In January, I happened upon a Swedish band called the Rockaphones. I listened to the songs they have available online and became intrigued. Now, I've listened to other artists from Sweden before ... ABBA, Sahara Hotnights and some others. But, none of them involves a banjo! This is something that immediately made me curious. So, my curiosity led me to Klas Eriksson (bass, vocals, trombone) who was kind enough to answer my questions and tell me a bit about the Rockaphones.
Quirky NY Chick (QNYC): I came across your music on Amie Street but I don’t know much about you. Tell me a bit about the band. How did you come together?
Klas Eriksson (KE): We met at the music store in Bålsta, north of Stockholm. Marcus [Filipsson] owned the store first and Thomas [Björklund] bought it from him a couple of years later. I was just the regular customer. Thomas and Marcus wanted to start a band with an acoustic sound and they needed a bass player who could bring some outside influences, so they asked me and we started jamming and arranging some song ideas by Thomas. Both Thomas and Marcus had a background in rock and I came from the jazz and reggae direction. It all landed in some crazy country/rock/reggae with acoustic guitars. We played original songs by Thomas and we did some rearranging of covers too. We started playing together in 2001 and in 2007 we finally found Fredrik [Dermer], a drummer we could consider a genuine member of the band.
