We speak to the main man Fredrik Saroea
Hi Fredrik, nice to speak to you. You must be knackered with all the interviews you have done with all of the worldwide journalists today?
“Ha, yes I am. But I have just done an E, some Coke and a bottle of Bacardi so I am a little more with it now. Only joking, fire away Dan…”
Cool, that makes two of us. A brilliant comeback single ‘Give It Up’ just out – and your new ‘Red’ album coming out on June 8th through your own label Young Aspiring Professionals. Obviously inspired by 80s pop music, your love of Northern UK dance bands and Punk – what sort of artists made an impression on you back then to make such a record and how accessible was music to you back then?
“Well my favourite band of all time are The Stone Roses. I was lucky enough to have as my next door neighbour a record collector. My friends were very envious. He was out all the time seeking out the best new records, so I was getting to hear around ’89/’90 the likes of The Happy Mondays, 808 State, The Orb, De La Soul and obviously The Roses. He had a huge collection and you have to remember, there was no Internet back then for us with music on it. I wasn’t exposed to the likes of Talking Heads and Devo, who are also major influences to me back then, that came later. But thank goodness for my neighbour…”
A lot of your work has been featured on computer games and TV advertising as well rocking dance-floors all over the world – my friend Paul Harris is part of Dirty Vegas who smashed America with the soundtrack to the Mitsubishi car advert – making music that appears on adverts such as Coca Cola and Apple, is this for the money or just another way to bring your music to the world?
“Good question. Well this is how it all began. The group were sitting in the back room of some grotty live venue in Bergen. We had no income at the time, the future looked bleak, we couldn’t afford a drink at the bar and we knew that nobody was going to turn up to see us at the gig. We were all thinking, why are we doing this to ourselves? And then the manager came in and said “you have a phone call in the office, I think you should take this call…”It was a major marketing company who had been trying to get hold of us and had been tipped off we were appearing at this grotty club that night. He wanted to know whether we would be interested in Coca-Cola using ‘Fa-Fa-Fa’ for their new TV advert. We just fell about laughing. If you listen to the lyrics of the record…
I need a shot
I need a shot of ambition
I need a hit
I need a hit of nutrition
I need a fix
I need to fix my ignition
If you want to whip me into shape
I need a plan or a mission
‘Cause I’m gonna ride fast, going nowhere
…well it was just such a coincidence. I was 29 and losing belief in my career. But hey, don’t get me wrong – our music is not made to cater for the advertising industry. It’s a great way to get exposure which in today’s day and age is priceless. It’s a necessity. It’s amazing how quickly all of the money disappears for a band. Working with big brands has saved us. I wish we don’t have to go down this route, but we are lucky enough that our sound is apt for adverts etc. So far we have made music for 15 major selling computer games. I would imagine the games that we have worked on must have sold 50 million units through shops and a further 50 million on the black market. 100 million games that the computer industry have revealed that about three people play each game with their friends. No record distribution, radio or TV exposure can bring a band’s music to so many people. Just do the figures. We didn’t want to go down this route but in today’s day and age, you have to.”
There have been a lot of comings and goings over the years, Tom and Kevin both leaving, Kevin was one of your big trio of friends all those years ago, why did he leave?
“Ha ha. He was dumped by his wife and moved over to Baasten.”
Why was he dumped?
“Numerous reasons Dan, numerous! Too many to mention. But this was before we really started Datarock, although he did sing on our first track…”
How do you feel about the landslide victory for Norway via Alexander Rybak in the weekend’s Eurovision Song Contest with the highest points ever – 387 – embarrassed or proud?
“Your questions are great Dan. How can I answer that question? My feelings was both a little bit of being proud and also being embarrassment.”
You are from the south west city of Bergen in Norway, the second largest in Norway, what was it like growing up there, was there a music scene – I believe Royskopp are from your home town?
“Well I started my musical career in a Thrash Metal band when I was only 11. But then Black Metal came along in Norway – an extreme sub genre of Heavy Metal – but obviously the music had a dark side due to the misanthropic and anti-Christian ideology of many of the artists. For instance ten years ago, Norway was rocked by a brutal murder and a string of arson attacks linked to the Black Metal band Mayhem.”
So how did you steer yourself away from this scene?
