Camilla Nordahl, V2 Music Scandinavia
camilla.nordahl@v2music.com
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BIOGRAPHY
Peter Morén from Dalarna in the North of Sweden and Björn Yttling from Västerbotten - even further to the North - had been playing music together for 8 years when they in 1999 met John - from Norrbotten - which would you believe it is yet even further to the North!
The following year they started a band and simply called it Peter, Bjorn and John - not due to lack of better names - but because it felt right. Band names are often ridiculous - so why not just go for your own name? First they thought that they would recruit a bass player but after the well known saying "3 is a crowd" thus more than enough - the keyboard player Björn began playing bass. Live the band have learned to use the little format to its advantage and in the studio well let's just say they have been known to do overdubs...!
Initially all the press they got had to do with Björn's production CV and the members different guest appearances on other more well known bands and artists records. But soon that would change.
In 2002 the home recorded self titled debut album was released and received comments from the press regarding "superior sound beds" and "upcoming classics" while songs like "Matchmaker" and "People They Know" became favourites with the indie pop crowd. Rough Trade in London even penned "nothing else sounds as good in Swedish pop right now" and were probably not completely mistaken.
2004 saw the follow up with the more complete, mature and darker "Falling Out". "It beats me everytime" became a Swedish radio hit and the album was released Stateside the following year to press acclaim. Allmusic.com gave the album 4,5 stars and wrote: "very close to the best indie rock -- no, just plain music -- being made in 2005. More punk than the Concretes, less frantic than Shout Out Louds, as catchy as the most tuneful of the UK post-post-post-punk merchants. Falling Out firmly established Peter, Bjorn and John as a group to watch out for. Strike that. They are a band that has arrived in all senses of the word".
Now in 2006 PBJ embark on the second phase of their careers. The new album "Writer's Block" (recorded in Björn's studio in Hornstull,Stockholm) is the first to showcase all three members as songwriters and taking on lead vocalist duties and sees the band take on a new musical direction.
Peter Bjorn And John - Writer's Block
The area or indeed the blocks in which the album Writer’s Block was written and recorded are in a part of Stockholm called Hornstull – an area that recently has become quite hip even though there are parts that are still pretty dodgy. (The old timers call it kniv-söder, kniv meaning knife and söder – south)
Bjorn and Peter both live in Hornstull and Bjorn’s studio- combined rehearsal space is there handily located in the basement of the bar Sjöhästen (The Seahorse) where PBJ often host their own club called “Lucky You”. Right next door is Micke’s Records, a tiny used-record store that’s open as long as the owner feels like (and that’s often a lot longer than six or seven PM when most stores close here in Sweden) and has whatever you can or cannot think of.
”The question is, was I more alive then than I am now?
I happily have to disagree;
I laugh more often now, I cry more often now,
I am more me”
- Objects of My Affection
These words are sung convincingly by Peter Morén in the self-reflective ”Objects of My Affection”. It’s as much about the band’s development since they started in 1999 as it is about his personal self. Writer’s Block is Peter Bjorn and John’s third album and finds them laughing and crying more, exposing more of their true selves. Anyone that has not come across the band before will find their sound and expression is unique, playful and alive and those familiar with PBJ will only agree that this time they have changed the musical course and have by far surpassed the previous efforts.
With the SONG – first single”Young Folks” they have created an indie-anthem for 2006. It starts off with surging, funky drums, addictive maraca shaking, crazy bongos and a pleasantly lo-fi bass-line; all this wrapped up in a whistling melody – the result sounds like a mix of a wild west B-movie and a schoolyard full of fuel-engine kids. The song, that features Peter in a duet with Viktoria Bergsman of The Concretes, deals with that first period in brand new relationship when you are nervous and dazed, when you’ve just met and only want to be with each other whilst at the same time worrying about how much you want to show your true self to the other person so as not to scare them.
”If I told you things I did before,
told you how I used to be,
would you go along with someone like me?”
- Young Folks
Another difference since the first two albums PETER BJORN AND JOHN (2002) and Falling Out (2004) is that now both Bjorn and John join Peter in the vocal duties. Bjorn sings lead on ”Amsterdam”, which has a fantastic Prince –like chorus and on the repetitive, Spacemen 3-inspirered ”Roll The Credits”. John sings lead on, amongst others, the suggestive ”Start To Melt”, one of the many highlights of the album.
The lyrics are often brutally honest. All three are songwriters, but they’ve only wrote one song together - ”The Chills” – which is one of the fastest songs but with a slow and striking chorus.
”Your field is crowded and there is still
no place for someone like me to fill”
- The Chills
With Writer´s Block Peter Bjorn and John have made one of the best albums 2006.
DANIEL VÄRJÖ, (The Concretes) STOCKHOLM 2006-03-30