Swedish indie pop/rock band Peter, Bjorn and John are heading down under for Splendour in the Grass. We had a chat with Peter Moren before hitting the stage about touring, song writing and the making of their seventh album, Breakin’ Point.
Hi Peter, I’ve seen some videos of your current US / Canada tour and the shows look crazy.
Yeah we get pretty energetic, that’s just how we are. It’s been fun, especially playing the new songs; it’s gone really well. It’s a good mix of songs, new and old.
Tell me about the stripping experience at the Grogg Shop.
Yeah that was in Cleveland the other night. We got some clothes made for this tour, like work wear inspired jumpsuits. I have this jumpsuit in black and I have a blue one that I don’t like as much, so I got this spur of the moment idea that I should sell it. It’s a one of a kind thing; it doesn’t exist anymore with all the patches.
We didn’t have any merch because it got stuck at the borders, so I didn’t have any merch for that Cleveland show; I said on-stage, “Sorry we don’t have any merch, but I will sell this jumpsuit to the highest bidder.” There was a guy who bid like, $225, so then we did a film at the end of the night of me taking it off and him putting it on. It was a little tight on him, but that was the strip. You don’t see that much, maybe a bit of my underwear.
I see you caught up with the bronze Fonzie as well.
Yeah, we met him before and we caught up with him again at Cleveland. It’s funny here in Toronto, I’m not interested I hockey, but Bjorn is a huge hockey fan, so the last time we went to Toronto we went to the hockey museum. This time, I was walking in the legends row and the Toronto Maple Leafs have a row of hockey players and the last two are Swedish, Bjorge Salming and Mats Sundin. It’s interesting, in Canada, they have to bring in Swedes to make it happen.
Haha. I remember last time I was in Stockholm airport they had photos of famous Swedish people on the wall. There are quite a few of them.
Yeah. We’re not on there – we’re quite offended. (Laughs)
Can you tell me about your latest album, Breakin’ Point? What was the motivation behind it?
At the start, it was that we had finished touring so we have to make another record and we started making new songs, but then it dragged on a bit because we didn’t have a direction of what we wanted to do. We wanted to make pop songs and make them under four minutes. Apart from that, we didn’t have any set rules apart from some dogma behind the production, so that made it a bit hard to know what we wanted it to sound like. We started out by bringing in Swedish songwriter and producer Patrik Berger and he worked on a couple of songs.
Then we kind of took a step backwards and we sat just the three of us in a room with pencil and paper and guitars, writing songs the classic way and tried to make them fit well in all the details before we started to produce anything. There is nothing wrong with that, people write on the computer and move things around; we tried that a bit, but it didn’t really work for us, so we had to go back to basics and write songs old school. After that, we ended up bringing in a lot of different people, just trying to make different songs go in different directions that other people could bring to the table, production wise; just “up” everything to Peter, Bjorn and John plus.
So a large range of producers gives you a good range of sounds, but did it make it difficult to keep a consistency of your own sound?
I don’t think so because as I said, we did start out by writing a song for ourselves, so they were pretty set. Of course, the producers played with the arrangements and sounds a bit, but we played most of it ourselves in our Stockholm studio, so we did a good groundwork on the demo and they brought in things. It was different on different songs; some we worked [on] with Swedish people here in Stockholm, others we had people in LA bouncing files, very modern way of producing, so we never really sat in the same room. Then of course, we went to London to the Church Studios to work with Paul Epworth and he worked on four songs, so they changed quite a bit there. It’s mainly recorded in Stockholm, except for the Church thing. I think it’s [fit] pretty well together.
Was setting up your own studio a defining moment for the band?
Yes and no. Even ten years ago, when we did Writers Block, Bjorn had a space; it wasn’t really a proper studio, but we recorded the album there anyway, because we didn’t have any money. We’d done quite a lot of work by ourselves all the time then we’ve been jumping into different Stockholm studios. Maybe the biggest thing on this album is that we didn’t have a set deadline and we had our own studio, so that might have affected the delay a little bit. It’s easier to go into your own studio, rather than booking other people’s. It’s a great studio though, so that’s good.
The cover imagery with the three hammers and the previous album Gimme Some having three thumbs – there’s an obvious link there.
It’s the same designer that did it so that’s the obvious link, but we like that pop art thing and we always use three objects on our covers, so we had to have that. The hammer, when we came up with the title Breakin’ Point, the work wear thing, going to the factory and going to work, crafting pop songs, so that’s where all the tools came from.
