BLIND ALLEYBLIND ALLEY
BLIND ALLEY is primarly based around Magnus Olsson who played all the instruments and sang a couple of songs on BLIND ALLEY's debut CD 'On the way'. The CD is filled with hookladen AOR, not always heavy, but it's very melodic and sometimes the closest thing to pure AOR. Check out the review I did on the reviewspage, for now, read the review I did with Magnus...
When did you start playing music etc.?
Oh, a long time
ago... Actually, I started out as a drummer at the age of 10. But
when we formed our first band three years later, there were
already a drummer (better than me...) So I had to pick up another
instrument, and the obvious choice (at that time) was guitar.
This has been my main instrument ever since. But the day I found
out about MIDI and computer based sequencers, I was hooked. I
realized that even a average keyboard player could do some great
stuff, and with the drum machines and "multitimbral"
synths, you could actually sound like a whole band.
Can you tell us
about your first recordings?
This was in the
early 80's, and the punk-rock just started to spread. I played
guitar in a band called X-HALE. Although we never thought of
playing punk, we definitely got involved in its spirit, and
everybody should release a single. So did we... The single was
some kind of mix between Status Quo and Thin Lizzy, or
boogie-rock with double guitartunes all over it.
Tell me about all the bands/projects you got into before you released the first BLIND ALLEY CD?
The next recording was with the band FORTUNE, wich was formed around 1982 and lasted until 1991. In the beginning, there were a lot of people comming and going, but the long lasting band was a 5-piece band with drums (Claes Magnusson), bass (Magnus Pettersson), keyboard (Jan Johannesson), guitar (me) and vocals (Hans Dimberg). We were a major band in the area and had a lot of gigs. We released a single in 1988 and an album in 1990 (Record# MTR 2001). The material was very AOR (at least by todays standard ;-) At the time, we were discussing with a record label of being signed, but it all kind of faded away. We decided to release the album on our own. However, we didn't have the money to press both a CD and LP, so we had to decide wich way to go. In the autumn of 1990 CD players was not that common, so we decided to go for the LP. Guess which was the X-mas gift of the year 1990? A CD-player...
After the album,
some guys in the band lost the motivation, and in 1991 the band
broke up. Hans and I tried to form another band SHADOW PLAY-
that's when we met with Pierre Glans - but we never really felt
like a
real band. Some time around 1994/1995 we broke up even this band.
In 1991 I started to build up my home studio, and I could do my
musical creations there. The idea of "The BLIND ALLEY
Project" slowly arised - a project solely focusing on
creation/recording music, and not "rehearsing".
Please tell us everything about the BLIND
ALLEY CD which will be out soon
The Blind Alley
project has evolved from the dawn of PC-DAW (Digital Audio
Workstation) - the PC-based recording studio. First, the goal was
to make simple demo materials. The first recording that was made,
is the intro guitar solo on "The Boy Inside The Man".
At that time - 1994 - , it was a "miracle" to blend
"real" instruments with synts (MIDI). But the
technology has evolved enormuosly these last years, and today we
are capable of recording 24+ tracks with effects that would made
the normal studio green on envy in 1990. And as the technology
has evolved, the project changed focus and instead the goal
became making a CD - ON THE WAY.
The songs varies a lot, and while some lyrics are just nonsense,
some lyrics means very much to me. Like "In Your Hand",
which was written by my wife. It's about the birth of our son,
Anton, who was born 10 weeks premature (early). Another lyric I'm
very pleased with is "Internal Affairs", which is about
a friend of mine who was constantly beatened by her boyfriend.
She never admitted it, but everybody knew.
...and about the
other involved musicians, did they play in other bands as well?
Hans Dimberg has
been my musical partner for 15 years. He was the lead singer in
FORTUNE, and we've done a lot of stuff ever since. The story of
how we met is rather funny. He started out as a drummer in the
band, and was quite average. We then got a better drummer, and
fired him. He hated me for that. About 6 month later, I heard
that we was actually a very good singer. At that time our lead
singer had quitted, so I called him up and asked if he wanted to
join the band as a singer instead.... Thankfully, he answered
yes.
