Waaaaaassuuuuuup?

Man, the calendar is really filling up! Cool, I love to keep busy!

Overdrive: After a minor chrisis the band is back on track! We split, reformed without the old bass player, found a new bass player, and are now back on track. Gigs booked, new photos taken and rehearsal planned!

Grand Design: Was asked to join about a month ago, when the old guitarist quit. Since I actually came up with the band name, made the logo, named the first album and have laid down guest solos for three songs, it felt quite natural to accept the invitation. Great, but quite "interesting" first rehearsal due to a bad burger. Lots of gigs booken i Spain, Switzerland and Sweden. More to come!

Zoom Club: We've also managed to squeeze in a rehearsal/recording! We have a show booked in august and we need to get this vehicle moving, too!

Constancia: Finally have evenrything I need to really get down to recording guitars for the new album... except the time, due to the above. Well, if it's taken this long I guess it's better it's good and solid, than quick and dirty! It'll come together.

Locomotive Breath: Still talking about making a new album. I have thrown some song ideas at Mattias, so we'll see what happens there, too. Time (the thing I don't have) will tell!

The Encyclopedia of Swedish Hard Rock And Heavy Metal Vol 3: Now here's a beast that is really moving these days! I HAVE to get this massive monster of a book ready before summer! I'm putting a LOT of time and effort into finishing up all loose ends and leads. I just wish bands and labels would see the benefit of being and the book and understanding I have a deadline. There's a lot of stuff out there I'm missing, and if I was to buy all these records just to be able to feature the cover and write about the recording, I'd be broke long before the book release. Bands/labels: shape up and ship out! Please!!

FUZZ magazine: Yes, still constantly writing. Have several interviews that need to be written and reshaped into fine and interesting articles. There's that issue with time again...

Love: Yes, love is there, or else all of the above would be down the drain. Thanks luv :-)

Business as usual? Well, business anyway :-)

Most of my "blogging" time is devoted to my reviews blog, why I'm not that frequent here (check out: http://starkmusicreviews.blogspot.com/).
Anyway, so what's up? Well, about a month ago I was in Japan, doing some promotion for the Japanes release of Overdrive's "Angelmaker", had a great vacation, met a lot of great people, saw a lot of great things and oh yeah, me and Ozzie got married :-). It was a new experience getting married at the Swedish embassy in Tokyo. Went great!

So, what's up?
ZOOM CLUB: Recently completed the trio with and outstanding bass player/singer - Micke Hujanen! We have a shitload of songs and in great need of getting all the stuff down on "tape". Hopefull soon after new year. Have a festival gig booked for next year - a great start!

OVERDRIVE: Album recently released in Japan. Gig with Pretty Maids coming up in December.

CONSTANCIA: Started recording guitars (yes, I've been working on and off for a while, but now we're down to busines!)

VGS: Finally got an endorsement deal and I'm impatiently waiting for my new VGS guitars! One is a beautuful ravenblood (red) Les Paul shaped guitar with Evertune System and True Temperament fretting. The other is a Strat! More info to follow!

ENCYCLOPEDIA: Working like crazy, finishing Vol 3! Has to be out mid next year!

Listening to:
Jarle H Olsen - Quadrasonic
Dirty Sweet - Of Monarchs And Beggars
Federale - s/t

To quote Johnny Rotten...

"I'm a lazy sod"... well, maybe not lazy, but occupied with all other things. So, whats's up?
Well, first of all, just got back after a great weekend at a new and highly interesting hard rock festival called Rock Out Wild in northern town Sorsele (or rather, 15 kilometers outside, by the foot of a ski slope). What a scenery! Great bands, great people, great weather and no mosquitos!

Endorsement
If all goes as planned I will have my ultimate guitar made for me! I can't wait to tell you more about it when all is settled! It will be a KILLER guitar, I assure you!

