by Stella Kim

LINKS:
backyardbabies.com

STELLA KIM: Introduction, please. A brief introduction about who you are.

DREGEN SVENSSON: My name is Dregen, and I play guitar in Backyard Babies. I’m touring with Social Distortion, and we’re in a parking lot in somewhere in fucking New Jersey.

SK: Sayerville, New Jersey.

DS: Mm hmm.

SK: What are you currently up to?

DS: We are gonna have an album out called Tinnitus on April 5th in the States. It’s more or less a compilation of last three records, kinda like best of thing, kinda like introduction since we haven’t toured here since the end of 2000.

SK: Yeah, that’s right. Actually that’s one of my questions.

DS: Ah, okay.

SK: So how’s the tour going? You guys toured with Social Distortion before.

DS: Yeah, they’re actually the band who brought us over in the first place. We did a tour with Social Distortion in '97 in Europe, and then they invited us over to America to tour with them. So they were the guys who got us signed in the first place.

SK: So you are good friends.

DS: Yeah, yeah.

SK: Why didn’t you tour in the U.S. for such a long time? When was the last time you toured here again?

DS: End of 2000. We signed with this record label called Scooch Pooch when the album Total 13 came out, then we toured here pretty frequently. Like we did a two-month tour with L7, then we did our own tour. Then we signed with RCA records, which was great in some ways. I mean it was great for Europe, great for Japan, but RCA Records here is only about fucking Britney Spears. So we were kinda stuck with that contract, so the last two albums never came out here.

SK: So Stockholm Syndrome and Making Enemies Is Good never came out here?

DS: No, unfortunately.

SK: So what are the three albums that you are gonna make a compilation out of?

DS: It’s a compilation with four songs from the last three albums. Eventually they’re gonna release the whole back catalogue.

SK: Good to hear that. So what are your expectations on this tour?

DS: (Mumbling Swedish) Oh, I guess to gain new fans. Just start promoting the new album. The album’s gonna be out on April 5. So at the very moment, they’re booking our own headlining tour.

SK: So you guys are touring here again soon! (Noticeably delighted)

DS: Yeah, sure. You’re gonna see a lot of us over here.

SK: That makes me happy ‘cause I’m gonna have to miss the show tonight and I was so bummed out about that.

DS: Have you seen us before?

SK: No. I was about 15 at the end of 2000, and that was right around then I started to get in to your music. Then you never came to tour in the States. Speaking of touring, what was your best touring memory?

DS: (Silence)

SK: Too many?

DS: I guess. Well, you know, I guess every tour is good. Support-wise, we have the privilege. We are a pretty picky band. We don’t go on tour with anybody. No fucking money in the world could make us tour with Limp Bizkit. We’ve been touring with bands that we’ve been fans of, you know, Social Distortion, AC/DC, Kiss. We did a tour with Velvet Revolver in Europe before we came here. And uh, Hanoi Rocks and the Wildhearts.

SK: What was your worst touring memory?

DS: The worst touring memory. I guess that’s gonna be the van tour we did in Eastern Europe somewhere. Middle of nowhere. I mean, I don’t have any bad memories. It doesn’t matter if we’re playing in New Jersey or Osaka, Japan. We normally do good shows. Oh, we had a terrible experience in Hamburg last year. A guy actually died in the audience. I mean that was out of our control. There was nothing we could do.

SK: How do you feel about the new label?

DS: Excited.

SK: They’re pushing you guys in the States.

DS: Yeah. I mean, they should.

SK: So what direction are you going in the future music-wise?

DS: We probably won’t be out touring in Europe for a long time like we did before. I mean we’ve been touring with these albums for a really long time in Europe. So it’s time for a fresh start in America. Oh, we’re actually writing songs for the new album already in the studio too.

SK: Give me a little historical background on Backyard Babies.

DS: Four guys growing up in a small city in Sweden. We all went to the same school, had the same interest for rock music, record collectors and all that. Then one day we decided to form a band. Same four guys ever since then.

SK: So what’s the secret to stay together as a band? So many bands break up, go through member changes, you know.

DS: We’re like, you know, old marriage. We stay together but we don’t fuck anymore. We’re friends, of course. I don’t have any brothers or sisters so they’re like brothers to me. And we never played in any other bands, so we don’t know anything else.

SK: What are your influences as a band?

DS: Well, I mean the reason I started playing music in the first place was Kiss. Kiss and Sex Pistols. If we wanna describe Backyard Babies, I would say we’re kinda like a missing link between Kiss and the Ramones. I don’t know if we’re a punk-loving hard rock band or hard rockin’ punk band. Since we were all born in 87, we grew up with punk music, but we all had share of Slayer and Judas Priest albums too, you know.

SK: What about personal influence, as a guitarist?

DS: I’m kinda like a three-finger guitar player, so I can pretty much cut off my left finger and be cool. I grew up with Ace Frehley, Jimmy Page, John Lee Hooker.

SK: So you’re not a fan of technical shredders.

DS: Well, if you look at us individually in Backyard Babies, it wouldn’t be anything that’d blow your mind. But it’s different when we play together. We’re not about sitting home practicing. We spend so many hours on the road playing together, so we’re more about song writers than players. So you know, I’m not really into guitar masturbation like Yngwie.

SK: Ah, so you’re not a fan of Yngwie.

DS: No, actually he’s pretty high on my shit list. I mean those guitar players grew up in classical music. And you know, I think classical music should be done by violin and things like that.

SK: So you play any classical instruments?

DS: No, I’m a blues man.

SK: How important is visual image to your band?

DS: My first musical experience was, you know, I mean my first album was Kiss Alive II on vinyl. So I spent the week of my life trying to look like the cover. I mean you can never make a career on images. It’s all about the songs, but at the same time, I think you can judge the book by its cover when it comes to music. I mean it’s all about being noticed. If I hear about two good bands and I only got fifteen bucks, I’ll probably pick up the album with cooler cover.

SK: Why do you think that Backyard Babies hadn’t been able to achieve much popularity here?

DS: Well, I think over here it’s very radio-driven, which is different from Europe. It’s more of a mafia scene over here. You can give them the right amount of money, and they’ll play your songs on the radio.

SK: The Wildhearts toured here recently. You guys seem to share a lot of fanbase.

DS: Yeah, we’re good friends. We played with the Wildhearts last August in some Spanish festival, but I haven’t seen Ginger since then. Maybe we’ll do another song together.

SK: Anything you haven’t done but you want to music-wise?

DS: Yeah, sell shit loads of albums. We haven’t done that. We’ve made many great albums though.

SK: Future plans?

DS: Try to go to bed for one more hour so I can play a good show.

SK: Any long-term future plans?

DS: Oh, yeah, we go down the East Coast to Florida, then New Orleans, then I think Texas, then end this tour in Vegas. Then we do a Scandinavian tour.

SK: Final words?

DS: Well, for the fans who are really interested, we have a live album out called Live in Paris. It was recorded in Paris last spring. We also have a DVD out, it’s like a documentary of 16 year history. They’re both out in Europe.

SK: Well, we’re finally done! Thank you for the interview.

DS: Cool, thank you very much.

Check out Tinnitus from Liquor and Poker Music, which should be out by
the time this article’s out if you are interested.

Thank you to Dregen from Backyard Babies for a cool interview and Jen Malone from Black&White PR for arranging the interview.