Here’s a band you should be checking out. Garage punk-metal crossover Acid Blood. The Stooges and their chaotic sound meets the exploited meets early Mayhem for a kick-off. We thought what better than hunting down bands from around the globe and giving them some space on RPM Online especially when they are as good as Acid Blood. So introducing the band ladies and germs here’s Acid Blood…
RPM Online: Firstly. Tell us a little about the band. How did the band form? What influences brought the band together?
Jojo: Karl asked me and I said yes!
Emil: I wasn’t in the band from the beginning, but when the previous bass player quit Karl reached out to me and asked if I wanted to try out a few songs.
Karl: My old bands broke up and I was looking for people to start a new band with. I ran into Jojo in a heavy metal bar, then again at a friend’s party and we sort of started the band there and then. The first bass player answered an ad and the drummer came from another band I knew. We did our first gig in November 2016, and recorded the 7″ EP “Dagger Eyes” in January 2017. It didn’t work out with them, so Jojo and I had to start again with a new line-up in early 2018. I knew Emil from bands and friends. His old band Raging Steel played gigs with my old band AC4. I first met Isak in our rehearsal room, when he came down to try out for us.
Jojo: Karl writes the music and some lyrics, and I also write lyrics. Karl writes about war and stuff, and I write about plants, idiots and so on.
Emil: Then I add my own touch to them.
Isak: Karl writes almost all of the songs. As musicians, I think we all get inspiration from quite different bands and musicians.
Karl: My riffs are mainly influenced by old British Punk and American Blues, and some hard rock and heavy metal. Stuff recorded between the early 1940’s and late 1980’s. Just guitar based rock’n’roll. Lyrically my biggest influences are probably Lemmy and Jello Biafra.
RPM Online: The band has a striking image and the album sleeve was certainly attention-grabbing. What reaction does the band get locally?
Karl: Well, Jojo was striking when I first met her. She really stood out in an all-male sea of black and blue denim. That’s why I asked her if she wanted to front my new band. I thought she looked cool and different, and had her own style, and independent people like that usually have the confidence to sing in a band. I’ve dressed like this for 40 years now. I wouldn’t know what else to wear. The hair’s been the same too, except a short period when I had a mohawk. It’s getting thinner though, now I’m getting mentally prepared for skinhead times, haha. Locally, I think we get a few more girls in the audience than other punk bands, which is really cool.
Isak: We get mostly positive reactions locally, Umeå is a town with a lot of punk and hardcore so people here enjoy our live-shows, I think.
Jojo: I only get positive response!
RPM Online: What about live shows, any plans for post-pandemic?
Karl: I just want to get out and play again. It’s been really difficult to book anything for a post-pandemic world when no-one knows when it’s gonna be over. Everything keeps getting postponed, as you know.
Jojo: We will play when it is time. We have done some live-streaming shows, and we are going to do some more.
Isak: No plans so far when it comes to live shows, but hopefully we can start booking some shows soon.
RPM Online: What kind of lockdown have you had? Have the past twelve months been creative for Acid Blood?
Jojo: It’s been an easy time for me in this pandemic. I don’t like people that much so I have just been doing what I always do. Hitting the gym, and hanging out with my closest friends. The band has done some new songs.
Karl: I’m still not fully recovered from getting the virus a year ago. Normally I do roadie and stage-hand work when I need money, but with all big events cancelled I had to do other odd jobs for my mate’s firm, including COVID-19 disinfection and waste management work. That’s not how I got the virus by the way, we wear pesticide suits and gas masks. I was probably infected at one of the last big festivals. I couldn’t see my girlfriend Jessica for 3 months then, so that was shit. With the band, we shot videos for some of the album tracks. We’ve already released videos for 7 of the 14 album tracks, and with the slow progress here in Sweden it’s starting to look like we’ll have time to do videos for all of them.
Isak: No real lockdown here in Sweden. we have still been able to have band rehearsals. We´re rehearsing new songs at the moment so I think it´s been a creative period even if the pandemic has affected some of the plans for the band, such as the live shows.
RPM Online: What next for the band? New album- songs? Tour dates?
Jojo: A new album is coming up!
Emil: We are writing new material to put on a new album and when all this is over, hopefully, we can do a tour with both albums!
Isak: New album is what´s next, I think! Maybe another video as well.
RPM Online: Have you been able to meet and play together over the past 12 months?
Isak: Yes, but without bass.
Emil: Unfortunately, I haven’t rehearsed a lot with the band during this year because of covid related things, but I sure as fuck miss it.
Karl: We did a live-set at an international on-line festival a few weeks ago and Emil had to wear an old army surplus gas mask for that! It was fun though and it turned out pretty good.
Jojo: Yes!
RPM Online: Any bands you’d love to tour with when it’s safe to do so?
Jojo: Celine Dion!
Karl: Yeah, right now the answer is any band on any tour! We’d be happy to open for Nickelback, haha, no. If I look back on tours that I’ve done in the past, all the bands that liked the old sex, drugs and rock’n’roll thing were fun to tour with. I get along with most bands, but yeah, we all wanna do shows with our favourite bands, don’t we? The ones you love and respect, you wanna be a small part of their story too. For me that would be a band like The Exploited. Or Girlschool. Rose Tattoo. Varukers. Cockney Rejects. Iggy. D.O.A.. Airbourne. Vice Squad. I could list a thousand names. Someone recently wrote that Acid Blood should tour with Amyl and the Sniffers, that would be cool too!
Emil: There are a lot of great bands out there, but if I had to pick one; The Hellacopters or Venom would be great to tour with.
RPM Online: What about writing collaborations, anyone you’d love to write with? What bands would you say influence Acid Blood?
Emil: I’m not interested in collaborating with other bands with Acid Blood. If I’m going to write something with other people, I want it to be a different project.
Karl: Yeah, I don’t think I’ve ever thought of collaborations. I sometimes write music that doesn’t fit my own band, you know, like songs that are maybe too much blues or Aussie bar rock, but I have those riffs kind of tucked away with no plan. I wouldn’t mind writing a hit single for another band though, haha. The biggest influences on the Acid Blood songs are probably Motörhead, Exploited, Stooges, and the biggest influence on myself would be the Sex Pistols, they really changed my life.
RPM Online: Anything else you’d like to promote.
Jojo: PUSS!
Emil: Hope to see you when this shit is over!
Karl: Yeah, once the pandemic is under control, we’d love to tour the UK! In the meantime, feel free to stop by
European LP and 7″ EP on JANML/MvL
US CD on Dead Beat Records
http://www.dead-beat-records.com
The album is also available at Amazon, iTunes, Apple Music, Deezer, Tidal, MediaNet, Napster, Spotify and other digital stores.
Acid Blood – Jojo Anderbygd – vocals / Karl Backman – guitar / Emil Fjällström – bass / Isak Mörtzell – drums
Recent Comments