Music
We just did the last gig in a while with Overdrive, at the Hasslö Festival. Short set, but great fun! We have some stuff booked in the fall together with Pretty Maids, but it's quiet for some months now. I'm quite anxious to get going on the new Constancia, but I'm waiting for some files to come roaring my way. We've also started working on some new Locomotive Breath material. This time it's actually leaning more towards good old hard edged southern rock! We'll see! I've recorded some guest solos for Grand Design's new album, a demo track from Peter Espinoza (Nasty Idols), Thalamus and Chris Catena. I'm still experimenting  with recording with IR (Impulse Responses) which is really interesting!

The Encyclopedia
F***ing hell! Every time I turn my back a new bunch of bands pop out of the woodwork! I'll never get this thing finished if you don't all take a break! I'm so trying to get this brick finished before new year for a release early next year, and, even though I'm starting to, I still haven't lost hope!

FUZZ Magazine
Finally!! The next issue will feature my new Spotlight page, where I pick out six new promising guitarists/bands. It will also be featured on the new and updated website with links and all! The first column will feature people like: Mike Mills (Toehider), Curt Anderson, Alex Ehrsam, Tommy Johansson (Reinxeed) and Kjell Bergendahl (Thalamus).

New music
I've started CD trading with an old friend again and got some great stuff, plus found some new interesting acts as well:
TADDY PORTER - s/t - Killer retro/southernish hard rock
KAMCHATKA - Bury Your Roots - Killer fourth release from Swedish power trio
ASSAILANT - Wicked Dream - Quite angry, but still melodic Swedes
THE WHEEL - s/t - New good retro rockers
WORK OF ART - In Progress - Great second release from these Swedish melodic rockers

All for now, over and out!
Janne

Impulse response, canned cabs and lots of choises!!

I'm going through some type of digital (sort of) revelation! I've been meaning to dig into this world before, but haven't really got around to it until now. Mainly because a good friend, Mikael Nord Andersson, really gave me all the details on HOW to actually do it! I did have all the equipment already, just needed some softwares and the almighty impolse responses.
So, what's it all about? Well, what I can do now is basically to run my amp heads through a THD Hotplate (a big resistor), straight into my MBox and use speaker simulation.
The speaker simulation is achieved through a digital reverb LAConvolver, TL Space etc. where I can load in an impulse response (which is basically a short wav-file of a recording of the characteristics of a certain speaker). I purchased the BigBox from RedWirez (really cheap!!), which contains in the neightbourhood of 40 000 different sound combinations to choose from!
The sound combiantions, based on real speaker cabs, features: Cab+speaker+mike+mike placement.
For instance - ONE of the sounds would be Marshall 1960's cab + upper right speaker + SM57 mike + 2" from the cone.
It DOES sound and react like a real speaker which is just great! This way I can record using my own amp and pedals and after I have recorded I have the possibility of changing cab if I want a diffent angle. I can also split the signal, record through two amps and use different speaker, such as one close SM57 and one distant Royer to get a nice blend of sounds.
I can also easily take the stuff with me to any studio with ProTools without having to bring the somewhat bulky 4x12 cab.
No latency, play with the sound, possibility to alter the speaker afterwards, record "quiet". A new world just opened!!

News

Been a while, sorry. Been a bit busy, you know. Anyway, a lot of stuff has happened.

Overdrive - the vinyl "The Angelmaker's Daughter" has been released and is already almost sold out! We just recorded a new song, "New Beginning (Arata Na Stato)" for a Lion Music Japan benefit compilation. It was mixed by Pelle Saether last week.

Locomotive Breath - It's been awfully quiet, but also we have recorded a new track for the Lion Music Japan benefit compilation. Recorded the drums last weekend, guitars and bass two days ago, vocals yesterday and it will be mixed by Johan Blomström tonight. Title: "Rise Up".

Zoom Club - Working on new songs, planning a recording session.

Constancia - Still working on guitar arrangements for the second album!

The Encyclopedia Of Swedish Hard Rock & Heavy Metal Vol III - Continuously working on it! The plan is to be ready by July. Not sure if I can do it, but I will sure try!

FUZZ Magazine - Done a bunch of interesting interviews lately with Doug Aldrich, Mick Box, Evergrey, Ghost etc.

