HARDCORE SUPERSTAR
Interview with Jocke and Adde, respectively vocalist and drummer of Hardcore Superstar. Interview by Jean-Pierre & Jean-Philippe (2 jp's!), done on  4.5.2006. Special thanx to Eric Coubard of Bad Reputation.

Before the interview begins, Jocke spots the name 'Babylon Bombs' on my pages:
Jocke : Ah, Babylon Bombs! I always wear a Babylon Bombs T-Shirt when I'm on stage!

HR80: Could you introduce us the band in few words?
Jocke : We're a band from Gothenburg, SWE,
Adde : and we formed in 1997.
Jocke : We put out 4 records, this is the 4the one, and the best one obviously!
I think we play sleaze/thrash combination, like the best of the 80's! we try to stay true to what we grew up with, the sleaze and the thrash metal scene of the 80's. That's what we love.

HR80: Where did you get that name, Hardcore Superstar?
Jocke : Actually we always wanted to be as our idols, who were superstars. We always aimed high. So we would be glad if we reach the tree tops. So to be something 110 %, like to the core, hardcore, that's why hardcore superstars.
Adde :we could have been hardcore tennisplayer, but we wanted to be hardcore superstar! (laughs)

HR80: Last album: How much time did it take you to release it?
Adde : we started the writing process in January 2005. Before that we had a 6 months break, and during that break we were able to take a step back and watch ourselves. We almost wrote like 50 rough ideas on the spot, and we did demos, recorded during the summer, June & July, and we were finished in August/begining of September. We took away a lot of songs because we wanted to have a good rhythm in the record, so we had to have a strong first song, a typical second song. We had a lot of first songs, but not a lot of ballads. Maybe for the next album we'll use some old ideas. It took like 8 months from writing process to the album


Photograph © Emma Svensson


HR80: The production is very good, how did you manage to get such an awesome sound that fits the songs perfectly?
Adde : This is so much fun that you say that because everything is so important, that's what I discovered making this album, even the strings on the guitars, the choice of the room where you record the drums. And almost the most important of all, we rehearsed like bastard, really! Like animals, for 8 hours a day everyday for a month, before we go in the studio. If you get a really tight band, it's gonna sound better. The instruments are gonna sounf better and it's gonna be well glued. We also mixed the first songs for three weeks before with ended up with the sound that we liked. We worked really really hard. The day the album was finished was on my birthday. I was sitting in my car and about to drive home. I was so exhausted I couldn't find my way home! Because I was so focused on the mixing. It took a couple of weeks to get back.
Jocke: It took a couple of weeks to get home! (laughs)

HR80: Adde, on the last album you used a peculiar drum sound with a lot of handclaps. Why didn't you use it on the last album?
Adde : because we didn't like it.

HR80: So why did you use it?
Adde : our producer wanted a slick sound on the album, but what we wanted to do was the other way around, we wanted it to sound punkier and raw, more like a trashy sound. It came out so polished, that's what the producer liked. We didn't really wanted that , but he had the last 'I decide what it sounds like'. We were kinda pissed off because we wanted more a Misfits kinda production (Adde makes sounds with his mouth).


Photograph © Amy Lagerman

HR80: So maybe that's why the new album is much more heavier?
Adde : yeah, it came out the way we wanted, not the producer, because we were the producer!
Jocke : A mix between sleaze and thrash.

HR80: Does it sell good in Sweden?
Jocke : Yes.
Adde : I think we sold 30 000 copies since November in Sweden.
Jocke : In Japan I think we sold 15 000 copies and it came out since three months! In France, we're gonna sell at least 1 million! (laughs)

HR80: How do you explain the success of your band in Italy?
Adde : We opened for AC/DC in Turin, 90 000 people!!!
Jocke : it was like 'I can't do this'

HR80: Sometimes we can feel intonations in your voice that reminds us of Taime Downe of Faster Pussycat. Is this band an influence for you? What US bands from the 80's do you like?
Jocke : of course, Taime Downe influenced me because I grew up with Faster Pussycat. But I would say that Steven Tyler of Aerosmith is even more an inspiration. Nothing bad about Taime Downe, but you know, Steven Tyler is more like a daddy I never had.
Adde : Tesla!

