Dear readers, we are pleased to offer you an interview with a Swedish band that plays Heavy Rock sounds steeped in Psychedelia and Stoner. We welcome Vikböle Boogie Brigade.
Hi, it is a pleasure to have you among our pages, how are you?
“We are great! The winter here is not the best so not so much snowmobile or snowboarding at the moment. More time for bandpractise and songwriting. We are happy about the latest release and planning for the next one where we are realesing three more songs.“
The band was formed recently, how did the project and the choice of the name Vikböle Boogie Brigade come about?
“We started jamming in a little shed just next to the railroad one day after a couple of beers in the slopes. The shed is outside our drummers place in Vikböle just outside Åre (Sweden). At first we called ourself Gandy Dancers wich is old slang for railroad workers because the shed was so close to the tracks. We have a bigger place to rehearse now and nobody liked the name Gandy Dancers so Vikböle Boogie Brigade it is, bit hard to say 10 times fast but it sounds pretty cool. Sometimes we just say ‘the VBBB’s tough.“
You offer a mixture of Heavy Rock Psychedelia, Boogie and Stoner, how did your passion for these sounds come about and what are your sources of inspiration in this regard?
“It is impossible to answer this question without mentioning Black Sabbath. Everything that sounds good sound a bit like Black Sabbath. We do listen to a lot of different music that we take inspiration from. From old blues, stoner, heavy metal, fuzz, boogie to old school hiphop.“
In January 2025 your debut single ‘Mountaineer Matilda’ was released and in February the EP ‘Hybris Hill,’ how would you describe these two works?
“Mountaineer Matilda is about a deer deer friend that no longer is with us, but instead of writing it cheesy and sad i tried to make it some what funny and happy. It is written about one epic day on the mountain with her instead.
The ep contains three of our earliest songs with one really straight forward and easy song ‘Boogie Town’. When we play it is kind of like just leaning forward and ride a long. Its a dancable banger! Desert Cruisin’ takes you for a ride in the desert in Mustang 64 with guitar battles and a bunch of different riffs. The song Dr. Joo Jii is the weirdest and fastest with a heavy riff that all of sudden stops and gives you a melodic breather. Its a wordplay both in lyrics and name. It is fun and quite exaggerating to play. When we recorded it we invited my little brother to add violin on the track with no guidelines whatsoever, ‘just get in the booth and fuck it up good’. And he did… at first its like ‘why is there a violin here all of a sudden’, but then it blends in and its kind of like, it must be there. My grandfather is the one that made the violin actually.“
Solid and engaging tracks, how does the creative process of your music take place?
“We really like to start on a boogie riff, jam around on it and make it heavy, fuzzy and throw in pieces with other tempos. We write the main ideas at home for a song and then mess around with it in the rehearsal place where we rewrite some parts and add more parts or verses to it. Some songs gets forgotten for a while and then gets picked up later and all of a sudden sounds a lot better then the first draw.“
The vocals are dynamic and incisive, what themes do the lyrics deal with?
“Same old stories about mountains, dessert, fast cars, cool stuff, love and forbidden pleasures as youve heard or read before but written with other words and pencils.“
Yours is an engaging sound, will there be a chance to hear you live in the near future?
“We really hope so. It would be so fun to play a bit further away from home. We got some gigs coming up in Sweden at least but we surely hope for a lot more. We love to play live and its important to give a good show no matter what, we have a lot of fun on stage and i think it shows when we play. I say like the native american in Waynes World: -If you book us, we will come!“
Do you have any memories or anecdotes about any live experiences with the band?
“Our first gig was on my girlfriends fishing themed birthday party. We played in waders and fishing wests on a small trailer in the forrest and weve had few to many before the gig. We looked funny and played loud. We opened up for ‘Plot of knives’ couple of months ago wich contains members from Entombed and other band we listened to a lot growing up. But on that gig, not even them where the main attraction. Because the gig where on a event where people on snowmobiles had tourney, a lans in hand, full throttle chicken race and last man standing. Then we played heavy music and people drank beer in an old barn.“
Music has changed a lot compared to the past, how do you see today’s scene in your country and more generally in Heavy Rock?
“Sweden has a lot of great band in all rockgenres. But its not on the radiostations and everybody listen to house and pop nowadays. Our sound is really small where we live but we only want to play it for the people that likes it anyway.“
“How difficult, if at all, is it to succeed in today’s music scene for a band with sounds like yours?
“We haven’t succeded, yet! All jokes a side, we are in it for the fun of it. None of our previous band was especially succesful either so we wouldnt know. But for me it is a big success to have something really fun to do with friends one night per week when you are mid 30s. Live gigs, recognition and people listening to our music and liking it is a bonus, a big bonus.“
How do you see this technological contribution that is happening within music creation?
“If an AI can make something like the first Sabbath albums i would listen to it. But how about the live scene? If you cheat to much in the studio or something like that or make the music without real instruments, how cool and fun is that gonna be on a smaller live venue? Good music can surely be made a lot faster with todays technology, but ive never been a fan of the ‘one man with a usb-stick’ on stage so unless its some epic Tony Iommie robots on stage with real guitars i wouldnt pay for the tickets.“
Do you have any other activities or artistic passions outside the music?
“We are snowboarders and skaters. That has been in our lives forever and pretty much guided most life choices for all of us. A passion that has pushed us thru shitty jobs in the past to pay for winters with more riding and less working when we were younger. The drummer does not ride boards so much anymore but he just got back from a trip riding snowmobile in British colombia.“
I thank the band for the interview and wish them all the best in the promotion of their new works and the continuation of their artistic career.
Purchase their music on Bandcamp: https://vikboleboogiebrigade.bandcamp.com/
