This month, Helsingborg, Sweden’s The Sounds return with Crossing the Rubicon, their third album of synth-accented glam-pop.
Awash in piss and vinegar, the record picks up right where 2006’s Dying To Say This To You left off, with the band plowing its way through athletic, menacing rock anthems with sweaty dexterity under the guidance of sassy siren Maja Ivarsson’s raspy yelps.
Team Last Call chatted up drummer Fredrik Nilsson about the new album and the Swedish cockiness curve.
Team Last Call: What were your goals musically with this album?
Fredrik Nilsson: We just wanted to make an album that was totally the band’s [idea] of what our music is, and not someone else’s. We did all the demos ourselves in our own studio in Sweden, and then we decided to not have any labels whatsoever involved in the process of making the album. The five members of the band, we financed everything, all the album costs. We got rid of pretty much all of our old labels in various territories. Right now we’re licensing the album here in the States to a record label, but The Sounds own the album.
TLC: Going into your third album, do you feel satisfied with where you are as a band?
FN: The only thing I really want now is for the album to be out. It’s much more fun to play the new songs when people actually know them. I’m sure by the end of the tour cycle I’ll be really sick of the songs and just want to write a new album, but that’s the way it goes.
TLC: You’ve always been plagued with comparisons to Blondie. I always thought it was unfair, until I heard “Beatbox” from the new album, which sounds exactly like “Rapture” …
FN: Blondie is a great band, but I don’t think any of us is a Blondie fan or has any Blondie records or anything like that. To me, that’s just a lazy thing that journalists do, is to compare a band to something else that already exists. I think that’s a really easy and cheap way. To me, that’s really boring. It has more to do with the look of the band than the sound of our band.
TLC: You also get grouped in with the whole ’80s revival scene.
FN: We all grew up in the ’80s, so it factors in somewhere, but we never set out to have an ’80s sound. It surprises me sometimes. As soon as there are keyboards on the tracks, they all refer to the ’80s, like that was the only decade that had keyboards.
TLC: You’ve got a reputation for being a really cocky band.
FN: I don’t think we ever considered ourselves to be a cocky band. We’re a self-confident band.
TLC: I meant cocky for Swedish people.
FN: They don’t like it in Sweden when you’re too self-confident. They have this saying – Jantelagen, it’s called in Swedish – that basically says you’re not better than anyone else. Everybody’s the same. Don’t think you’re better than anyone else, because you’re not. We don’t think we’re better than anyone else. We just think we’re really good.
TLC: People have accused you of not being Swedish enough. Is there such a thing as being too Swedish?
FN: Yeah, there is. I think you can only explain it to other Swedish people. But yeah, you can definitely be too Swedish. There’s a lot of people like that in Sweden. They’re very, I don’t want to say self-centered, but everything that happens in Sweden is really important and everything that happens outside of Sweden is not so important.
TLC: A lot of Americans know your music best from the GEICO caveman commercial. Is that good or bad?
FN: All ways of coming across our band to us is a good way. But if you see one song in a TV commercial and then you go and see the band, you might be in for a real surprise.
TLC: Maja is always making the Hottest Women in Rock lists. What’s it like for the rest of you to see stuff like that?
FN: All publicity like that is going to rub off on the band. It kind of makes me wonder where all the Hottest Drummers lists are, and why I’m not on them.
*Reprinted from Fly Magazine
Showing posts with label 80s. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 80s. Show all posts
Posted by
Jeff
on
6/01/2009 02:30:00 AM
Labels:
80s,
interview,
rock,
Sweden,
The Sounds
Posted by
Jeff
on
7/01/2002 09:42:00 PM
Labels:
80s,
poison,
quiet riot
One fine day about a year ago I was sitting at my desk, minding my own business, engrossed in a riveting game of Minesweeper, when my boss suddenly burst through the invisible walls of my office, without even bothering to pretend I had a door.
