“Music gives meaning to our lives, it’s absolutely everything to us, it gets us through the tough times, it helps us celebrate the happy times, it articulates our feelings; you cry a bit, you laugh a bit along to a record. Think of a world without music, going home and just sitting in silence, they’d be no clubs, they’d be no singing, they’d be no dancing. Music is a real lifesaver; we hope that our music can put words to people’s feelings too, it will soundtrack their lives, and in so doing make the world a better place, a much happier place. This,” says Rebecka Rolfart, the guitarist in Those Dancing Days, “is our reason for making music.”
Mimmi and her friends – vocalist Linnea Jonsson, the one with the wonderfully big hair, guitarist Rebecka Rolfart, drummer Cissi Efraimsson and synth player Lisa Pyk-Wirstrom – are sat around a table in London Soho’s Lorelei caff. They’re sipping cappuccinos and gabbling excitably about the life enhancing qualities of music. Hailing from the Stockholm suburb of Nacka, Those Dancing Days clearly know their stuff.
They formed back in 2005 while still at high school – “it was hard, schoolwork really got in the way, we’d want to go and rehearse, but we’d have a maths lesson to go to instead,” sighs Cissi. They initially just set out to play tribute to some of their favourite artists and “have a fun time” – one of their tracks, Shuffle, illustrates perfectly their outlook: lyrically ingenious and terrifyingly simple, it comprises solely of song titles as they come up on their iPod: “Run for your life, true love ways, suit yourself, I’m looking through you” sings Linnea over one of the most infectious backdrops you’ll hear this year. It gives an indication of where they’re coming from.
“We never dreamt we’d get to make a record, we just wanted to express ourselves and hang out with each other, we didn’t particularly want to be famous, we’re not interested in celebrity culture” explains Mimmi. “In Sweden it’s easy to start a band, we weren’t good at sports, we couldn’t play hockey or tennis or do gym so we got instruments instead and started to sing and play. We have these places called youth-gardens, kind of like youth clubs, you go along, they have free instruments and that’s where we’d rehearse.”
Fuelled by the punk DIY ethic – “although we can play our instruments properly,” says Cissi proudly – their name, though, is a nod to Led Zeppelin song, Dancing Days on 1973 album Houses Of The Holy. Mimmi explains “my favourite band, no one else really likes them in the group but I’m trying my best to convince them they should like them but some people do find the name puzzling as we don’t sound anything like them.” In fact they’re a galaxy away from Led Zep’s machismo huffing, puffing, strutting and thrusting.
Their songs instead exist in a much more otherworldly space; one where say, the kaleidoscopic surrealism of a Michel Gondry film could inhabit and make perfect, beautiful sense.
“Our songs are crazy weird,” says Lisa. “The lyrics are very imaginative, each song is like a fairytale, grounded in reality, but anything can happen, they open doors to other realms of existing.”
It’s no surprise really, after all Rebecka describes events and people in terms of paper textures – “she’s the most creative, she lives somewhere else sometimes” says Mimmi. Meanwhile, in a case of reverse-anthropomorphy, each has an animal alter ego – Rebecka is, we’re told, a giraffe, “tall, graceful, observant, strong, but easily wounded,” Linnea is likened to a deer, “elegant, beautiful”, Mimmi a seal, “a circus seal, I don’t just sit and stare out to sea, I do tricks!”, Cissi a cat, “a wild, foxy cat,” and Lisa a monkey, “and all that that entails,” she laughs mischievously.
They’ve also discussed at length which berry they’d like to be; gooseberry, strawberry, blackberry, blueberry and cranberry respectively. “We’ve each got a colour to describe our moods too,” adds Cissi.
On this visit to London, they visited a city farm and saw a white goat with a torn ear. “He was kind of goofy,” says Rebecka. “He was broken but that was what made him special. As a collective we’re like that broken goat, kooky but charming and cute.”
If they have to be pigeon-holed perhaps it’s their illustrious forebears at Postcard records that Those Dancing Days recall most. Their pop is fizzy, intelligent, driven by warped synths, pounding drums and Linnea’s enriching vocal delivery –the group describe her as “a soul singer”; not in terms of sound but in emotion and attitude.
Their three singles, Those Dancing Days, Hitten (meaning The Hit) and Run Run fuse the exhilarating sounds of 60s girlgroups with smidgeons of Blondie, the Smiths, the Cardigans and northern soul.
“And Sweden,” says Mimmi. “Our home country does define everything we do. We could never have come from America or England. If we had we’d be more heavy, they’d be more guitar. People in Sweden, they tend to be shy, they don’t really express themselves openly, they can be reticent, so perhaps that’s why there’s so many good bands in Sweden because they use music to say how they feel. And also there’s not really much else to do in Sweden. It’s a very beautiful country, it keeps us looking young and our skin free of spots but it does get very boring at times.”
While their early gigs consisted mainly of covers – “the first song we ever played together was 100 Degrees by Shout Out Louds, this brilliant Swedish band, we really wanted to be like them,” Lisa remembers fondly – it’s the originals that make up their debut LP, In Our Space Hero Suits produced by Max-Mans Wikman in Dubious Studios, Sweden that they’ll be remembered for. From the hint of post punk, Intro to the uplifting closer Space Hero Suits through the aforesaid three singles and much, much more, this release marks these 18 and 19 year olds as something very special.
“Just getting to release the album has been exciting enough,” says Cissi. “But now we get to travel the world and play it to everyone. We’re so proud of the record, we love all the songs, we can’t pick our favourites, it would be like picking your favourite child. It would be wrong. Just listen to it all and we hope you won’t be disappointed.”
Listen to this album as she instructs and we’re sure you won’t be.
|