The “Breakin’ Point” video really captures the duality of Sweden, the dark and mysterious vs the light and brightness. Was that what you had in mind when you created the video?
All we said was that we wanted a European feeling to it and we wanted an older male and something a bit moody, but apart from that we didn’t really give any idea. We actually talked about cartoons and dolls, so some of those ideas come from us. I suggested getting Stellan Skarsgård or something but of course he couldn’t do it. Then we sent out this idea about the lonesome male, Europe and some sort of monster, so then ideas came from directors. This was actually shot in Poland, so we weren’t there, but I’m really pleased with it.
So you’ll be in Australia soon for Splendour in the Grass. Are you coming straight here from Canada or do you go home first?
It’s a bit different for different people in the band. Some are staying here in America, they’re going to Hawaii; I’m going home, but it will be just for a week. It’s kind of stupid, because I have to go around the world again, but I want to go home briefly. But we’re really looking forward to it.
Do you know much about Splendour in the Grass?
Not much more than it seems like a great festival and a great line up. Of course, we’re maybe a little bit sad that it’s winter but it’s not really like winter is it? It is outdoors, so it can’t be too cold.
Have you been to Australia before?
We have, but it was a long time ago, like nine years or something. We have been offered to come several times, but it hasn’t really worked out well. We’re really glad to be back finally because we seem to have a lot of fans there.
When you look back on the success of “Young Folks”, does it’s popularity sink in?
I guess it makes sense, because it’s a good song, and it was quite different to a lot of songs that came out in that period and it stood out in a way. I guess there were a lot of other songs after that sounded a bit like it so it was original and new, but I don’t think we really knew that ourselves; we noticed it after it happened, but when we play it at a show, of course people are happy to hear it, but basically it’s another song. It’s not the albatross of the show, because the rest of the show is so powerful.
It might even become a bit of trouble sometimes, because there are so many powerful songs and that song is quite twee, but people love it. We’ve been having a girl singing it every night, so that makes it a duet; in the past I’ve sung it myself, but this time we have someone playing acoustic guitar and she sings really well. That makes it better, I think. It fits well with the new songs too. Maybe it fits better with this new album than the last album, in a way.
Was it strange seeing yourselves as cartoon characters in that video?
It’s not really us. We nicked it from a 70’s cartoon book we found in the studio when we were recording, called “How to Record at Home” or something. So it’s not based on us at all, there are three people but any resemblance is … coincidental.
Your song with Claptone last year, “Puppet Theatre” was a favorite of mine; how did that collaboration come about?
Basically I got the instrumental track and made up the words and melody to it and put down some harmonies. I never met him (or them), but I really like it too because I’ve been trying to write some sad things but I think I’m so set in writing pop songs in a way. Sometimes things are so loose, it’s hard to put down a proper melody in my way, but that was really easy. There was something really moody about the instrumental track, something that fitted our type of melodies, so that was actually really easy so it was good. It was fun doing it and I’m glad that people liked it.
So would you say that you tend to write sad songs?
I can’t speak for all of the band, we all write songs and to some degree we all write lyrics, but for me, it just comes naturally and not something I think too much about. I guess it’s just the subject which triggers me to write lyrics. Not all songs are like that, for instance, “Young Folks” is pretty positive. I mean it’s melancholic, it’s not super dooper happy, but it’s positive. Other songs on that record Writer’s Block, like “Paris 2004” and “Roll the Credits”, a couple of those songs are quite positive [like] “Objects of my Affection”, but if we look at the whole discography, I think there is more negative and dark stuff.
I think it’s an old pop tradition that I quite like. Even in old Beatles songs or 60’s stuff, Motown, where it’s super happy then you listen the lyric; “I’ve got to dance to keep from crying” or “I’m a loser” – it’s just a tradition. It’s a thing that comes quite natural to me and I think it adds another layer to it. I quite like the opposite too, if you can pull that off; something that sounds really moody and dark, but it’s actually a positive lyric. I haven’t pulled that off so many times, but there’s something about contradiction that makes it more interesting.
It’s always important not to take yourself too seriously. It’s always nice when there’s little puns or self-sarcasm or ironies in the negative lyric or whatever or playfulness in the words. I think that is quite important because even Leonard Cohen has that.
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PETER, BJORN and JOHN AUSTRALIAN TOUR DATES
July 20th | Metro Theatre, SYDNEY
July 21st | Corner Hotel, MELBOURNE
Supported by Hein Cooper. The band also plays Splendour in the Grass this weekend!
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