Sep
04
9.55pm

ABANDONED BY BEARS // Pretty In Punk


Cooped up in the back of a white van in a darkened American street, Abandoned By Bears are truly living the punk dream.

“It’s an adventure, I guess,” chuckles bassist Gustav Eriksson, “It’s a special place,” “But it’s definitely nice to be back,” adds vocalist Fredric Andersson. Yes, the punk life is still as grotty as it ever was, even for bands as cool as Sweden’s Abandoned By Bears, out somewhere on the US west coast touring their latest album, Headstorm.

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Think of punk and of course you’re going to think of US and UK bands, but Abandoned By Bear’s recipe for anarchism and aggression is a whole different kettle of fish. Take Headstorm, an authentic blend of traditional nostalgia and home grown invention. Touring in America as the album drops, however, means following the reception has been a bit hard. “Hunting for Wi-Fi is like hunting for gold here,” says Eriksson, Andersson laughing in agreement. “We think it’s been positive so far. It’s been like a lot of what we hoped for I guess, we tried to make a more mature sounding album.”

When Hysteria got their mitts on Headstorm, Abandoned By Bears received a well-deserved 9/10 review—Abandoned By Bears have made punk their own, throwing in a little metalcore and some docile Swedish licks. “Most of the punk and hardcore scenes, especially in the US, has a, how do you say it, kind of a more aggressive vibe to it,” says Eriksson. “British punk, more like the oi! punk, but this, we could maybe have some influences of that kind of punk music, but this is more mature and experimenting punk since we play a lot of heavy music as well.” Andersson, sitting by his bandmate nodding in earnest agreement so far, helps Eriksson out when he struggles to find the English phrases to describe the musicality. “What I think he’s trying to say,” begins Andersson, “Is okay so the American pop-punk has a certain sound but I guess we have influences from Swedish music, which in general, is kind of melancholy.

As much as I like super happy music I think people, here especially, what do you call it, they feel at home with the whole thing, the cheesy … [ Andersson ]

“I would say that our older stuff is more leaning to the American stuff because it’s extremely happy without reason—this stuff, we’re touching subjects like feelings and stuff like that. Sounds kind of shitty when you put it like that but in the beginning, yeah a happy-go [lucky] vibe, but now, more melancholy.

“As much as I like super happy music I think people, here especially, what do you call it, they feel at home with the whole thing, the cheesy …”



Andersson has trouble finding the words, but you know what? What he’s trying to describe, those sentiments, are not cheesy at all. Nostalgic, sure, but Headstorm introduces something new into the mix with amazing breakdowns and a hint of metalcore. In the early days Abandoned By Bears tested the waters to solidify a merger of all these different sounds to be what they are today. “In the beginning I think we were compared other bands more, we had more obvious influences,” says Eriksson. “For some people who listen to those bands and wanted more of that band but couldn’t get it, they got super stoked about what we made because it added to their playlist.

“Now it’s not obvious because we take influences from outside of the genre. Yeah I would say it’s a bit more muddy, if that’s the right word for it. We’ve had people be very supportive of the change and it seems to [have] worked out.”



At this point, I’m not going to lie, reading very intricate posts about why we suck is actually more fun than anything else! [ Eriksson ]

Vocal melodies are where an audience will remember a song and while you might think that after all this combining, to still cut across in that punk vein would pose a challenge for Andersson and fellow vocalist Leon Ekelund, you’d be wrong; they’ve got this. “One thing I think we have still that is very important for us is that we still do a little bit of what we want, in the sense that the music we do is the music we listen to,” says Eriksson.

“For the album, we like diversity, it’s totally fun. A perfect example is Enter Shikari, how they can make an angry song with a lot of distorted guitars, then they can make like a soft electronic sound and even though the songs are different, you can hear it’s the same band—it’s that kind of playful space we want to be in, and so far we’ve been able to do angry songs and happy songs and no one’s questioned it.”

Whether or not Abandoned By Bears want people to be asking questions really depends on the tone of question they want to ask. “If the questions are nice, if they’re not hateful,” Eriksson smiles knowingly, Andersson chuckles. “There’s always going to be hateful people, I guess. There’s always someone who’s nasty on the interwebs and whatever. We’re down to talk about the music we write.

“At this point, I’m not going to lie, reading very intricate posts about why we suck is actually more fun than anything else!”//


Headstorm is available now through Victory Records >



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