So, spring is here, life is good!

New album released... and up/downloaded

Today the new OVERDRIVE album "Angelmaker" is released on Lion Music!! The reviews have been outstanding so far!
However... I get kinda sad and frustrated. A couple of days ago I did a web search to see if there were any reviews up. What did I find? Two pages of links to download the album!!
It's so incredibly fucking frustrating to put months and months of work and effort into an album just to have a bunch of cheapskates upload your work for everyone to download, even before it's available!! It's fellow JOURNALISTS (or whatever the hell they are) that do it, which is even more frustrating! People you trust by giving them access to the album prior to its releas to listen and review! It feels like the utter treachery when people you trust stab you in the back by putting the album up on torrents and download sites. Why the fuck should I bother to put a lot of my own money and effort into making an album, when some people just piss on my work by stealing it? It it wasn't for the love of music I'd get out of this fast! But, even though I love what I do, it doesn't mean I want to pay to do it!

PLEASE, support the bands and musicians that put their time, heart and money into giving you great music by PAYING for their work and effort!! No matter what your defense may be, in the long term it IS KILLING music!

Listening to (purchased music):
INTO THE PRESENCE - s/t - Awesome melodic hard rock
URIAH HEEP - Very 'Eavy... Very 'Umble - Classic!!
VOODOO SIX - Fluke? - New awesome heavies!!
GHOST - Opvs Eponymvs - Blue Öyster Cult meets Demon!

Toehider - Toehider @ Progfest Brisbane - 14th Aug 2009

Toehider from Australia, featuring Swedish drummer Rickard Evensand. This band is absolutely brilliant!!! Check them out!!!

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!!!!!!!!!!!

Sometimes you just get soooooooooooooo tired of yourself. As if it wasn't enough with all the other crap, now I have to create some of my own... Damn...

I've been working on and off with the new book. I've been way too busy with other musical projects and endeavors to be able to fully concentrate on the book (Vol 3 of my encyclopaedia that is), but nevetheless, I've been struggling to keep up the work. I'm now working on finishing the letter E. I have a separate document for each letter. I write the stuff in Word and will then, when I'm finished, transfer the text to InDesign and do the layout. Anyway, since I did the last up-date on my Office for Mac it's been giving me nothing but problems. It freezes, suddenly shuts down Entourage etc. When Word freezes the only solution is to force it to shut down, and then re-start it, losing what I have just done.

However, what really made my heart sink was when I realized I had done a fatal (well...) error. The last time I was working on the letter E, and Word collapsed on me, I shut down and re-opened the program. It opened a re-created copy of the "E" document. I re-saved it, not notocing the program wanted to re-save it as... "A"... So when I open up my finished "A" document to add some new information... up comes "E"... I have overwritten my "A" document with my "E" information. No back-up, no extra copy anywhere, no NOTHING!!!!! FUUUUUUUUUCK!!! This means I have to re-write everything on "A" AGAIN!!!

As if I didn't have enough to do already!! Soooooo tired....

Crap... I'm going to bed...

On a good note however, Overdrive have just signed to Lion Music for the new album "Angelmaker", to be released in January.

Listening to:

STAR ONE - Victims Of The Modern Age - Arjen does it again!!!!

LÅNGFINGER - Skygrounds - Great Swedish retro!

DEGREED - Life Love Loss - Great melodic hard rock!

CURT ANDERSON - For Some Time Now - Chubtone rocks!

Looking for a deal...

Well, first of all sorry for being such a slacker (thanks, Dave ;-)).

The world is not fair. When people like Jason Bibier and Håkan Hellström can get a record deal, and we seem to be all out of luck. I'm talking about the new Overdrive album. We have 18 tracks recorded, mixed and ready. This feels, by far, like the best album we've ever made with the best production, the strongest tracks and our best musical and vocal performances. Still, it seems noone's interested... I mean, I've sent out around 25 promo packages. I've received two lousy deal proposals and three "thanks, but no thanks". Well, maybe it is actually better to take matters into our own hands, set up some good distribution and release it ourselves? We've already more or less decided to make a CD and a vinyl version, with different tracks (just to confuse people :-)). We've put up some medleys from the new album on our MySpace and Facebook and the response has been great. Seems at least we have some fans out there. Too bad the labels aren't among them... Well, since I'm also the only one in the band engaging in trying to get us a deal (and in most things for that matter...), my patience is starting to run low. Right now I feel more like, fuck it, I'm moving on! We'll see... a miracle may happen...

