As said, on Tuesday, April 27th, will we release the debut single from Bedroom Eyes. And since he (yes its a he) still is a quite unknown, I did ask him a couple of questions the other day. So here we go;
Who are Bedroom Eyes, and what´s the story behind it?
Bedroom Eyes is my moniker and my birth name is Jonas Jonsson. I grew up
in a small town called Föllinge, located way up in the Swedish mountains.
I’ve been making music under my moniker for some four years now and have
played selected shows in Sweden and Norway with a live band since. The aim
is to make pop music that is so beautiful that it makes people want to go
out and do something pretty.
My forthcoming debut album is recorded on two-inch tape in the
all-analogue studio Ocean Sound Recordings, built inside a small boat
house on the scenic Atlantic shores of the tiny Norwegian island Giske.
All songs are written by me and produced by myself and my dear friend
Henric Boija.
The story behind the name is simple.
I was in London when I had just turned 20. I was exiting a record shop in
Soho and accidently smashed into a lady passing by on the street. I almost
knocked both of us over and when I looked up to apologise, every cell in
my body froze.
It was Chrissie Hynde of The Pretenders.
I stood there staring while my mind unsuccessfully tried to find some
polite and suitable words to say. She looked back at me, adjusted her sun
glasses and said “Hey, watch your step, bedroom eyes!” and disappeared
down the street. I went back into the shop and with shaky hands bought
“Get Close”.
The first single release on A West Side Fabrication, the lovely
“Hand-In-Hand Grenade” what can you tell us about it?
“Hand-In-Hand Grenade” stands as a very fine example of nearly all the
things that makes my music what it is. A clash between my 60’s Phil
Spectoresque instrumentation influences and the slight touches of the drum
machine verve of contemporary indie, crowned with a lyric I spent a long
time refining. To make it all come together in a solid way we are actually
eleven people playing on that one song. That’s the way this album is
recorded – no short cuts or time saving half-measures, we chose the path
of most resistance even though it nearly killed us a few times.
And talking about West Side Fabrication, why did you contact us at all, do
you have any personal relationship with us?
As a kid, growing up in northern Sweden, A West Side Fabrication was for a
long time the only Swedish label I knew. Around the time when music really
found me, there seemed to be an endless row of West Side bands like The
Bear Quartet, Popsicle and The Wannadies who, just like myself, came from
very isolated and far-off places in northern Sweden. The fact that these
people could make drop-dead cool indie was a major inspiration and somehow
I think Bedroom Eyes is a part of the second phase of the northern indie
scene, standing in debt to these arctic pioneers. Maybe not so much in
sound as in sentiment.
When I recorded my first demo song some years ago, a friend stopped by to
listen and said “this really sounds like something that could have come
out of A West Side Fabrication”. For me and my friends, northern indie and
A West Side Fabrication is as tightly combined as anything could possibly
be.
At last, is there anything else you would like to share with us at this
point?
There’s always tons to be shared. The second most urgent thing right now
is that the forthcoming album is really something to look forward to. You
can’t find a more biased person than me, but I think this is one of the
best albums of the year. I don’t expect any one else to share my opinion,
but that’s what I truly think. The most urgent thing I want to share are
the words of Lenny Bruce; “There are never enough I love you’s”. Share it,
practice it and let’s keep in touch!
