By Ryan Settee

Sweden's Hellacopters have been cranking out high energy "Action Rock" for years now, ever since 1994. Classic without being cliche, tough, yet tender at times, and injecting a much needed dose of authenticity and energy into music that seems to otherwise have no lineage these days, The Hellacopters have influenced a generation of bands, and are still upstaging 'em all. Robert Eriksson, the drummer of the 'Copters, had answered a few questions that I had about his bands' past, present, and future.

Your latest record, "By the Grace of God" is a continuation in your love of classic rock that you'd started rolling on "Grande Rock". I personally feel that you created a timeless album there (along with "High Visibility"), and It seems like ever since then, the Hellacopters have been on a major classic rock kick. Does the band feel like there's a lack of really timeless rock n' roll albums out there, these days?
There´s still classic rock around but it seems a bit too polished and too controlled for my personal taste. And then there´s some bands that makes a great record “for the moment” but won´t stand the test of time. I don´t think about it that way. When we make a record we wanna make it as good as we possible can in the longterm way, period.

Now that you guys have sorta left your earlier, faster, more metal-rific rock n' roll of "Supershitty To the Max" behind, did you feel that moving away from that sound was important to keeping the band vital and fresh?
Once again we don´t think about it, we go in and record what we have. And through the years we´ve consumed huge amounts of different music that inevitabely influences us in some ways-- either we like it or not. I don´t think our earlier records are bad in any way, I´m just saying if they were done now, they would sound different. But then again there´s some (earlier) songs that could have been written yesterday. Most of the difference lies in the way they were recorded. Eight years ago the more distorted everything was, the better. That´s not the case these days. So the “changing” comes without us thinking about it.

When the Hellacopters started out in around 1994, there weren't alot of bands doing the full on rock n' roll thing, even in underground circles. Now there's alot of bands that are doing it, especially in Scandinavia, and what do you think of the rock n' roll resurgence?
Great! But then again there´s always been bands around here in Sweden (like the Nomads) that play straight rock´n´roll so we were not by any terms first, but I think we helped to spread it a bit.

You guys love a whole bunch of great bands like Radio Birdman, Stooges, Misfits, and New York Dolls, as evidenced in your great covers of some songs by those groups. Do you think that keeping the rock n' roll lineage alive is important?
Well, first of all it´s fun playing the songs you like. Then it´s also fun to play a song by an “unknown” band for the crowd (80 % of the “general” crowd we play for in Sweden have never heard of Radio Birdman for example) to sort of “show them” good music. EDUCATE THE AUDIENCE so to speak...haha!

The Hellacopters are quite well known over in Sweden and Europe, right? How do you feel about your status in North America, in terms of popularity?
Our status in America has pretty much been the same since day one. In some cities we play for a bigger audience than before but we haven´t broken through to everybody yet...In Canada we´ve played far too few times, but the shows we´ve done have been great! As a matter fact I´m listening to D.O.A. when I write this! Speaking of Canada I mean...

Gotta love DOA, man! Did you ever think that, back in 1994, that the Hellacopters would ever get to be as big of an influence, and as successful as they are, now?
ABSOLUTELY NOT!!! When we started our plan was to have a few rehearsals and make a couple of songs, then release a 7” single (“Killing Allan” our debut single) so that we would have proof that we at least existed as a band if somebody asked us later. Then we got offered a show here in Stockholm and did that, then someone asked if we could make a single for his label, one more concert, etc. etc. We still don´t see ourselves as a big and influential band or anything. We´re good to keep ourselves on the ground where we belong. And we still don´t plan very long ahead, mostly only a few months.

Wayne Kramer asked Nicke to be in an updated, new version of the MC5, right? That must have been a heck of an honour!
Oh yeah, he couldn´t believe it! He called everyone of us up and asked what to do, “can I really do it?” sort of... We had some shows around that time but we cancelled and postponed three of them so he would be able to get to London, rehearse and play the show and then back to our tour again! I didn´t see them but apparentely it was fantastic!

Your old guitarist Dregen left because he wanted to focus more on his band, the Backyard Babies. Was there any bitter partings, or are the you and him still friends?
We´re still friends and hang out on a regular basis, when we´re not out on tour of course! It was a necessary thing to do and it was a bit hard for us for a few months but we had friends filling in on guitar so no shows got cancelled because of it. We met Backyard Babies on tour in Spain, they had a day off and came to see us and that´s the only time so far that Nick, Strings & Dregen shared the guitar-duties on stage together. Only two songs though, but it was great fun! He has also sung “Search and Destroy” on stage with us a couple of times.

There were a few guitarists that you had in the band temporarily, before Robert "Strings" Dahlqvist joined the Hellacopters. Was the chemistry just not right between them and the band?
Here´s the story: Chuck Pounder, the first guy after Dregen, was a “stand-in” guitarplayer since we had a European tour coming up in 7 days when Dregen quit in May 1998. We actually contacted him right after we had given the ultimatum (choose between The Hellacopters or Backyard Babies) to Dregen, which he would answer within 3 hours he said. We already knew what the answer would be so Nick called Chuck and asked him if he was interested if / when Dregen says no. He said “of course” and after he learned 17 songs in 5 rehearsals we left on the tour. After the tour we started looking for a “real” replacement but that took some time so Chuck continued to play with us and after Europe we went to both Australia, New Zealand, Japan and USA. In the middle of all that (September ´98 we recorded Grande Rock as a fourpiece (Nick, Kenny, Robert and Boba who played both piano and second guitar). After that we tried out Mattias Hellberg, another friend, on one American tour (December ´98. He didn´t fit 100% so we told him that after the tour (he was also on one recording-session) but we´re still friends and hang out. (Actually Mattias, together with Nick and Strings, are the back-up touring-band for a famous Swedish singer/songwriter right now!) THEN we found Strings in a bar. He was a bartender in one of the regular places where we go, Peppar here in Stockholm, and we started hanging out and talking and then we rehearsed the first time in March ´99 and went on tour again in April. Grande Rock came out in May and since then we´re going strong! Feels like this is the ultimate line-up!

