ROYAL REPUBLIC INTERVIEW

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SD: Guys, a little introduction for all the people that don’t know you yet. How can you present yourself in few words?

RR: Hello! We are the royal, we hail from the wonderful city of Malmö in southern Sweden! We met up about 3 years ago to form this band, and we’ve been the best in the business ever since!

SD: You come from Malmo, Sweden. What’s the situation like for all the musicians like you that wants to live with music? Is it an alive or dead context? In few words, it has been difficult for you to be where you are now?

RR: Well, there are upsides and of course downsides. People often refer to what we do as “living your dream” and stuff like that, which might be true from time to time but there is a lot of hard work put into it! Of course we love doing what we do, and we knew what we were getting into! Sometimes it’s hard but when we have a good night on stage which is usually every night, that makes it worth all of it! We are not millionares, we can’t even pay our rent every month! This said with four #1-singles on the radio, one #1 on MTV and sold out tours – to sum up, the music industry isn’t what it used to be a few decades back!

SD: I read you said that you all understood very fast that Royal Republic was going to be something bigger, even if it was the beginning, in 2007. What were the differences you felt between your older musical experiences?

RR: IT! We felt IT! I guess i was the first one to start thinking really big and the others kind of laughed a bit at my huge ambitions, but a few rehearsals and gigs later we were all on the same page! We’ve all played with a lot of people, in a lot of places before – we know music, and we know “chemistry” but we didn’t know eachother when we walked in the rehearsalroom the first time. It was kinda stiff until we started playing, and you could see everyone getting that stupid grin on their faces! Like “-Yey, I’m getting laid”!

SD: Let’s talk about your upcoming record ‘We Are The Royal’, available from 18th of January.

RR: Let’s talk about it! It is a 12-hour-party crammed into 36 minutes of music! We cut every song down to the bare essentials, trying to keep it very effective. Like “-let’s not use this riff more that twice or it will get worn out”, and so on. The Beatles could get away with songs around two minutes so we should be able to get away with it too! What we wanted to create was basically a soundtrack for a party that we could take on tour.

SD: Many people have talked about something between The Hives, Danko Jones or Franz Ferdinand. Maybe for the energy and the shout-in-the-face spirit in it. How will you describe your album? Do you agree with all the people that link you to all these bands?

RR: I agree! Of course we don’t wanna rip-off any of these bands, but at the same time we never set out to be totally new and original! I think you can compare anything to something else, there was always someone before you. We wanted an awesome liveband with great songs, that’s what we have now – compare it to whatever you want!

SD: In my opinion your music is such a pop-rock music but with a great dance spirit. Do you think that rock can be something that make you dance without stopping like it was, for example, with Chuck Berry in the 50s

RR: Definately! We’ve seen it happen, repetedly! Would be cool if we got some of that back today, instead of DJ’s pushing play. Livemusic is a lot cooler to dance to!

SD: Do you think that your music is better for listening live for this reason?

RR: I think the way to see us is live! I hate describing this band with words on a paper, I want to drag you to the front row and show you! There is an energy that you really can’t capture on album, you need to see it aswell and “be in it”!

SD: I’ve read that your lyrics are often ironic and referred to true life and personal experiences. Do you think that music and personal experiences are things that go in the same way?

RR: Music and personal experiences can definately affect eachother! When writing for this album, we didn’t feel like going into any deeper issues, politically, emotionally or whatever, we just needed some words for our melodies basically! I like making up stories, that way it has no boundries! You be as creative as you want! Some of the stuff in the lyrics are things we experienced ourselves, some with twists and some without! You try and figure out which!

SD: Why been so ironic? Do you think being ironic it’s the only way to make music in the era we are living?

RR: It is one way, but not the only way! I guess we just happen to be good at being ironic or something, I don’t really know why! We wanted some kind of “edge” to the lyrics without being hard-ass-primadonnas… Maybe irony is a solution for that!

SD: After touring in Sweden you’re going to Germany, Netherlands and Uk. Do you think you’re going to do a bigger tour and maybe you’re going to come to Italy this summer?

RR: Well, we’ve been touring quite a bit (over 140 gigs in 2010) around Europe and the list of countries we haven’t been to is getting shorter but Italy is still on it! And we really hope to come to Italy soon for many reasons! Serie A being one of them!

SD: With who are you going on tour?

RR: For our next run in February we are taking Eternal Tango for support! Over the last two years we’ve met up with Mustasch, Biffy Clyro, CKY and many other Great bands!

SD: Which is your typical audience?

RR: Crazy and passionate! We have great fans who really make us feel awesome on stage! We as a band take it to the same level every night, the rest is up to the audience – they can make it magic or they can make it just another night. I prefer magic.

SD: What about your musical preferences? Have you got some nowadays bands to recommend?

RR: Well we have quite a wide variety of songs spinning in the tourbus, everything from Norah Jones to Cannibal Corpse, Dylan, Metallica, U2, Lady Gaga, Eminem and so on… I’d like to recommend you check out another band from Malmö called Bleek, melodic and progressive pop!

SD: Who’s in your playlists at the moment?

RR: A lot of Tom Petty at the moment! The album called ‘The Last DJ’, awesome album! Cheers!

Royal Republic I Myspace
www.royalrepublicband.com