Tour - Beartrap/Witch Cult - Sweden & Denmark

Day 47/ Show 40/ Stockholm, Sweden

So yesterday we woke up on the boat and all the bathrooms were out of order. We all got up and headed to Malmo, Sweden. We didn’t have a show but we had a place to stay. The drive dragged on real slow because I knew we had no show to play. The person we were staying with told us there was a free show happening in Malmo that night, and gave us the number to the venue. It was 2 punk bands playing and the club was called Debaser so I thought we had a shot at hopping on. The dude at the club told me “it wouldn’t benefit the other bands or the people coming to the show.” Thanks asshole. So we just went to the apartment we were staying at and slept. Woke up early to drive to Stockholm. Its raining/snowing and wet and really cold. It looks like the set of Let The Right One In.


The show is at Kulturhuset Skarpnack which is a youth center. The Stockholm straight edge crew booked the show for us. They are all super nice and one some of them are in No Omega, check them out. The show was cool. I did merch during the first bands so I didn’t catch them. The room was super dense/soundproof so I could barely hear them. Witch Cult played and people filtered into the room. They seemed to enjoy it. Then we had to warn them that BearTrap would be playing in 2 minutes and to not go too far. People have missed either band at a lot of shows because of how short we play. People enjoyed BearTrap and moved around a bit. After the show we went back to where we were staying, drank some tea, and watched Hesher. It was a good night.

Day 48/Show 41/Gothenburg, Sweden

Woke up today to a wonderful breakfast. Pancakes, oatmeal, nuts, juice, and tea. Then we watched Almost Famous. The drive to Gothenburg wasn’t too bad, Sometimes the view was real nice. The show tonight was at Aktivitetshuset Härden. It’s a practice space/venue in an industrial area. It's probably hard for people to get to from the city. The show was decent. Not a packed room but not empty. We both played good. We are sleeping in here on the stage. I hate people who smoke indoors.


Day 49/Show 42/ Aalborg, Denmark

Woke up at 10 today, had some hummus and left for the next place. We skipped all the ferries and still lost money on Sweden. We spent 160 euro on bridges. So next time we go, get more shows in Sweden. The drive was pretty long and uneventful. We got to the club an hour before the show started.


The name of the venue is 1000fryd. Peter booked the show and he is is a nice dude. I was told that the venue is city and country funded. This is how they afford to pay 4 touring bands when the turn out isn’t so good. Witch Cult played first and the set was cool. The people here enjoyed it. Same for BearTrap. Then Streetwalked from Seattle played. Then Catheter from Denver. 3 bands from the USA and one from the UK. I had a good time having tour talk with my fellow Americans. The venue has an apartment upstairs with laundry and a show so right after the show I did that and went to sleep.

Sweden - Gothenburg 2

Sweden - Gothenburg 1

“Me and a couple of friends have just started a booking label here in Gothenburg. The main reason for doing so is because we want to be more involved in the hc/punk-scene in Gothenburg and Sweden. We already have Göteborg Straight Edge that put on a lot of good shows. But we still feel that we wanna be a part of this as well, and that way we can put on shows with some of our own favorite hc/punkbands.


In the beginning we'll probably just use one venue. And we're mainly looking to book hardcore and punk bands. We're all big fans of british hardcore, so we'll probably try to book a few bands from the UK. It's fairly easy to put on shows I think. If everything goes according to plan, we'll be putting on our first show in February!

I think it'll take some time before people know who we are. But if we put on good shows, and makes sure everybody is having a great time, I think people will be more supportive! We will probably do some shows with just local bands, so that they have somewhere to play. Because I think it's important to support your scene. But we'll also try to book bigger bands of course. And maybe put local bands as support!


Two of the bands that represent Gothenburg the best in my eyes are Anchor and Stay Hungry. Great bands both of 'em. And if you haven't heard 'em yet, make sure you do!


I play in Leaving Shore, a newly started post-hc/hcband. We've just recorded our first EP which will be released in mid-January."

Sweden 5

Sweden 4

“If you ask me the best bands from Malmö, or Crime City, as it is known as, are :

Sista Sekunden


Hårda Tider


Herätys



Skitkids


Fy Fan


Malmö seems to have a very varied scene with something for everyone.

Last month I went to Gothenburg HC fest at a place called Oceanen and the atmosphere was great. It felt so good to see people with patched jeans jackets, punks, hardcore kids etc. running together in the circle pit. The mixture of bands was great.”

Agent Attitude : Hardcore from Uppsala (they also have a great scene!)

Night Fever : Hardcore from Copenhagen, Denmark.

Hårda Tider : Crime City's Finest.