Pierre Glans, is the third member. He is a very talented
singer/songwriter, and has recorded his own stuff. To my
knowledge, I don't think it's available on the net, but I'll
inform you as soon as he publish anything. Anyway, he makes
wonderful popsongs with a lot of "acoustic feel".
Together, we also play in a coverband called "DOG".
Our "guest musician" is a gentleman called Daniel
Vogel. I've never met him, or even spoked with him... I asked on
a newsgroup if anyone was intrested in playing Hammond on one of
our songs. Daniel answered, and I sent him a raw mix of the song
"In Your Hand". He then recorded playing the Hammond,
and sent me his "hammond-track". I mixed it into the
song, and voilá, we had made an internet recording!
Musically there are a lot of pure AOR songs on the album and both vocally and instrumentally it just sounds too good to be true, man I love the catchy hooks and choruses of your songs, which bands influenced you?
The idea of this
record was to elaborate songs in different kinds of musicstyles.
I've been writing "melodic rock" all my life, and I
wanted to try different styles. But, I'm always focusing on
strong melodies and catchy choruses, so the pop/rock concept is
always nearby. It's not like fusion jazz, or Rap/Hip Hop, or that
like... So the influences varys a lot. There's PINK FLOYD, ELO,
JAY GRADON, TOTO, MARILLION, BSB and others.
Have you tried to get in touch with labels yet, because I think a few labels will definitely be interested in releasing your record (try AOR HEAVEN for example or FRONTIERS RECORDS)...
Actually, no. But
since you recommend it, I will defnitely try it!
What are your
comments on mp3.com, the site where I discovered your band...
I think internet in
general and MP3.COM especially has meant a lot for
"independent" bands. I think that, like us, most
artists are not really intrested in making money, but just want
to be heard. Also, making a record can be a risky project, but
with MP3.COM it's as easy as sending files.
However, we now see a phase on the Internet where the
"dot-com" companies has to make money to survive, and
so must MP3.COM. Recently they've been adding
"services" for bands that they will have to pay for. In
the end perhaps the artist will have to pay for the opportunity
of being on MP3.COM, and then we are almost back where we
started...
On the other hand, a cleanup of MP3.COM is necessary. One of the
main complaints from "normal users" are that there's
too much crap. And I really mean crap (my wife for instance has
published her "singing", recorded when she was 2 years
old...).
Any touring plans?
We've been
discussing on playing Blind Alley songs live. However, since the
music never been played by a whole band, and never rehearsed,
there's a lot of work involved. If we go for it. it will be a
huge band (drums, percussion, bass, keyboards, hammond, 2
guitars, acoustics and at least 4 vocals).
What are the plans for the next coming months?
Since we finnished
recording On The Way, I had two different plans. First I though
of making a Swedish pop-album, with lyrics in swedish. But the
last few month my "roots" have been calling on me, and
the plans are now to make a second Blind Alley album.
This album will not be "multi faceted" in musical
genres, but will focus on "melodic rock" or AOR. I
feeel the need of a straight rockbeat, with nice keyboards, and
heavy guitars, and of course catchy tunes...
Also, I've decided to change my way of writing/recording music.
On "On The Way" we started to record the song as soon
as the idea was finnished. But a lot of songs were missing
lyrics, breaks, endings and stuff, and they tended to never being
finnished.
Now I'm recording all ideas in a huge
"idea bank". From there, I will make complete songs.
Thereafter I will start recording them. By doing it this way I
hope to be finnished in 6 month instead of 6 years....
Thanks for answering the questions, finally, anything to add yourself...
Even if there's no
way today of ordering Blind Alley/On The Way, in your local music
store, there IS a possibility to order it from MP3.COM. Check it
out at http://www.mp3.com/Blindalley
Thanks for Inviting us to Strutter Magazine.