Only two years separate 'People Like...' and 'Stockholm', you've worked quite fast for this new album. Can you tell us about the writing process?
Normally when you've been touring for an album for so long, like we always do, we're really tired after touring. I think we did 1 and ½ year on the road and we said ok, we need a break and we should start thinking about the new album. When we came back from this Social Distortion tour we did, it wasn't really planed, we were kinda excited, coming off the road with Social D, we said fuck takin' a break. So we went straight into the rehearsal studio. Before the tour with Social D I was in France, I started write a little bit in the summer and then continue to write right after the tour. All the influences are really fresh, all the impressions you get on the road are really there, so it just came down, all the songs came natural. And then we thought of Nicke Andersson because nobody wanted an American kinda big producer. The songs were finished by December. Nicke Andersson came in after December and we rearranged a lot. We had already book the studio time in January. And sometimes you work better under the pressure. You can see by history that bands that get really famous got 4 years to record. You should be really focused. I think rock n roll music is supposed to be in the moment.

Did the recording of 'People...' took time, or was it fast?
We were 3 weeks in the studio. We could have stayed longer if we wanted to, but actually that's Nicke Andersson thoughts, 'cause he's so restless, he got no patience at all! He pushed us to understand that we're really good when we're playing together.

How was it like to work with Nicke Andersson?
I thought that both him and us were a bit afraid that we're gonna start to fight. He's very like 'No, I like this only!' Of course Nicke and Dregen has history in the Hellacopters and he's a good friend of the band, and we respect him a lot for being a very talented musician. But it was a challenge for him too. It was his first production job for a big band, and first for us to use a friend. I hate when a record company try to pick up a producer for the band, and the producer doesn't really care about the fuckin' band. He's takin' the money and say 'yeah, we do like that like I always do'.

Are you happy of the result?
Yeah, very much. As I said, in the beginning it was kinda hard to work like that, 'cause we are more used to work in a more perfectionist way. It's hard to let go off, 'keep that version', when you know you could play a little bit better. But maybe that's not better. It's a period of time when you have to understand that this is rock n roll.

How did you choose the picture for the cover? What does it represent for you?
It's a weird fuckin' story behind it! Actually, it doesn't mean anything really! There's a guy, I never worked with him before, but he's done a lot of record sleeves and  stuff, and he's got a sick kind of hobby, he's collecting old photos for antiques, he's buying old photo albums from families, stuff that are like 100 years old. And he found that picture in one of these photo albums. And it's such a fuckin' weird picture, it's so old, and nobody really knows where it's from, if it's from Sweden or Minnesota or something! These girls sitting behind a barn and everybody's smoking! We started to love the picture more and more. What I see is a kind of mix between Van Halen's '1984' and Nirvana's 'Nevermind'. It's a fuckin' cool picture. The Nirvana picture, the baby with the dollar, was a bought picture. This one as just taken 100 years ago or something! We thought it was just great. And then the booklet goes in the same kind of color and vain. They're nice nature picture, they were taken outside Stockholm. It was really snowy and we were freezing our ass off. You should see the cover for the new single, 'Dysfunctional Professional', it's exactly the same, but we had playboy models drinking wine and smoking, with more glossy colors.



You've toured in the US and in Europe with Social Distortion, what is the best memory of this tour?
First of all it's an honor that Social Distortion asked specifically for us to be special guests. Over the years, we became very good friends, they're wonderful people, their crew is great, and I like Mike a lot. I know his wife, his kids. We have a special relationship I think, which is really usual these days, people are so afraid of whatever. Nobody really fucks with Mike Ness. Even the crew are kinda afraid of him. And on the last gig we did on that tour, it was in Munich, we thought that we gotta do something fun to fuck with the main band. They crew was like 'no, Mike will get upset'. So on the amplifier there's this fez hat. Me and Dregen wore this fake moustache, and put the hat on, looked like this Egypt Cheik or something, and Mike would cracked down, 'fuck you guys'. The crew was afraid we would be angry, he was just laughing, 'you fuckin' idiots!'. That's good memories of the tour, and after that last gig we were really good friends.