“Well of course I had my love of UK Madchester bands. I just went in another direction. Getting into club culture. Telle Records was so important for the Norwegian dance movement. It all started in 1998 when Norwegian record shop owner Mikal Telle realised he had to start a small vinyl-based record label, especially since a lot of his friends made what he thought was cool music. These friends included Bjørn Torske, Erot, the amazing Annie and two guys named Torbjørn and Svein, later to become known as the duo ‘Röyksopp’.” Other labels that followed from him included Éllet, which he started in ’99 as an excuse to release his friends Kings of Convenience music, Primitive Records, 12″ label Footnotes – originally started by Bjørn Torske and Erot and then the Electro label Tellektro. Dimitri from Paris came up and we made a track together – that just showed how all of a sudden Bergen was becoming really important on a worldwide musical stage – people were talking about my home city. I later got into bands like Gonzales and Chicks On Speed.”
What are they feeding the Scandinavians at the moment, from the pop of Stargate, Robyn and Kleerup through to the hip Royskopp and yourself, the Nordic musicians are taking over the world. How can you explain this extraordinary artist outburst?
“Wow, well thank you. I can’t really put my finger on it. Well I think we have all started to understand the industry more which was always going to happen. We’ve learnt the art of touring and just generally become more professional. Also, the majority of Norwegian bands are all friends. I think it’s also important that people like ourselves, keep it all real – we only release our music and other bands on our label – through our own label YAP.”
Are there any other bands we may be hearing of about to explode?
“Yes, Karin Park who have just had an album out called ‘Ashes to Gold’. I produced it at the Wendyhouse Studios in London – the same place ‘Red’ was made that featured appearances by the likes of Alex Carapetis (Nine Inch Nails), Kelis, Ralph Myerz (Ralph Myerz & The Jack Herren Band) and Kristian Stockhaus (Ungdomskulen) – a really good album.”
“So the new album, what is the feel of the album, what are your favourite tracks and why? For instance, the story behind the lead single ‘Give It Up’ has a very interesting story behind it, out this week in the stores, but also an interesting single The Blog – what’s behind that tune too?
Well yes ‘Give It Up’ was actually created with an idea for a music video before it became a song, paraphrasing Michael Jackson’s ‘Beat It’ and ‘Bad’, the 1961 film ‘West Side Story’ and the film ‘Romeo & Juliet’. As for ‘The Blog’ which I love, we just had fun with it. I wanted stadium applause in it, we replaced Prince lyrics with the word Datarock here and there, it’s an insane tune which sums up our album. We took a vibe from our first album, combined it with our live shows and just tried to turn things on it’s head.”
And then there’s ‘Molly’ – what is that about?
“A love song to actress Molly Ringwald. All people of our generation know half-remembered pop videos and the deathlessly young heroes and heroines of teen films. Pop cultural fluff that is meaningful, because invoking them now, as adults, is a sharp reminder from a more innocent time that we should always be having more fun than we are right now. ‘True Stories too is crazy, it’s a song made out of nothing but Talking Heads song titles. What I wanted to do with the whole album was to say this day and age is just as interesting as the early Eighties.”
Where did the idea of the red tracksuits originate and will you be sticking with the look?
“Definitely. That’s why the album is called ‘Red’. We love our look.”
Tell us about your fascination with Devo…
“I love them. Every time we’re in Los Angeles we drop by to see them. They stand out from other pop bands. I love the fact that they are in complete control of what direction they go in. And they are also a uniformed band!”
Some of your gigs have been a little surreal. There was the show with the theatre group performing aerobics on stage, the full High School Marching band and of course, the men’s choir – what has been the most surreal?
“Oh we out did all that at the Norwegian Grammy’s this year. We had 100 people wearing red tracksuits on stage whilst we played. So funny, but looked incredible.”
How important is it to have fun with your music?
“So very important, you should never take yourself too seriously.”
You have made some fantastic records – what do you think has been your best ever release?
“I Know What Boys Like/Bouffant Headbutt’. We actually only printed up 30 copies, all on pink vinyl as the song was originally brought out by Shampoo. We thought the two songs sounded like themselves when we slowed the record from 45 to 33 RPM.”
Your tour sees you finish in Japan, what has been the best crowd in what country you have ever played to?
“Err Aussies. They are crazy.”
“Thank you Dan, a real pleasure…”
Datarock ‘Red – the album on June 8th