He had a sinister look on his face that said, “I’ve got something in store for you, my young minion. Plus, I just caught you playing Minesweeper.”
After letting me panic for a few moments, he pronounced my fate. “You’re going to the Poison, Warrant, and Quiet Riot concert tonight. Take your wife. Write an article.”
Oh boy, an ’80s metal concert! Great! And then we can go superglue our asses to a beehive.
I was less than thrilled. I had promised my wife a romantic evening out on the town, and my plans didn’t really involve sweaty glam rockers living out their mid-life crises in a pair of chafing leather pants. “Yeah, um, slight change of plans, honey. We kind of have to cancel our dinner reservations, and I pawned off our theater tickets. But on a positive note, C.C. DeVille might sweat on us!”
Sure, there are jobs out there with much bigger drawbacks than mine. I could be the intern in charge of changing Strom Thurmond’s diapers, for example. Or I could be the “back and ass” guy at an electrolysis shop.
Or I could be the guy who cleans out the elephant cages at the circus. Legend has it, someone actually died two years ago when a constipated elephant suddenly “let loose,” so to speak, right on top of him. After being knocked unconscious to the ground, the poor man suffocated under 200 pounds of ill-timed pachyderm poop. What are the odds?
I personally have never been blasted by a constipated elephant at work, so that’s one perk about my job. But at the time it was small consolation for being shipped down a one-way street to Metalsville. I mean, I’m proud to be the resident music junkie, but – no offense to all the ’80s warriors out there – these bands aren’t exactly the cutting edge of rock and roll anymore. Quiet Riot hasn’t hit No. 1 since 1983. I was 7.
But I have to admit, I did have kind of a morbid fascination with what the crowd would be like. I imagined an ocean of mullets, a forest of stone-washed jeans, a field of high-top sneakers. Do they still peg their pants? Do they wear Swatches instead of watches? Do the men prefer to perm their hair, or just feather it back? I had to know.
It would make for a great story to say that I was way off with my stereotype of ’80s metal fans. But no, I pretty much nailed it. There were frayed jean shorts, nipple-bearing mesh shirts, assorted leather accessories, and plenty of half-shirts that were probably more flattering 20 years ago when they weren’t hanging over a poochy gut.
What I was wrong about, however, was how much fun I would have. And not at other people’s expense, either. Poison, Warrant, and Quiet Riot all put on a genuinely good rock show. It took some time, but eventually I was able to wipe the smirk off my face and buy into the glitz and glamour of a decidedly over-the-top stage show. There were pyrotechnics, laser shows, a rockin’ sound system, Bret Michaels in a blazing white fur coat, and plenty of hit songs from all three bands that I had nearly forgotten all about: “Cum On Feel the Noize,” “Cherry Pie,” “Talk Dirty to Me,” ad infinitum.
As for the bands’ newer material, well, um (cough) it was (ahem) maybe not the most artistically credible music I’ve come across. (“Come on, everybody. Rock the house. Slam it ’til we all freak out,” implores Quiet Riot.) But for what it’s worth, all three bands are still making original, straight-forward stadium rock without selling out. After being subjected to eight straight hours of Top-40 radio at work, I found it kind of refreshing. I mean, really, someone’s got to keep rock and roll alive, and it sure as hell isn’t going to be Creed. “My sacrifice” is listening to their latest single 10 times a day.
What does the future hold for ’80s rockers? Well, I’ve been hearing a new Hall & Oates song on the radio lately, so I guess anything’s possible. And, while their approach is definitely more tongue-and-cheek, a pocket of new bands like The Strokes, The Hives, and The White Stripes have sparked a revival of the straight-forward garage rock that yielded to ’80s metal so many years ago. As Quiet Riot’s Kevin DuBrow said to me last year, “That’s just the nature of music. It goes in cycles.”
So does journalism – it’s one year later, and here’s my article, just in time for Poison’s next tour through Central Pa.
