Beezewax are from Norway and “Who To Salute” is their 4th album. The album is produced by Bent Sher of Motorpsycho fame and Jorgen Wall from Sweden who produced the latest Ken Stringellow album as well as being an important producer/musician in Stockholm. We are also happy to inform you that the strings on the album are the same as the ones Brian Wilson used on his masterpiece "SMILE". Ken Stringellow also lent his golden voice to spark things up.
Beezewax have been underground for so long, this year they will rise to the surface with this new album that is filled with hits, anthems and has enough depth to excuse the catchiest hooks you've heard in years.
Here are some liner notes from Ken:
10 years so far, which makes me feel old. We spend a lot of time talking
about what has been, getting nostalgic about certain places we have visited
or people we have met. But then I realize I'm just in my mid twenties, as
are my respective band members. There are still places we have yet to tour,
like Australia, Russia, South East Asia, Brazil! When that crosses my mind,
I get excited.
When we recorded our first album "A Dozen Summits", I didn't have a clue of
how the signal from my singing, or my guitar playing travelled from me to
the tape machine.
I had written 12 songs from when I was 15-17, the band arranged the songs,
we recorded it live with producer/label manager Fridtjof Lindeman behind the
glass grinning. A 1960's Slingerland drum kit, a Vox, a Marshall, an Ampeg
and distortion pedals for everyone. We travelled from school to the studio
everyday in May 1996. It was fun and we can still play the songs without
feeling embarrassed about the material.
A few months later we were on tour in the UK playing for large crowds and we
were crowned the kings of "Emo." We would look at the posters and say "does
anyone know what emo is?" It was amazing, sleeping in people's houses in
towns we were never meant to see.
I remember waking up in the middle of the night in some house in Glasgow,
looking through a 5 foot wide hole in the main wall, this was in January.
Still we were having an amazing time.
Then suddenly a few months later we are in the studio with Ken Stringfellow
recording our second record "South of Boredom", paid and released by Popkid
records New York. Alan, the president of the now defunct label is a close
friend.
Flying into Newark, watching the Manhattan skyline (with sweaty hands - yes
we all hate flying!) we couldn't believe we were there because we were a
band.
But this was the case and a few days later we were drunk onstage in Reno,
running down the main street of Las Vegas in bunny suits and playing a show
along side our all time favourite skaters, Matt Hensley.
After more touring, we found ourselves in the studio again. In Stockholm,
Sweden with producer Pelle Gunnerfeldt (the Hives, Fireside etc.) recording
our 3rd record "Oh Tahoe" (inspired by a trip to Lake Tahoe where we bought
a Six Track Synthesizer from a hippie turned Christian who lived in a
triangular house!)
This time we knew more about the recording process, spent time arranging and
building a big sound of guitars, horns, piano, old synths and harmonies.
We did a lot of the production ourselves, we fell in love with Stockholm and
felt for the first time that we were musicians (but not good ones I might
add!)
John Agnello (Dinosaur jr, Buffalo Tom, Bob Dylan, Lemonheads), who is my
favorite producer mixed the record. He was the nicest guy I have ever met.
In the coming months we flew to Tokyo where they danced synchronized when we
played a sold out show at the Eggsite (girls actually cried), toured Europe
twice and did Scandinavia for the first time. It was our third record, we
hadn't gotten a bad review, we got used to do interviews and playing on TV.
When sound checking for a TV special in Madrid, a technician gave us a huge
bag of pot. What happened to it I don't know but the Spanish police did raid
our van for drugs a few days later in the middle of the desert. They didn't
find anything and our tour manager grinned all the way to Granada, where we
played our best show ever.
We crashed our van a few times, almost died 3 times- like all bands do, and
actually we got sick of: playing shows, each other and basically being in a
band.
Six months later we sat in a circle in our drummer's living room drinking
coffee and planning our next album. We started the whole thing over again
and got signed to a major label in our home country which we find very
ironic.
10 years of fun, 4 albums (recording the 5th now) and about 300 shows later,
we feel like we have just started.
Kenneth Ishak 26.05.05
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