed concerts. When restrictions finally lifted in 2022, they returned to the road. And when they did, something had already begun to shift. Maldito was changing.

Finding their own sound
2023 - Now

Rather than making Heartlands II, the band increasingly leaned into the music they actually listened to. 70s rock. Progressive music. Pop. Psychedelia. Harmony-heavy songwriting. Longer arrangements. Twin guitars. Songs that didn't necessarily need to fit neatly into one genre. The change started becoming apparent even before the next album arrived.

“Miracles – The best song of the bunch. The debut album Heartlands was well received, but this was much better.” Ole Jacob Hoel, Adresseavisen, 2023.

That evolution became Contact Light, released in May 2024. The blues hadn't disappeared. It had simply become part of a much larger musical vocabulary. Songs such as Moon and the Stars, Miracles, The Clown, Voices, Balloon and the album's sprawling finale Nothing revealed a band becoming increasingly comfortable with following a song wherever it wanted to go.

“Contact Light is timeless, un-Norwegian, energetic, pulsating, red-hot rock'n'roll.” Øyvind Rønning, Dagbladet, 2024.

Musikknyheter gave the album 8/10: “The first half of the album, with tracks like ‘Miracles’, ‘The Clown’ and the single ‘Voices’, is pure joy to listen to.” Torger Havåg, Musikknyheter, 2024.

By this point, defining exactly what kind of band Maldito was becoming increasingly difficult. That was probably a good sign.

Whatever direction the records have taken, the constant throughout Maldito's history has been the live band. Since 2015, Maldito have played more than 160 concerts across Norway, Germany, the UK and the US. They have played festivals including Notodden Blues Festival, Øyafestivalen and Eutin Bluesfest, represented Norway in Memphis and supported Grammy-winning duo Larkin Poe. And one country in particular kept calling them back.

Germany has been part of Maldito's story almost from the beginning. What started with those early tours gradually developed into a relationship with German clubs, festivals, audiences and national radio. Maldito have repeatedly been invited to Deutschlandfunk, including two full performances in the Deutschlandfunk Kammermusiksaal in Cologne. When the second session was broadcast in May 2025, presenter Tim Schauen described Contact Light as more complex, more progressive and further removed from the mainstream than its predecessor – while retaining the pop melodies that characterise Maldito's sound. Then came a line that perhaps summed up where the band found themselves after ten years together: “Once again, it became clear that the four Norwegians are far too good to still be this unknown.” Tim Schauen, Deutschlandfunk

In the summer of 2025, Maldito returned to Germany to play Kultursommer on Schlossplatz in Oldenburg in front of around 3,000 people. The concert was recorded by Radio Bremen and later broadcast on Bremen Zwei as part of Sounds in Concert. Bremen Zwei described the performance as a “captivating guitar spectacle”, noting how overwhelmed the band themselves appeared by the reception from the Oldenburg audience. A few months later, when the station looked back at its live highlights, Maldito appeared again. “The rock band from Trondheim made Schlossplatz shake.” Bremen Zwei / Radio Bremen After the concert, every CD and vinyl record the band had brought with them was sold. The following winter, Maldito returned to Germany for six concerts in six days. The road they had chosen over Paul McCartney almost a decade earlier was still very much alive.

After years of touring abroad, Maldito returned home to Trondheim and closed the latest live chapter with a sold-out show at Moskus in April 2026. After a decade shaped by life on the road, the band turned inward again – to the rehearsal room, the studio and album number three.