On the other hand the Guts train has now seriously started moving! We've got a shitload of great songs already written, and this feels really really exiting! The plan is now for me to get my butt up to Stockholm for a weekend of rehearsals and recording! Drummer/singer Peter Hermansson is one of the most prolific persons I've come across in years! And I thought I had a lot of extra hours on my day!

On the third hand, I will now also start arranging and recording guitars for the new Constancia album! The material I've received from Mikael sounds great!

Well, if one train has stopped moving, the best thing is to try and get on another one. Who knows, it may be an express!

Here's some new great stuff I've picked up lately:

BLACK COUNTRY COMMUNION - s/t - The album Chickenpox... sorry -foot, should've made!

RAZR13 - s/t - Dug Pinnick doin' the King's X dance with some other boys, sounding great!

PRETTY MAIDS - Pandemonium - Their best in years!

SHARKATTACK - s/t - New great CDBaby discovery! Cool rockers!

THE NAUGHTONES - s/t - see above!

Rockin' in Finland

So, we've returned from a highly... interesting... trip to Finland. It started with a gig at Sigurdsgatan in Västerås, supported by Sour System (a really great band featuring a former Carnal Forge member). Very small audience, but a really cool gig! We continued to Stockholm, where we spent the night and entered the ferry to Finland. We met up with the boys in Watain, who was all up for some headbanging to the Blues Brothers covers band in the dance hall. Just for the hell of it. We also spent some time with the boys in RAM, who were also accompanied by Pelle from Nifelheim. A great guy, which a cool sense of humor. He turned us on to the extremely cheesy Turkish versions of Superman and Star Wars, which just HAVE to be seen. Just go to YouTube and type in "Turhish Star Wars". You won't regret it!!

The festival in Helsinki, Metal Warning, was a really cool festival at a great venue called Gloria. Went out together with Henri Juvonen to do some record hunting, too. Bought some stuff, too. Some stuff that happened during our journey on and off the ferry I'm just dying to tell, but I have to protect the innocent (and I'd be killed by the main person). Anyway, I still laugh my butt off just thinking about it!

The Overdrive album is all finished. Now we just have to find someone interested in releasing it! We'll see what happens.

Listening to:
TRILLION - New demo tracks! AWESOME pomp!!
ALTER BRIDGE - III - They are back with another killer!
GOV'T MULE - By A Thread - Blues rock played the way it should be!

Back from the dead... or something

Haven't written in a long time, but now life has returned to its old routine (or something like that).
I've spent the past four weeks working on the new Overdrive album. Editing drums, recording rough guide guitars and bass. Bouncing tracks for the other members to record to. Then recorded my own final rhythm and lead guitars. 19 tracks times 3-4 guitars per track. Also recorded some final bass in case our bassist couldn't make it. That's a lot of tracks... and a lot of time. As I feel the song material is really really strong this time around I want my performance to be as perfect as it can be. I must've re-recorded a couple of the solos at least 20 times before I got them the way I wanted to. Some, however, I did re-record several times, but picked the first take anyway. Sometimes it has a certain flow and spontaneity you just can't re-create. Then I waited for the other members to send their vocals, bass tracks, acoustic and lead guitars, so that I could add them to the ProTools project, check them and then consolidate all the files to make life easier for Pelle Saether, who was going to mix it. It's however a bit frustrating, to say the least, when you sometimes have different ambition standards.