HR80: I was about to talk about Tesla because what stroke me first when I heard HCSS was that you were like a heavy metal band with a singer that would sound like Jeff Keith!
Jocke : Thanks, I got goose bumps!

What do you think of the current sound of Faster Pussycat?
Adde : they used to be good. Not to slack 'em off! Three of the guys from the old band had offered to come to Sweden to play with us: Brent Muscat, Eric Stacy, and... the other guy!
Jocke : Eric Stacy actually wrote on our website that if Martin, our bass player, would ever leave the band, he would gladly fill his place.
Adde : and Brent Muscat proposed us to be our second guitar player, this was like two years ago.

HR80: But you declined?
Both : yeah!
Adde : He wouldn't stand a chance in Sweden because he would be bored, you know?
Jocke : He wouldn't stand the chance to play the songs! (laughs) Just kidding!

HR80: Your second album was softer, and then you released a more rocking album. Was it deliberate to change the pace on 'Thank You', or was it a natural evolution of the sound of the band?
Adde : that's our Aerosmith era, 'Janie's Got A Gun'! We loved that album, but it's a little too polished for our style, so if you would have heard us at around that time live, I think our songs were a bit more edgy. It came more better live.
Jocke : With this new album, I think this is the first time we ever catch what we wanted to sound like on a record.
Even with the first album?
Jocke: yeah but that's easy because it's the first album, you don't know anything else, you know?

HR80: What's happening right now in Sweden? It looks like it's the new Eldorado for rock n roll as was the Sunset Strip in the second half of the 80's. Last February, there was the Glamfest in Stockholm, you guys have one of the biggest European festivals with the Sweden rock, plus all the bands that have demos (Vains Of Jenna), and many others that have deals like Gemini 5, Supergroupies, Crucified Barbara, Babylon Bombs. Do you feel as the leaders of this new wave of sleaze rock along with Babckyard Babies?
Adde : if you look at the sales and if you look at history because we've been around since 1999, I guess you can say that. I think we and the Backyard Babies were the earliest bands.
Jocke : I always get bored when journalists compare us to Backyard Babies, Hellacopters. If you really listen to individual albums from the bands, you can hear that we are more like a sleaze/thrashband, more of a skateboarding band, more up in your face. Hellacopters is more like 70's rock n roll, twin guitars, more like Thin Lizzy. And Backyard are more like Social Distortion. We are completely different.

HR80: Here's a list of Swedish bands, tell us what you think about them:
SHOTGUN MESSIAH: Great! Zinny Zan, fuckin' great, and a nice guy as well. Zan Clan. Their guitar player is our sound engineer.
NASTY IDOLS: cool band. Short lived.
GLORIOUS BANKROBBERS: great band! Good ol' times. And the singer of Glorious Bankrrobers used to be our booking agent for a brief period.
GEMINI 5: friends of ours
MARYSLIM: good friends
CRUCIFIED BARBARA: great! The best female band in the world, for the moment. The new Girlschool.
BABYLON BOMBS: great guys

HR80: Did you hear their new album?
Jocke : yeah, I got it, great! I got their t-shirts.

HR80: Did you know the members of Crash Dïet? What impact had the loss of Dave Lepard on the Swedish hard rock and glam scene?
Jocke : Actualy we didn't know those guys. I like couple of songs they did, like 'It's A Miracle' (he sings), that's a really good song.
Adde : we didn't have a chance to meet them, and they were so short-lived.
Jocke : they're going to continue, they're looking for a new singer.