I have this feeling that you're big Didjits fans, especially after hearing "Grande Rock". Are you, and how much of an influence are they on your band?
We´re fans of both Didjits and Gaza Strippers (Rick Sims' band after that). I know that Nick loves the "Hornet Pinata" album (well I do too!) so it might have been some influence on his songwriting but I would say that other American bands from that “era”; New Bomb Turks, Supersuckers, Dwarves, Rocket From The Crypt & The Devil Dogs are even bigger influences for us in general, especially when we started. There´s a lot of those influences on the first album along with Swedish bands like Union Carbide Productions & The Nomads. And of course MC5, Stooges, Motörhead, Kiss, Ramones, Sex Pistols, AC/DC, etc. On the second, Payin´ the Dues, we started to get our own sound.

You guys have released so many records! It's really hard to keep track of everything, but do you do this to always have that "nugget" for fans to seek out?
It started with us being very bad at saying no to labels who wanted a track on a tribute-record or a 7” single etc. Plus we liked the fact of having a lot of singles out on different labels. It helped us to go on tour in others countries, spread our name, 'cos our albums couldn´t be found everywhere (we´re still fighting that though...)

That brings me to my next question-- as alot of those obscure songs are compiled on the "Cream of the Crap", you're working on volume 2, right?
Yeah, Vol. 2 is coming out (here in Europe) in February. There´s still songs enough for both a Vol.3 and 4, plus we still do exclusive songs for other labels once in a while when we have the time, but we´re gonna do a “real” album between each of them so expect the last one to be out around 2135.

Ha ha....I'm writing from Canada here, so i'm just wondering.......who are your favorite current Canadian bands, and who do you consider to be some classic Canuck bands that the 'Copters would like to cover?
We´ve played with The Spitfires from Vancouver, who are very good. Can´t think of any else for the moment, but some classic bands are of course Nomeansno, D.O.A., Voivod, Rush, Razor,& Exciter! Aren´t they all from Canada? The Nomads also did a bunch of great covers on their “Cold hard facts of life” record: Ugly Ducklings, Northwest Company, Teenage Head etc.

It says in the liner notes to "Cream of the Crap", that there's copies of the "Killing Allan" 7" out there on E-Bay, that aren't originals. Does this offend the band that there's people out there capitalizing on both the Hellacopters success, and ripping off unsuspecting fans?
When someone does a bootleg of your band, that in itself is something of an accomplishment, so the few bootlegs of us that are around is sort of flattering. But mostly the vinyl ones with hard-to-get songs (“Empty Heart” 7”, “Born Broke” LP), cos then you know that the guy who made them has made an effort rather than just making a bunch of CDs with a cheap cover. I know a friend who´s a record-trader that has got us one copy each. The “Killing Allan” one is a bit boring though, cos the guy just continues to make the record to make money and new vinyl-colors all the time too just so the collector has to get copy after copy. That´s resentful.

If there's one band that you guys think is very overrated, who do you think it is? Say, maybe a classic band, and a newer band.
Whooo, there´s a million of `em!!! All American bands that are on the radio and tv nowadays like P.O.D., Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park etc. are really crap if you ask me. Then again, since 95% of the music today is crap I don´t even wanna waste my time on talking shit about bands, I just don´t listen to them. There´s so much good music to discover instead.

I totally agree. What else is new with the Hellacopters, and what does 2004 have in store for you guys?
As I said earlier, in February Cream of the Crap! Vol. 2 comes out here in Europe. Don´t know about Canada, sorry. And then finally By The Grace Of God will be out in the US sometime around April. But there´s sadly not time for a tour there. Since we´ve waited so long to have the record out there, other plans have come up in the meantime: Nick is recording a soul-record together with Scott Morgan around the same time (April). Boba and Strings also play in a band called Diamond Dogs, and they have their third record out (first with Strings) in March and are touring Europe after that. We all DJ a fair bit in different rockclubs, parties etc. In fact me and Boba will fly down to Italy for a short DJ-tour in March!

Nick has also started a rockclub called Wild Kingdom, together with a couple of friends (Henke Walse who does our artwork and Calle Schewen who started White Jazz Records and now runs his new label Wild Kingdom Records). I play drums in The Wild Kings who plays every month that the club is held, together with Chips K. (our producer) and Macke (ex-Turpentines), plus different guests each time to make every night special. (Are you following...?) We only do covers so far from bands like The Nomads, The Nerves, Buzzcocks, Johnny Thunders & the Heartbreakers, Real Kids, The Sonics, The Runaways, and The Undertones. The next occasion, on February 10, we might do Lime Spiders, Stiff Little Fingers, The Ramones, Sex Pistols, Blondie, Eddie & the Hotrods among a others, we´ll see. So I can´t honestly say when we get back to the US and Canada, but when we do it´ll be great!!!

Of course, the Hellacopters have their excellent new album out, "By the Grace Of God", as well as a DVD titled "Goodnight Cleveland", which documents the last 10 days of the 'Copters 2002 US tour for their album, "High Visibility". You can keep track of the band's news and stuff at the Hellacopters' official website.