Last week me and our drummer drove the 600 km's to Studio Underground in Västerås to start mixing with Pelle Saether. The first day we started checking and transferring the files to his system, we gave him our reference discs (we want this and that drum sound, bass sound, guitar sound etc) then we left him to it. He always wants to set the sound alone with no interference from the band (understandably so). Instead we went record hunting and did some great finds! In the afternoon we returned to the studio and listened to the basic sound, which was just plain killer! Brutal! Our drummer just drooled when he heard the drum sound and it all came together just great! It took us 6 days to mix the tracks, however seven of them still lack vocals (lack of time) so we just mixed the basic tracks. The vocals will be finished this week and the final songs finished mixing in two weeks. We got back Saturday evening, one day off and then back to work. Feels like I've had no vacation whatsoever...

So, now all we have to do is find ourselves a label that wants to release the new Overdrive album. It will without doubt be our best album ever, and it's definitely one that I've put a hell of a lot of work, effort and love into!

Some song titles: Angelmaker, Signs All Over, Thriller, Run Out, On With The Action, Brand New Sinner, Cold Blood Chaser, Wavebreaker, Short Moments Of Freedom, It's Not As Easy As It Seems, See The Light, I Know There's Somethimg Going On (cover)...

Listening to:
Overdrive - checking for flaws, things to fix...
Furyon - Gravitas - New UK unit, powerful and melodic!
Iain Ashley Hersey - Nomad - Reviewing it. Decent retro style.
Paul Gilbert - Fuzz Universe - Really dig Paul's playing!

Overdrive, Guts and gardening!

Long time, no lake. Well, here I am again. Starting at the beginning I've found myself very much and happily involved in a new band. This time it's a trio that gues under the name Guts. Drummer/singer Peter Hermansson (220 Volt/Norum etc) and Johan Niemann (Therion/The Murder Of My Sweet/Mind's Eye) are the othet two members. Stylewise this is what I've been aching to play for a long time, the stuff I grew up with - 70s influenced hard rock! This is fun! We've already written several songs together and this can definitely be something!

Overdrive is finally in the studio recording the new album. The past weekend Kjell and Kenta were supposed to lay down the drums for Kjelle's songs, but after the 4th song on the Sunday, Kjelle had to take his dog to the vet. A phone call later (I was in the garden covered in grass and moss at the time) I took over and we managed to lay down another four tracks. We're continuing tonight. I'm not exaggerating if I say this will most likely be the best Overdrive album ever! We've selected 20 songs to record and they all feel strong! Stronger than ever! This is pure classic metal once "invented" by the likes of Judas Priest and Accept. If it works, don't fix it! Mix is set for July and hopefully the CD and vinyl versions will see the light around September.

At the same time TrumPeter Svensson has laid down drum tracks for 10 new Constancia songs! Man, this is gonna be a busy, but fun, summer/fall!

Listening to:
RAZR13 - "Reflecions" - King's X but not. Dug with a new crew sounding awesome!
STONE AXE - "Stone Axe" - Holy crap! The 70s revisited. Killer CD!
RAWBURT - "Muskedunder" - Only a demo, but better than a lot of albums!
THE SWEET - "Live in Kopenhagen 1976" - Still love these guys!

New blog!

Just a quickie to tell you I've started a new blog solely dedicated to reviews. As I already write for FUZZ Magazine (in Swedish), www.metalcentral.net (in Swedish) and www.metalcovenant.com (in English), I decided I'll publish my collected reviews here, all in English. I will most likely publish a couple new reviews every week. As I'm working on the new book, there will be a bit more concentration on the Swedish hard rock/metal releases.

If you feel like sending me stuff, feel free! Just mail me and I'll send you my address. E-mail: stark(at)starkmusic(dot)net.

You'll find the blog, named Stark Music Reviews, here: http://starkmusicreviews.blogspot.com/

Welcome!

Janne

New album out, new songs written!

Finally the new Mountain of Power CD has been released! I'm ever so happy with the result, I must say! Hope it sells a million copies so I become a millionaire!! No, wait, it's only covers... well, I hope the original artists get what they deserve :-)

I'm slowly but safely getting in to the mac and ProTools train! Just transferred a bunch of demos for the forthcoming Overdrive album, from Cubase SX3 to ProTools. Had to bounce down the files in Cubase, save the project to a new fold and exclude all files not used. Import the files in ProTools into a new project and re-program the drums. Fixed 7 tracks in two days, so it worked pretty smoothly.

