Biography
I was born 1980 in
Helsingborg - Sweden. My interest in music started early when I was around four
or five years old.
My grandparents had a christmas album with Swedish singer Bosse Larsson called
"Hej tometegubbar".
That album turned my life upside down. It's unbelivable what a innocent
christmas album can do to a kid...
I totally persecuted everyone that crossed my path, by singing christmas songs.
And since I never been much of a
singer, I probably made their ears bleed. I must have got some weird looks from
people while singing christmas
songs in the middle of the summer.
However, Bosse Larsson was my first big idol, and I consider him the root of all
evil music that I create.
Maybe someday this album will enter your life and turn it upside down as well...
Let's take a big leap in
time. The year is 1992 and I was watching a Guns N' Roses concert on tv with a
couple of
friends. We all played air guitar, thinking we were as cool as Slash. Watching
this guy with a Les Paul in his hands,
a cigarette in his mouth and the coolest hat known to mankind I knew I had to
start playing myself.
My parents bought me black Sratocaster copy, a small amp and distortion pedal.
My dreams had come true!!
Instead of a cheerful christmas singer I had transformed into a heavy metal
guitar player! I Practiced days amd nights and I bet my parents wished
they had bought me an harmonica instead.
I started taking lessons
at a local music school where I earned basic chords, scales and some riffs.
After a about a year I decided to study on my own
using tabulature books, mainly Metallica and Iron Maiden stuff. I leaned the
complete Black Album by Metallica as well as some other stuff. At this
point I was around 14 or 15.
My next guitar was a Ibanez Roadstar guitar. I came home from school one day,
and the guitar was lying there on my bed.
My dad bought without
telling me. I got so happy, that I probably had tears in my eyes. Sold my old
guitar to a friend, and we started to play and make music together.
Nothing fancy, but we had lot’s of fun. We did covers of songs by a local death
metal band among other things.
Around 1996 I got into punk music.. Still like some of the stuff. At that time I was seeing myself as a rhythm
guitar player. I didn't spend to much
time on lead guitar playing...My
good friend and drummer Martin Svensson and myself started to play and jam a lot.
We recorded some crappy punk music demos, which I still have in my apartment
today. We really sucked, but we sure had fun.
Moving on... When I was
18 I started to take some private guitar lessons from a local guitar player.
He got me into more guitar oriented music like Yngwie Malmsteen and Steve Vai.
I had never heard such guitar playing before, and I couldn’t believe
how it was possible to play like that. I started some heavy practising, to be
able to play some fast and fancy solos. Learned a lot of Yngwie and Vai stuff,
just jamming along to various albums. I stayed home during the summer holidays
practicing, instead of chasing after girls and getting drunk.
The next turning point was when my father came home with a Marty Friedman cd (True
Obsessions). I loved Marty's phrasing, vibrato and use of
exotic scales. I had heard Marty's playing before on some Megadeth albums, but
didn't really take any notice until I heard that solo album.
1999 I came in contact with Swedish guitar player Mattias IA Eklundh for the
first time.
He was doing a guitar clinic in my home town. I had no clue about who he was,
but I showed up and just dropped my chin.
After the clinic Mattias gave me a private lesson, and during the following
years I got several lessons from him.
IA is such a great guy, and we still speak from time to time.
During my visit at Mattias annual Freak Guitar Camp in 2001, I met another great
player named Christian Johansson.
We became really good friends and decided to stay in touch after the camp since
Christian only lives about an hour
away from me by train.
Today Christian is one of my best friends and we make music under the project
name In Focuz where the music is
in focus. Lot's of soft, melodic acoustic stuff which I really enjoy doing.
During that time I started recording my own music for the first time. I didn't
have the best equipment, but it was
to get some ideas out of my head. The first song I recorded was a cheesy song
called Speak up. I used a drum machine
with the most corny sound ever, and direct line in recording. I always crack up
when I listen to that song.
Around 2002 a friend of mine introduced me to a local player named Magnus
Olsson. Me and Magnus became good
friends and Magnus pushed my playing to new heights (he still does). Magnus has
helped me in so many ways with my
playing. He's a really great guy, and one hell of a player and a photographer.
Ok, so now I'm 24 years
old, and I found a add on the internet from a band that were looking for a new
lead guitar player. The name of the band was Indemnity.
They played heavy thrash metal, in the vein of Metallica. I wasn't really into
that kind of music, but I met up with the guys and we came along really well. I
got
the job, and had to learn all their songs in about a week since there was a gig
booked in Malmö. The gig went well even though I was improvising a lot since I
still
wasn't sure about all parts.
The same year we
recorded a demo cd called 16 hours of darkness. This was my first time in
a real studio.
I am still very proud of the songs on that cd. The demo got some good words in
Swedish magazines. We also got the title track played on the radio one time.
We only did 100 copies of the cd, and they sold out pretty quick. We got some
offers from record labels, but nothing serious. You need to watch your back,
in the music industry so we declined.
2005 consisted of some
live shows with Indemnity, as well as recordong more of my own music. I
also visited Mattias IA Eklundh's Freak Guitar Camp for the
third time. where I finally got to meet the amazing Ron "Bumblefoot" Thal for
the first time. I had been in touch with Ron for a few years, ever since IA
played
one of his records for me. It was cool to finally meet Ron in person and I got
some lessons from him as well, that changed a lot of my approach to the
instrument.
In 2006 I had to leave
Indemnity, since I moved to Katrineholm, which is around 6 hours away
from my hometown. The band split up after a few years of great
times and lot's of playing. Me and the singer Jonas Gustavsson are very good
friends, and we are talking about making music together again, when time allows.
Let's continue our
journey and move forward in time. The year is now 2007 and I got endorsed by
Vigier guitars. This was a really cool thing, since I had a fretless
guitar that I got back in 2005. Got my self an Excalibur custom model as my
first endorsement guitar. Love that one a lot too.
In 2008 I returned back
to Helsingborg. I began to work on some new songs, and recorded quite a lot of
music. I also started to give private guitar lessons again.
Had to quit the teaching after a while since time became an enemy. I began
working on what was supposed to be my first solo cd. I wrote about 8 songs for
the cd,
and by the time I finished song no.8 I, I couldn't stand listening to song no.1
anymore.
Also got a few endorsments from Curt Mangan strings and Spectraflex cables.
The following year I
began my studies towards being a english teacher at the university of Malmö.
Gonna finish my studies around 2013. Did some guest solos on other
artists recordings. Mostly fretless work.
In december 2009 I
decided to start from scratch and move towards a different direction with my
album. I wrote and recorded two songs, and for the first time I'm
really satisfied. The music is pretty different from anything I have ever done
before. Gonna do about four more songs for the album, and have the whole thing
ready at the end of 2010. The album is goiong to have a couple of cool guest
musicians on it as well. Got endorsed by the cool people at OddGrooves.com, and
their
stuff is being used a lot on the cd.
That's the story so far. I will update this biography as soon as things move forward. Thanks for reading.