The vault
Translated news
Here is a translation of official news that were published by Skambankt on skambankt.com, MySpace, or Facebook, as well as articles published by Norwegian and Danish media. The orginal texts have been published online. If you have an article you don't understand and want a translation up here, please give me a hint.
2009/01/08 Kick Music: Hardt Regn
| when the rain gets hard - we see so clear when the rain gets hard - it's hard against hard because when the rain gets hard - then the rage comes The past as "Punk Offspring" in 2004 suddenly seems very far away when you listen to Skambankt's 3rd album "Hardt Regn". The ex-hobby-toy-project has now become a serious bet for the Scandinavian rock throne. A metamorphosis from "Ugly Duckling to Swan", that the band started powerfully already with their second record "Eliksir", and that they will complete January 26, 2009. And of course this still happens in soundful Norwegian, which is accurat one of Skambankt's linchpins. The will to sing international rock music in one's mother tongue is not something you see very often outside the USA, England and France. Norway is known abroad for its many fantastic rock bands (Gluecifer, Motorpsycho, TurboNegro, We, etc.), but they all sing in "international". This alone does not make Skambankt unique, but it gives the music a fresh and very different touch. Whether these are songs from the debut album with flaring slogans, or whether we talk about other more earthly subjects from the band's second record "Eliksir" - it gives some more variety to the music... Norwegian is simply a good singing language. This is why Skambankt of course stick to the language on the new album, and it's still the trenchant subjects that dominate, but now with a bit more seriousness behind them. In contrary to the debut album, that you had to take with a little smile sometimes, Skambankt anno 2009 is a band that dares to hold up the flag with songs that ask for some first and second thoughts. "Hardt Regn" opens with the song "Vår Bø" ("Our Burden") that is about the fact that everything we humans do, follows (with) us. A song like "Løgnprofitør" is almost self-explanatory, "Trygge Rammer" reminds us not to forget the world around us, love can be found in ""Slukk Meg (For Eg Brenner)", and then of course the song of everybody's "Malin" - the girl standing in front of the big dangerous life... "Malin" is also the first single of the new album, and despite being a song of almost radio-friendly quality, it also shows the big step that Skambankt have taken musically. Skambankt is still a rock band, but they try out other ways and compositions in the genre. Like this, "Malin" is almost a rock ballad, but Skambankt round the whole palette and still aren't afraid to avow them to their musical origin and send greetings out to the heroes. All this in addition to Skambankt's usually strong feeling for the melody's big meaning in the 11 songs of the album. Skambankt still consists of the same cast, but now with real names: Terje Vinterstø Røthing on guitar and vocals (and who actually never sang better), Hans Egil Løe Abelsnes on lead guitar, piano and background vocals, Tollak Friestad on bass and Børge Sageng Henriksen on drums. But additionally, they got help from a bunch of friends, for example the kaizerly Janove Ottesen and Geir Zahl, the big talent Christer Knutsen and many others. The album has been recorded at Bekkstudio, mixed by the fast Skambankt mixer Mike Hartung, produced by the band itself and mastered by the American star masterer Dave Collins (Black Sabbath, Chris Cornell, Fu Manchu, Bruce Springsteen and many more) The Norwegian swan has taken off and will land in Denmark in 2009 - This is your captain speaking: Tune In and turn up... NOW! |