HR80: What do the following cities remind you of:
STOCKHOLM: good rock clubs & great following for HCSS. We played Stockholm 3 weeks ago and we sold out, which is great and unusual, because there's so much things happening in Stockholm. And The asshole of Sweden! (laughs).
PARIS: Romantic! Great red wine, and we live on the street of temptation! The pussy street.
TOKYO: Lovely fans. They treat you like Elvis. Always so loud! Fanatic, really hysteric.
NYC: CBGB's. We're one of the last band who played there. And a good vibe. Reminds you a little bit of Sweden actually, because of the parks.
GOTEBÖRG: Home. And a great music scene, there's a lot of good clubs to play. If you guys got a band, you should come to Gothenburg because you can play a lot of fuckin' clubs over there. I think in Gothenburg there's at least 10 hard rock clubs you can play.

HR80: You did record many covers, and during the release party of your last album, you did play 'Prime Mover'. Do you think you'll do a studio version of this song? Or any other cover song?
Jocke : yeah, we plan that, never say never!
Adde : Because he was also short lived, and they have such a great album
Jocke : he was so 'unshowered' (laughs)! Filthy man!

HR80: Do you attract an audience of young people in Sweden?
Jocke : Yes. When we play in Sweden, it's in front of 10 years old up to 25 years old. In Italy or Germany, the names are 'Jurgen' and he's 50 years old, with a moustache!

HR80: You have a very good reputation as a stage act. Do you like being on the road?
Jocke : that's HCSS!
Adde: the thing we appreciate with the great bands we saw in the 80's is the energy, that's what we try to focus on the live performane, we want to take your breath away, we want to keep it intense. If we don't get off the stage really exhausted, we feel like we've been cheating. It has to be lot of sweat, 110%!
Jocke : that's a sad thing about young bands of nowadays, they intend to be good on the record but when you see them live you almost get angry: get the fuck out of that stage and rehearse.
Adde: in the 80's, you could still hear good guitar players, but nowadays it's just wah-wah, they just hide behind the effects.

HR80: What do you think of Mötorhead, and how did you meet them? Do you have any tour anecdote to tell us?
Jocke : Lemmy invited me in his back lounge in his tour bus and said (impersonating Lemmy)'there's a country song that I recorded'. He was pouring out whiskey in a glass of beer, it was 70% whiskey, and 30% Coke, and he was not forcing me, but making me listen to his country. He actually recorded some country song with Slim Jim from Stray Cats. He was pouring the whiskey down, I drank two of those, when I was out I was like I'm gonna faint!

HR80: When will we have the opportunity to see you guys live in France? Any plans for 2006?
Jocke : actually we were talking about this in the last couple of days. Hopefully we're gonna tour in Sweden, and we're gonna play with In Flames in Hamburg, I think it's in two weeks, and we're gonna do the European release for the album, at the White Trash in Berlin, and we're gonna do festivals in Estonia, Sweden, Germany, and so on, and hopefully, this fall, we're gonna do a European tour. Hopefully we're gonna come to France, and we're gonna play Germany, Spain, Italy, Greece, Switzerland, Austria, Belgium, Holland!

HR80: Do you plan on releasing a DVD? A live album?
Jocke : it's funny you ask that, because last week we recorded a live DVD! We played this venue in Gothenburg called Sticky Fingers. We thought 'where should we record a live DVD?' We figured out it's best if we record it at home, in Gothenburg. So we rented the place, Sticky Fingers, and we started to sale tickets on tickenet in Sweden, and we sold out immediatly! Then we put on another show, and it went sold out too! We sold a thousand tickets in two weeks. And then we were thinking about having two more, but we only did two shows, so there were a lot of discontented fans in Sweden, especially in Gothenburg, so we're thinking about doing a show in a small arena in Gothenburg, it's about 2500 people in there, before Xmas.

HR80: And do you plan on releasing a live CD?
Jocke : yeah, we're thinkin' about that too, but maybe next tour. We always record every show when we are on tour, so we have a lot of material.

HR80: Do you have one last word for the readers of this interview:
Jocke : I want to take the opportunity to thank all the French fans because I heard that it's very hard to get HCSS records here, I want to thank those guys who bought it by import. If you don't get it, you always have internet. We're not Metallica, we're not angry if you download it. It's a funny thing, they are billionaires, why even bother?

Thanx a lot to Adde & Jocke for this long interview, the guys are super cool, check their last album it's a must-have!


Photograph © Emma Svensson