INTERVIEW - The Hotseat - Fredrik Larzon of Millencolin

Millencolin return to Australia in just over a month for a national tour with Adelaide’s Grenadiers in support.

The band continue touring the world in support of their album ‘True Brew‘, and recent digital EP of the same name.

They’ll be playing in Fremantle, Adelaide, Sydney, Gold Coast, Brisbane and Melbourne with tickets not surprisingly beginning to run thin.

This week in The Hotseat we caught up with Millencolin drummer Fredrik Larzon to answer our questions. Check out his answers below.

Tour dates at the bottom if you need reminding of those.

LISTEN WHILE YOU READ

THE BASICS

Name : Fredrik Larzon
Band : Millencolin
Job In Band : Drummer
Website Address : millencolin.com, denihilrecords.com

HOME

Hometown : Malmö, Sweden
Hometown is best known for : Well, how about the fantastic soccer player Zlatan Ibrahimovic and the best falafel in the world.
Best venue in your hometown : Babel, KB and Norra G are some of the best venues in town.
Favourite show you’ve seen in your hometown : Two really great shows I went to pretty recently – Eyehategod & Ufomammut.
Favourite show you’ve played in your hometown : Malmöfestivalen and KB in Malmö where I live these days. Several great ones in Örebro where we started as a band.

THE BAND

How did the band first come to exist? Before forming Millencolin we played in three different bands playing punk with swedish lyrics inspired by bands like Asta Kask, Anti Cimex and lots more. Then late early 90’s when we got ahold of music from bands like Bad Religion, Circle Jerks and Decendents we immediately felt that this is what we should do! The other three fellas in the band were skateboarding too so I reckon they got a lot of inspiration from watching skateboarding videos like Shackle Me Not, Blind Video Days and Hokus Pokus.
How long has the band been going? We started the band back in October 1992.
Is there an interesting story behind the name? The idea was to have a name bandname related to skateboarding in some way as we considered ourselves ”skate rock/ushc” and there’s a trick called Sad Air or Melancholy and we basically took that and just re-spelled it so it’d just be our name and nothing else.
What’s your most recent release? Tell us a little about it… We released the True Brew album april 2015. Studio album number eight for us. The album was recorded in our own studio (Soundlab Studios) and we had Jens Bogren at Fascination Street mix it. When we did some tours few years back playing Pennybridge Pioneers in full I think we all got inspired by some of those tunes when making True Brew. As well as Bad Religion as always. The album has the vibe of some of our old stuff but with a really nice modern production. Recently we release the True Brew EP which is the new single. On top of that there’s a swedish version of that song called Inte Vara Ägd and two new songs. It’s out on Epitaph digitally. The vinyl version (12” 45rpm) was released by my own label De:Nihil Records.
Got a personal stand out achievement of your band to date? The fact that we’ve been same people in this band since the start back in 1992 is pretty cool if you ask me. There are several things that were big for us like signing with Burning Heart and then with Epitaph where you’d find bands like Bad Religion that inspired us to start in the first place. Recording Pennybridge Pioneers at Westbeach Studios (LA) with Brett G and Donnell was another great moment for us. We actually received a gold album for in Australia later on.

OFF THE STAGE

What was your first introduction to music that made you think seriously about playing it? During mid/late 80’s I was listening to tons of thrash metal and some punk. Most of my friends had bands and the rehearsal place was the place to hang out at. Without having a clue how to play drums me and two friends formed a band. First songs we tried out was Misfits ”Skulls”, Nuclear Assault ”Hang The Pope” and Slayer ”Black Magic”, it didn’t sound very good but we had a blast for sure.
Any band, album, or song that you personally credit as a major influence? Ohh many! Circle Jerks ”Group Sex”, Discharge ”Hear Nothing…” & Bad Religion ”No Control” are some of them.
Your first band name, and what style did you play? Gastric Flu! It was some kind of thrash metal mixed with punk. Crossover.
Most prized music related item you own? Beside my drum-kits and stuff that would be my record collection. Anti-Cimix ”Raped Ass” 7” would be the favorite.
When you’re not doing band related stuff, what are you usually found doing? I have a record label called De:Nihil Records with a friend of mine. www.denihilrecords.com We put out 20 vinyl-releases so far. Music styles varies from hardcore punk to garage rock to psychedelic space rock. I book bands for a club called Klubb Tidens Tempo and me and my buddy Mathias (Millencolin) also have a management company called Anger Management.
The thing you most look forward to just before a tour is… Since most of us in the band live i different cities these days I’m looking forward to meet up with the guys & crew, you know catching up on things, having a laugh. And of course the shows!!
The thing you least look forward to before a tour is… …the knowledge of being away from my kids and wife.
Any item you seem to always forget to take on tour? My collection of tooth paste and headphones at home is massive, always forget to bring those!