Commitment Crew RIP : Gothenburg Hardcore

Photos from the show

Sweden - Nyköping

“I live in Nyköping, a town in the middle of Sweden with 50 000 people in. Nyköping is located 100 kilometers south of Stockholm. Some famous bands are from here:

Disfear


Victims


In the 90s Nyköping was a real punk-city with lots of bands and a big scene. Today there are only 4 active bands left:

Vulture Mob (Hardcore)


Systemskifte (Crustpunk)


Still With The Pisces (Punk n Roll)


Suloh (Punk)


But the future's looks nice cos 1 year ago a group called Bergatrollen squatted some houses which led to them getting another house legally from the politicians. The house is now called Magasinet, and thanks to Magasinet I think the punk-scene is on its way back. We’ve got gigs every month on Magasinet and people travel here from other cities to go to the Magasinet gigs. Last week as an example we had Italian Grindpunx Humus playing and people drove over 100 kilometers to come to that show.”

Live at Magasinet:
Humus
Vulture Mob

Sweden 4

Sweden 2

“We had the Gothenburg Hardcore Festival last Saturday. Was really crazy.


We got some guys from Gothenburg sxe running swehc now containing all hardcore news in Sweden.


The guys running it are the "oldies" in the hc-scene here, they play in various bands and keep everyone updated. A lot of europeans visit it as well I think (they post interviews, band reviews, shows etc and it’s very active). Everything's in english ofc! :)

So that’s kinda all the stuff you need to get yourself updated on our scene which is growing as fuck atm :)”

swehc sampler 2010

Sweden 3

Sweden 2

SWEHC.COM

Check this site out if you wanna know more about hardcore in Sweden, those guys knows what's up!

Sweden - Gothenburg

We had a show in the beginning of this year, a "donation-show" where all the money went to 2 girls who lived together but one of them was in a car crash and is now in coma. So there were some hardcore bands playing for free and giving all the door-money plus extra donation money to this girl so she can make up the rent :)

Also this Saturday we've got a HUGE hardcore-festival here in Gothenburg. Retaliate from the US is coming here on a exclusive show only in Gothenburg plus the best bands of Sweden are there as well. In total I think there will be 12 bands. I'm counting on loads of people too.

Sweden 2

Sweden 1

I would probably say Sweden has got one of the best scenes in Europe right now. It got an uplift a few years ago and alot of great bands have started up the last few years.
Hard to say how often we've got gigs in Sweden, but about 1-4 times a month, and maybe once every second/third month it's a bigger band from US or so.
About the community, I would say it's good, most people in the scene know eachother and people travel around the country for shows.
We have got some good venues and promotors/promotorgroups in various cities, some of them: Jönköping, Lund, Malmö, Stockholm, Göteborg, Linköping, Orebro...etc.

Some bands:

Balance (Lund)

Hårda Tider (Malmö)

Big Deal (Jönköping)

Values (Jönköping)

Commitment Crew (Göteborg)

Stay Hungry (Göteborg)

Thefuckyoufingers (Malmö)

Bad Intentions (Jönköping)

Anchor (Göteborg)

Sista Sekunden (Malmö)

photos: my unsaid everything

Green Menace Recs

:) peace/ robin

Sweden 1

Thanks to Martin...

Well, for starters I live in the biggest Hardcore/Straight Edge town in Sweden which is Gothenburg atm (in my opinion at least). The Straight Edge/Hardcore scene here just keeps growing and growing. It started out with not that many people at the gigs but now it's often very crowded. Always new faces at the shows nowadays which is a good sign. We've got pretty regular gigs but sometimes it slows down...

We've got 2 venues in Gothenburg (Nordengården and Fängelset) but most of the gigs are at Nordengården. The promoter in Gothenburg is called Gothenburg Straight Edge which is setting up all the gigs in this area.We have also got a smaller one called TRW. Don't know that much about the scene in Stockholm and southern Sweden but its popping up sometimes.

The whole of Sweden is like one big community, most people know eachother (since people travel all the time to different shows) and we've got a hardcore forum aswell.

As for the community in Gothenburg, well we do a lot of activities together like footballgames, every wednesday there's "movie/gaming night" at Nordengården and we have meetings etc. Some people are working alot with getting bands over here.

Bands:

Stay Hungry (Goteborg)
One of the biggest in Sweden with some of the "oldies" of the hardcore scene here! Recently made a Europe tour and is doing one soon again together with UK's Never Again.

Anchor
Don't really need a presentation, I think most people have heard em.

Forever Young (Umea)
Got their song for the credits in Edge the Movie.

Harda Tider (Malmo)

Balance (Lund)

Values ( Jönköping)

Big Deal ( Jönköping)

Sista Sekunden (Malmo)
Some oldies who toured the US etc!

Played Out (Stockholm)

Conviction (Stockholm)