This week we'll have a meeting about the upcoming Overdrive album, our 30th anniversary disc. Man, I'm not that old!! Well, you're only as old as you feel (or others tell you...). I however feel pretty confident with the new material. Luckily (well...) the Scorpions didn't choose any of my songs so now I can use them for Overdrive instead. This however does not mean the new Overdrive will sound like a Scorpions record.

Been getting into some Swedish stuff I haven't listened to in a while when working on the book. See my list below.

DIABLO SWING ORCHESTRA - "The Butcher's Ballroom" - This is just too crazy to describe, but WHAT AN ALBUM!! Metal meets jazz meets, awing meets Mariachi music meets metal again!

DEGREED - s/t(MCD) - Great new Swedish melodic rock hope! Debut album on the way!

AIRBOURNE - No Guts. No Glory - Yepp, these Aussies sure can rock!

DIRTY DAVE OSTI - Voodoo Guitar - Awesome new heavy blues cat!

UPS can kiss my BWA!!!!

OK, today I'm actually slightly mad, angry and aggravated. Before Christmas I ordered three T-shirts from CafePress.com. Great company, I must say. Excellent service! I received the package before Christmas and the t-shirts (with pretty cool prints) made excellent gifts.
Last Friday I receive an invoice from UPS...
Disbursement compensation: 110 SEK (+ 25 % VAT)
Customs fee: 48 SEK
Pay within 10 days (from Dec 23) or interest and 50 SEK penalty fee will be added. (Standard in Sweden is 30 days)

WHAT THE FUCK??!!

This means I should pay UPS 130 SEK for paying my customs fee of 48 SEK!! Plus they send the invoice out so that I receive it AFTER it should be paid!!!

Naturally, I called them. Yes, I was right, they paid my customs fee (which I didn't ask for, plus I had no way of protesting to the customs service) and it was a fee for their "service". She said she would however change the pay date to 10 days from today. I told her - Nope, 30 days. She said that was only for companies. I said - Nope, according to Swedish consumer policies it's 30 days if I haven't accepted 10 days in an earlier agreement or a written consent, which I haven't. I could almost see her mouth looking like a chicken ass when she snapped "Well then, I'll let the economy department know".

So, DON'T USE UPS!!!!

On another note, the iMac is running smoothly, been working a lot on the book lately and the Mountain Of Power "Volume Two" will be released in a few weeks.

Listening to:
SOUL DOCTOR - "Eay Back To The Bone" - Yepp, they still rock
DIAMOND REO - "Dirty Diamonds" - Old classic!
OCEAN - "Ocean" (second album) - Another forgotten French gem!
IMPULSIA - "Expressions" - Great new Swedish AOR

Mac and a prayer

Well, long time no write! Had a great Christmas, even though the flu (nope, not the piggy) struck twise. Got my Mac during the holidays. It made me realize even more how much I hate PC. It all came to the hilt when my PC AGAIN decided it should pack it in. Installed all the software on the Mac without problems, connected the separate hard drive and could just continue working with my PC documents without problems! Man, I'm impressed and it makes me realize, I do love Mac! My fiancée has been right all these years... and I'm not afraid to admit it! At least I'm at home now, computerwise that is. Need to get all my mails and crap organized, though.

I've installed ProTools, Addictive Drums etc and it works like a charm. I haven't dared to start recording yet because if I had... I wouldn't be able to stop. New sounds and new system is extremely inspirational... and I need to keep my focus on the book for a while.

In just a few days the new Mountain of Power is supposed to be printed and ready!! I'm soooo longing to see the result. A cool 6-panel digi with an awesome artwork by Sami and Joe!

Listening to:
The Answer - Everyday Demons
RA - Black Sheep
These Crooked Vultures - s/t
Avenged Sevenfold - City Of Evil (RIP James)

Skagarack, Pretty Maids and a working computer!