WATCH

ON THE STAGE

When on offer, what’s your one must have item on the rider? I don’t need much I guess. On stage I’m good with a bottle of water and a beer or two. Backstage it’s nice with some vegetarian spreads and a nice vegetarian dinner. And yes, I’m a Peanut-addict! Once I’ve started I can’t stop. We really should take those off the rider.
Got a favourite place you’ve toured… and why? We did some shows in Panama and Costa Rica which was really cool and beautiful. Actually I like most places we go to. It’s all about what you do and when you go there. If you can catch summer it’s always nice. I’m really thankful we get to tour all these cool places like Australia, South/North America, Japan and all over Europe!
Got a favourite venue you’ve played… and why? Not really, as long as we have decent sound on stage and I’m not too far from the crowd I’m happy! I am a little bummed out I missed out playing Brixton Academy in London back in 2002! We had a stand in drummer because I had broken my arm (elbow). It is definitely a different experience to get to watch your own band from the crowd perspective.
Any embarrassing on stage moments come to mind? A funny thing happened when we did the Big Day Out festival in Australia (don’t remember which year). We all got ready to enter stage to some intro and I got up by my drums when I saw Nikolas bass-cable falling out of his amp. I knew I had like 20-30 seconds left before starting the first song so I ran down, found the cable after a little while and plugged it in and ran back up to start the set. Of course a missed the drumstool and fell behind the drum riser. Hurt myself a little but I had no time for thinking about it so I just got back up and started the song. I felt very embarrassed at the time, now it’s a laugh.
Any pre-show rituals? We hang out in the dressing room, the other fellas have a few beers. Talking, making jokes and sometimes listen to corny swedish classics. There’s some stretching going on, arms and legs to get the blood moving you know.
What do you find is the hardest aspect of touring in a band today? Except for being away from the ones you love back home I don’t find it that hard to tour. I’m not gonna complain haha. As for the ”business-part” there are so many bands that wanna tour so usually it can be a lot of competition about getting venues the dates you want them and you also need to book everything a long time in advance. If you wanna be a full time band you need to be out touring quite a lot since you’re not getting that much on record sales in these digital streaming days. But hey, I love playing live so for me it’s not a problem.

RIGHT NOW

Last song you listened to? ”Ugly Part Of Town” by danish band The War Goes On.
Last album you picked up? Tau Cross ”s/t” LP
Which band or album is currently on high rotation? Swedish band Viagra Boys debut 12” ”Consistency Of Energy”.
Tell us an up and coming band or artist you think we should go and listen to right now? Yeah, check out Swedish bands Viagra Boys and Lowest Creature
What’s on the cards for the next few months for the band? We’ll be out touring all kinds of places this year! First off it’s Australia then North America. During summer up here we’ll do a bunch of festivals in Europe. Planning on where to tour fall 2016 right now. Feels really good to be out playing the new stuff!

IF ONLY…

You can pick any one album for your band to cover in full, what would it be and why? That’s kind of tough question. Maybe something by Bad Religion like ”Against The Grain” or something by any of the other bands that inspired us back when we started… You know you have these records you really love and I imagine those are pretty impossible to ever do as good as the original so you don’t even wanna try.
You can pick any one band / artist to cover one of your albums in full, what would it be, and why? Dinosaur Jr maybe? Because Jay Mascis is genius.
One band you wish you were able to see live but never had the chance? Definitely have to see Neurosis live some day. They’ve been one of my favorite bands forever.
The chance comes up to fill in for a member of a band for one tour, which band would it be, and why? I could drum for Roky Erickson.
A headline tour overseas comes up, tell us two bands you’d take along to support your band. Pushing for more swedish bands! We could bring Pig Eyes and Rotten Mind.

PLUG TIME

Got any final words? We are stoked to come back to Australia soon! Late April that is. We all love Australia! Also we just released a new single called True Brew EP! It contains the True Brew track from the album with the same name as well as a swedish version AND two new songs! Thanks a lot Bombshellzine! See ya’ll in April!

TOUR DATES

MILLENCOLIN
With guests GRENADIERS
APRIL
26th – Metropolis, Fremantle [18+]
28th – HQ, Adelaide [18+]
29th – UNSW Roundhouse, Sydney [Lic/AA]
30th – Coolangatta Hotel, Gold Coast [18+]
MAY
1st – The Tivoli, Brisbane [18+]
2nd – 170 Russell, Melbourne [18+]
3rd – 170 Russell, Melbourne [18+] SOLD OUT
—> Tickets available now.
—> For more information, visit [Here].