Unmistakably Nordic in flavor, Sofia Talvik somehow still conforms to American interpretations of her own original music, a North Sea siren blending sparkle and melancholy, creating a special niche of folk music.
Hurray! Today ‘V – Part Three of L.O.V.E‘ is finally released, and it’s all thanks to all of you pledgers who helped me fund this EP and encouraged me through the production.
This time my bass player Janne Manninen has transformed my songs into electronica pop – a totally new sound for me which I love and I hope you will too.
On Thursday we’re releasing not one but two EPs! ‘V – Part Three of L.O.V.E’ is the most electronica I’ve ever been thanks to producer Janne Manninen, and ‘A – Part Two of L.O.V.E’ is the most hard rock my songs have ever been thanks to Swedish metal band G.A.I.N. (you can buy them both here! )
Speaking of EPs I just got a nice review from Swedish rock music site Hallowed on my second EP ‘O’. Daniel Källman who wrote it seems to be into singer/songwriters so I hope he won’t get a total chock when he hears ‘V’ 🙂 Here’s what he thought about ‘O’
“This EP is just absolutely fantastic in its best moments. Sure if you are a narrow minded typical metalhead you will probably not like this album but then again you will probably have stopped reading after singer-songwriter anyway. For all of us who like music however, this EP is a real treat.”
Kjell-Åke Glimberg brought his camera to my latest gig here in Stockholm and shot some of the songs I played. Here’s ‘Jonestown’ live at Lasse i Parken. Enjoy!
Sofia Talvik live 2011. Filmed by Kjell-Åke Glimberg
I met up with G.A.I.N who have recorded the second part of the H.A.T.E saga, ‘A – Part Two of H.A.T.E’. Here’s their thoughts about the project.
Hi G.A.I.N! You guys are doing “A – part two of H.A.T.E” how is the EP coming along? It’s coming along very well. It’s all done and waiting to be released. Niklas Stålvind of Wolf produced and mixed. Mike Wead of King Diamond and bibelblack mastered. From the final result we can definitely say that it sounds kick-ass! We’re very proud of what we’ve done and we can’t wait until we can share the result with the world!
Great! Can you tell us a little bit about yourselves? We’re just a couple of metalheads doing what we love. We all come from different places but our love for Metal brought us together. We all live in Stockholm and we like to go out and have a good old dirty time. It happens a little too often but that’s Metal for you! We live by the motto, Sex, Booze and Tattoos!
What did you think of the original songs when you first heard them and did you think it was hard to interpret them into your own style or did you get ideas straight away? When we first heard the songs we wondered what the hell we’d gotten or self’s in to. It was a little hard to “connect” with the songs at first but after a few listening’s they grew on us and now we like them. We decided early not to listen to the originals that much too ensure that our versions came more from us, so that they would sound like G.A.I.N. Some songs we had ideas for right after the first listen but some came harder. The song that came easiest was probably “King of the Willow Tree” and one that we had to work a bit on was “Glow”.
Which of the songs are you most pleased with and why? Our favorites are probably King of the Willow Tree and The War. We really like the raw drive of the riffs in both songs. They are really in our own style and don’t sound like covers at all. Your way of writing really fitted well into our kind of music. They came out just like our own songs.
What’s your favorite gig memory? Three of us remember on gig in particular. Mr Bandiit was a little too excited and played a bit fast. This resulted in that Gus had to prioritize ether singing or breathing in the last song. He chose to sing… He gave his last bit of energy in that song and as a result of that he ended up taking an ambulance ride to the hospital.
Can you tell us a little bit about the recording sessions and what was most fun with being a part of this project? We recorded everything in Viper Studios. From this experience we learned that we will never record four songs in two days again. It’s borderline impossible and we don’t recommend it. We finished all the rhythm guitars and the drums in one day and thought we were doing very well. Only lead guitar, bass and vocals left right? The lead guitar and the bass were done at about 8 o’clock the next night. The vocals took another 7-8 hours and would have taken longer if it weren’t for the excellent vocal coaching Niklas Stålvind of Wolf provided. We’re forever grateful for that. But on the whole it has been a lot of fun to be part of this project. We’ve learned a lot and would like to thank you for this opurtunity.
What’s next on the agenda for G.A.I.N this fall? Get out and play. The big damn show! This fall we will focus on getting out and bring our music to the masses. We haven’t played all summer so we’re really excited about getting out there again! We’ll just have to make sure that Gus gets to breath. Do you know where we can get a portable oxygen tank?
Thanks for hanging out! We look forward to hearing the songs.
The new EP is coming along nicely! My producer Janne Manninen has just started mixing the songs and I’m happy to give you not one, but TWO previews of the new songs. Here’s also some crazy pics from our studio!
Jonestown:
Each producer got to choose one of my old songs to make a re-make of. Janne chose ‘Jonestown’ from my third album and made it into an electronica version. We’ve also changed the lyrics on the chorus to my original lyrics that didn’t make the final cut on the first version.