Can you tell us about your visit of the US? How did the US audience react to BB?
We've been in America quite a lot. After 'Total 13', and we did a tour with 'Making Enemies Is Good', only one showcase with 'Stockholm Syndrome', and then we got back again, and they released that 'Trinitius' album, just to reintroduced the band to the American audience. America is weird, it's a big country to tour, you could tour forever without selling more than 10 000 records. And it's so corrupt when it comes to the music business. And the major labels are so afraid of putting the money into the wrong artist. It's only 'American Idol', and they spread that disease here in Europe with this 'Fame Factory', 'Star Academy', stuffs like that. All you can do is basically keep on going there, keep on playing, keep on trying to convince that this is the way it should be, and a lot of people really appreciate that we go there and tour. And now that we're signed on Century Media, they're putting a lot of efforts into this new album. We'll be released this summer, and we start touring in the end of September. I don't know if we're gonna go on headliner tour or on a support tour. But there's gonna be a lot of try to take bit of the step. America's screaming for real rock bands.

Do you prefer touring in Europe or in the States?
As I said, it's so different. But still it's the same, the rock crowd is the same. Promoters in Europe are very happy to have a live band. In America they're like 'you should be happy just to be able to play'. They're like 'you're from Sweden or Switzerland?' 'Sweden!' 'Is that where they make the watches?'. (laughs)

Last time we met was in Paris, and you eventually released this show as your official live album. Why did you choose this particular show?
Well, you saw the show right?
Yeah!
It was a magic night I think. We recorded about 26 shows, and after a while you forget that you're recording. I didn't expect anything from Paris. We played 'La Boule Noire', that was good, but we never played 'La Maroquinerie'. When we started it was so packed, so sweaty, the crowd was so loud, and I knew we were really good. When we came back home, I had all these tapes from 26 shows, and I was like 'OK, where do we start?'. I told Peder 'I'm gonna start with the Paris show', 'cause that was so fuckin' cool. I listened to the whole show: 'alright, that's it, mix that one!' Seriously, we did some additional guitars because the sound fucked up, but audience, all the vocals, the drums and the bass are exactly from that show. We just cut out one song just to make it fit on the album.
On the Japanese version of the album there's 'Say When'
Ah, OK, so we cut off two songs! The Japanese they always want something extra, I don't know why!


What do you think of all the new young rock bands in Sweden? Do you listen to some of them? Do some of these bands remind you of the beginning of BB?
I'm really bad at listening new bands. There's a little bit of a hype, just because a band is from Sweden. Sweden always had cool bands.

Can you tell us about the cover of 'King Of Fools' you did with THE BONES?
I'm a good friends of the Bones. They told me that they wanted to do a cover album with guest people on it. This was two years ago at least. We talked about 'I Wanna Be Sedated' at first. I really wanted to do a Social D song, that would have been awesome. So we thought 'let's do it in a totally Johnny Cash way'. I like the band, and I like the version. And Mike likes it too!

What are your plans for this year? Will you continue to tour, get back in the US, or take a break?
We will just keep on touring. If you look at my schedule, I think the longest I'm off is 5 days in a row! My girlfriend's like 'how can we plan the summer?' I say 'I don't know'. There are a lot of festivals this summer, then we do this 'Where the action is' tour with the Hellacopters and the Hives and Millencolin and Soundtrack Of Our Lives, just in Scandinavia. And then Japan, Australia, New Zealand again, and then the US, and then back in Europe again.

One last word for the readers of this interview:
As much as I like to play everywhere, there's something special about Paris and France in general, not only because my girlfriend is half French, and I spend most time in Southern France. For me France is really close to my heart, I try really hard to learn the language
Can you say something in French?
Putain! L'addition s'il vous plaît! Merde! (laughs) I hope that we come back and play bigger places, in winter or something
And one last word for the Swiss fans:
Well, join the EEC and fuck you customs! (laughs)

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