02/10/08
Text: Nik Mercer
Photographers: Johanna Hedborg
For starters, tell me a little bit about how you came together as a band and when it was. Both of you two played/play in other groups, right? How was Pacific! Formed?
We had an organic growth as a band. It took several years actually. Eleven years had passed since we had been in school together when we met at a gig I had with a psychedelic West Coast band, the Sun. Then I started the Whyteseeds—that grew into a big thing really quick. We were everywhere and nowhere playing rock for retards and other people. When I was home I use to meet up with Daniel to have a comforting chat about old electronic music like White Noise and similar bands. Daniel moved to London to start up New Skin and eventually came back. We fixed up a studio to put our stuff in and started to write songs for our bands and also fooling around with sounds and tape loops. Some years went by and we had a lot of songs that our bands didn't want. So we started a duo. And then we found a name reminding of Japan, California, deep secrets and sunsets. Pacific!
I think you stand out in the Swedish pop scene. You don't sound like literally thousands of other Swedish indie-pop bands, and that's really refreshing. What's your take on the hype surrounding Swedish music and the scene? Is it a positive force or a negative one? And how does it specifically affect you?
The Swedish hype is very 2006. Bands like Jose Gonzales, Jens Lekman and El Perro Del Mar went around the world. I played in El Perro Del Mar so I really like these artists, though! Also because they are from my hometown of Gothenburg. These artists are all some kind of reaction against the garage rock mainstream influences our town forced on the rest of Sweden and the world. I was a part of that too with my garage rock band. Anyway, I like the laid-back output these bands have because it describes something of the Swedish soul. Hungry for the beauty of summer, sincere and... low key. We have chosen to be a band from Europe more than a band from Sweden because we really just listen to non-Swedish music except the brilliant island romantic Björn Ohlson who I taught to play the D chord on the guitar when I was a kid.
You've released three singles on Dolores Records, all of which did very well; some sold out. You released a Japanese version of the 12" "Sunset Blvd" (which sold out), too. How are you being received in Sweden and, for that matter, internationally?
I think we are very blessed with good friends abroad that works well for us. People in France and Japan really like us. We have tried to not give the audience to much. We have until now released very small series of extremely beautiful vinyl records to keep the audience wanting more. We will of course give them more, maybe not in the way they expect, though. Our illustrator, Stephane Manel, who usually works for French Elle magazine and French Playboy magazine has done almost all of our visuals including our two animated videos. He loves to draw girls. We are being quiet well received at home as well though we are not like other Swedish bands at all.
Why didn't you come out with your LP sooner? You've clearly got the following and the remixes and hype to support a full-length. Why the wait?
We never waited. We tried to make another hit single and succeeded at last with Number One. We are not sorry for keeping you waiting, though. We only had fun in our studio.
Tell me a little about the LP. Who's releasing it, what's it like, and all that good stuff.
Our LP is a special thing for us. From the start, we wanted to release a trilogy of 12"s—which we accomplished with Stephane Manel's beautiful designs—and then collect them into a simple singles collection instead of an album. But our record company in Sweden, Dolores Recordings, managed to convince us to make an album and we called it Reveries. The LP has a sequence that differs a bit from the CD sister, but both are really worth listening to the whole way through!