He had a sinister look on his face that said, “I’ve got something in store for you, my young minion. Plus, I just caught you playing Minesweeper.”
After letting me panic for a few moments, he pronounced my fate. “You’re going to the Poison, Warrant, and Quiet Riot concert tonight. Take your wife. Write an article.”
Oh boy, an ’80s metal concert! Great! And then we can go superglue our asses to a beehive.
I was less than thrilled. I had promised my wife a romantic evening out on the town, and my plans didn’t really involve sweaty glam rockers living out their mid-life crises in a pair of chafing leather pants. “Yeah, um, slight change of plans, honey. We kind of have to cancel our dinner reservations, and I pawned off our theater tickets. But on a positive note, C.C. DeVille might sweat on us!”
Sure, there are jobs out there with much bigger drawbacks than mine. I could be the intern in charge of changing Strom Thurmond’s diapers, for example. Or I could be the “back and ass” guy at an electrolysis shop.
Or I could be the guy who cleans out the elephant cages at the circus. Legend has it, someone actually died two years ago when a constipated elephant suddenly “let loose,” so to speak, right on top of him. After being knocked unconscious to the ground, the poor man suffocated under 200 pounds of ill-timed pachyderm poop. What are the odds?
I personally have never been blasted by a constipated elephant at work, so that’s one perk about my job. But at the time it was small consolation for being shipped down a one-way street to Metalsville. I mean, I’m proud to be the resident music junkie, but – no offense to all the ’80s warriors out there – these bands aren’t exactly the cutting edge of rock and roll anymore. Quiet Riot hasn’t hit No. 1 since 1983. I was 7.
But I have to admit, I did have kind of a morbid fascination with what the crowd would be like. I imagined an ocean of mullets, a forest of stone-washed jeans, a field of high-top sneakers. Do they still peg their pants? Do they wear Swatches instead of watches? Do the men prefer to perm their hair, or just feather it back? I had to know.
It would make for a great story to say that I was way off with my stereotype of ’80s metal fans. But no, I pretty much nailed it. There were frayed jean shorts, nipple-bearing mesh shirts, assorted leather accessories, and plenty of half-shirts that were probably more flattering 20 years ago when they weren’t hanging over a poochy gut.
What I was wrong about, however, was how much fun I would have. And not at other people’s expense, either. Poison, Warrant, and Quiet Riot all put on a genuinely good rock show. It took some time, but eventually I was able to wipe the smirk off my face and buy into the glitz and glamour of a decidedly over-the-top stage show. There were pyrotechnics, laser shows, a rockin’ sound system, Bret Michaels in a blazing white fur coat, and plenty of hit songs from all three bands that I had nearly forgotten all about: “Cum On Feel the Noize,” “Cherry Pie,” “Talk Dirty to Me,” ad infinitum.
As for the bands’ newer material, well, um (cough) it was (ahem) maybe not the most artistically credible music I’ve come across. (“Come on, everybody. Rock the house. Slam it ’til we all freak out,” implores Quiet Riot.) But for what it’s worth, all three bands are still making original, straight-forward stadium rock without selling out. After being subjected to eight straight hours of Top-40 radio at work, I found it kind of refreshing. I mean, really, someone’s got to keep rock and roll alive, and it sure as hell isn’t going to be Creed. “My sacrifice” is listening to their latest single 10 times a day.
What does the future hold for ’80s rockers? Well, I’ve been hearing a new Hall & Oates song on the radio lately, so I guess anything’s possible. And, while their approach is definitely more tongue-and-cheek, a pocket of new bands like The Strokes, The Hives, and The White Stripes have sparked a revival of the straight-forward garage rock that yielded to ’80s metal so many years ago. As Quiet Riot’s Kevin DuBrow said to me last year, “That’s just the nature of music. It goes in cycles.”
So does journalism – it’s one year later, and here’s my article, just in time for Poison’s next tour through Central Pa.
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