So, the show at Amager Bio with the re-united Skagarack and Pretty Maids yesterday... was AWESOME!!!
Skagarack may not have looked like the hottest band on the planet, but man, they sounded awesome!!! They looked a little bit nervous in the beginning, but after a couple of songs they looked really comfortable. The sound was killer, Torben sang his ass off and they were all incredibly great musicians! Much heavier than on CD, too! Looking forward to hearing a new release (just hope they have improved a bit in the lyrics department...). They definitely need to do Firefest next year!!





Pretty Maids did an outstanding show! They also played a couple of songs I've never hard them do live before! Ronnie ALWAYS sings his ass off and always performs all the way without any cracks, Ken played great and their drummer is a machine!! A great night indeed!





On another note, finally, my computer is working! My colleague Johan managed to save most of my files and get the damn thing going again. A hard, but effective way, to get a heads-up about back-up...





Last week I picked up my new True Temperament Low Tune Strat (see pic). It's tuned to B (0.014-0.070). Body of swamp ash made by Eugen Guitars in Norway. Rio Grande pick-ups.

New interesting stuff:


EAGLESTRIKE - s/t - Freak Kitchen bass-player gone solo - great melodic hard rock


IMPULSIA - Expressions - Great new AOR w Marel Jacob (RIP) etc


URBANDUX - Eleven Eleven - Starting to sounds really good now!

Mixed mastered and ready!!

Right now the Mountain Of Power "Vol II" album is being mastered by one of my guitar heroes, who also does a guest solo on the album, Ty Tabor (King's X). The test track I received sounded awesome! We're slightly behind schedule but the album should be out before Christmas anyway.

My computer crashed, my entire drive was erased, all my reviews, articles, interviews, lists, book keeping... everything... gone. At least it seemed like it. Currently my computer wiz colleague Johan is restoring the disc, and it's looking good! It's been a couple of nerve wrecking days, I can ssure you!

Listening to right now:
KATATONIA - "Night Is The New Day" - Opeth's got competition!!
CITY BOY - "Dinner At The Riyz" - Great (but cheap) re-issue
CITY BOY - Young Men Gone West - (see above)

Yes, entering the final stage!!

Tomorrow knob wizzard Pelle Saether will put the finishing touch on the new Mountain of Power CD! After this, it's off for mastering by King's X stringsman Ty Tabor (who also does a guest solo on "Waves"). The mixing stage has been an interesting battle of the minds between myself and label owner/co-producer Joe "The Groovedawg" Romagnola where both our patiences have been put to the test. I think we both passed pretty unharmed though ;-). The end result is what matter and the album sounds awesome!! Well, what is less to expect from such outstanding musicians (besides myself, that is :-)). The release is set to early December and it looks like we will succeed!

On another note. The rumours of me leaving Sweden Rock in all it's forms is true. I have also been banned from the message board, so if you don't see me there, you kow why. I will have nothing to do with the festival nor the magazine.

Some new discs to check out:
The Psychics - s/t - Great bluesy UK retro feel!
Sherlock Brothers - s/t - New contemporary Swedes to check out!
Point Blank - Fight On! - Still rockin'!

Change of plans...

For various reasons the plans for mix of Mountain of Power has been slightly changed. The album will now be mixed by my old friend and partner in crime Pelle Saether of Studio Undeground (he's also the lead singer of Zello, Grand Design etc). Pelle mixed the previous MoP album and did a tremendous job, so I have the greatest of faith in him (well, he's also mixed all our Locomotive Breath albums). Mixing starts Tuesday, tomorrow, and I'm really excited to hear what he can come up with!

On another note I can also announce I have parted ways with Sweden Rock, both as a writer for the magazine and as a part of the festival and I will have nothing whatsoever to do with them in the future as I see it now. Money does strange things to people...

New recommendable discs:
Plankton - Ocean Tales
House of Heavy - s/t
Freak Kitchen - Land Of Freaks