Per Sunding | TapeOp

For most of 1997, it was nearly impossible to avoid hearing "Lovefool" by The Cardigans on a regular basis. As one of the rare hits heard on both popular and college radio at the time, its chorus was stuck in the heads of millions, much in the way the whistling pre-verse of Peter, Bjorn & John's "Young Folks" would be a decade later. However, it's safe to say neither of these would have reached the world's ears had they not been shown the way by the Swedish indie pop band, Eggstone. The scene this group created, both culturally and by laboring in Malmö's now legendary Tambourine and Gula Studios, not only launched world-famous bands but also drew in outsiders like Franz Ferdinand, Saint Etienne, Idlewild, and Boss Hog, to name a few. Eventually their studios would even host the inimitable Tom Jones and legendary producer George Martin. Founder Per Sunding not only continues to produce quality pop in Tambourine's hallowed halls, he remains Sweden's ambassador of Bonving [a sport invented by Eggstone that involves tossing shoes].

When did you start the studio?

Twenty-two years ago this week, in 1991. My friend, Tore Johansson, was working in a state-funded studio and my band, Eggstone, did an EP with him. We loved The Beatles, The Jam, '60s music, and people here weren't interested in the same things we were. Malmö was a working class city and most people were just interested in the blues. Also, the way things were being recorded here was like a competition for "best" '80s snare sounds. We didn't like it. We were more into a "cutlery box" drum sound. Tore saw an ad in the paper. A studio in Kivik had gone bankrupt and was selling everything. They had all the old gear [24-channel Amek console and a 16-track, 2-inch MCI]. Our parents cosigned some loans, and we started looking for industrial sites on the edge of Malmö. We found this space, moved out of our flats, and moved into here for 18 months.

Were you allowed to do that?

No! It was a crazy time. [laughs] We have the downstairs room now, but didn't when we moved in. It was occupied by an illegal goldsmith.

An illegal goldsmith?

It's not common! Heroin users used to come to him at night to sell him what they had stolen. It was a fencing operation. We had a kind of relationship with him. He was usually stoned, and he'd come upstairs with beer crates of records. He'd say [in a slurred, "stoned voice"], "Uunngghhh, you like music! These are great! Sixties stuff." It was fun to have him around.

When did he move out?

Actually the local Hell's Angels branch took over and moved his business out to a barn.

So you were off to an illustrious start!

I've played hockey my whole life, and I was sleeping with my stick every night for protection!

What was your first project here?

The reason we set it up was to be ours . A project studio. That EP with did with Tore was sent to some labels and we ended up with a 250.000 kr budget [approx. $40,000] because the music industry was rich at the time. We didn't want to go to one of those studios that didn't understand us, where we would also have to watch the clock. So we put that money towards equipment and thought we'd just learn from Tore. He knew everything and we knew nothing! But then he only gave us one day. He said, "Listen closely, because I'm only going to tell you once! First lesson: It starts with a microphone and it has to go somewhere, and it does that through a cord." Then we had another lesson after lunch about EQs. From there it was just, "Knock yourselves out." We had all the time in the world to make mistakes, and of course Tore helped along the way. Then we put the record out, and it reached a lot of people in small towns around Sweden who felt the same way we did — misunderstood in their community.

You had "started a thing."

Yes. The Cardigans were one of those bands. They sent their demos, and so did the band Bob Hund. We met their singer, Thomas Öberg, when we were on tour and we just clicked. When he started Bob Hund we saw them in Stockholm, and I had never seen anything like it! Eggstone was interested in an image. We were posing a little; but those guys were ! One of the brothers, Johnny [Essing], was not at all in control of his diabetes. He sat in a chair when he played, and at any moment he could just fall out of it and start convulsing. They would stop the show, pour milk or soda into his mouth to get his blood sugar up, and start playing again. I started wondering what I was doing and why. They were just breaking through that wall and pulling the crowd in. The bass player has a wooden leg! He was working like hell to get around the stage. We had just finished our record and we were like, "The studio is empty. You have to come down to record." They had no contract. They came down, were super enthusiastic, and in top form. We still didn't know much, so we just put up some mics and recorded it. The magic was in the performance.

So you did it live off the floor?

We had to go back to do some vocals, and maybe one overdub per song. A tambourine, maybe. The whole thing was done in two or three days.

Done and mixed?

We recorded 14 demos to cassette and then had our own "Eurovision Song Contest." [laughs] We all sat in the same room, listened, voted, and chose the highest- rated songs. The next day we recorded to 2-inch tape. We set the levels, checked it, and recorded. There is a legend that the cassette might even sound better than the final product. I don't know where it is, but I've been looking for it. Out of the demos that were getting sent to us, the other one we really liked was from The Cardigans. They really had something. Eggstone had to focus on our career, but Tore was excited about it. We didn't set out to be a commercial studio, but work was coming in. At first the only people sending us demos were people who heard and liked Eggstone, but after The Cardigans [ Emmerdale ] and Bob Hund [ bob hund (1) ] records worked their way higher up into the music industry chain, a relationship started. We started listening to tapes as if we were A&R people.

As tastemakers?

Yes, the labels were wondering how they had missed The Cardigans and Bob Hund. Then Elle magazine invited the Japanese artist Cornelius to do a music feature. He chose our album cover, along with The Smiths and two other bands, to be on the cover of the magazine. Suddenly we could fly to Tokyo to play shows for a thousand people and be treated like rock stars. Also, the second Cardigans record, which had been done here [ Life ], had just come out and it sold five million copies in Japan alone. So then we had interest from the Japanese market! "What is happening in Sweden?" Every Japanese label wanted a Swedish act, and the way to them was through Tambourine! So we started recording a lot of Swedish indie bands. Most of them got signed. Some "made it;" most didn't, but that kept us busy for a while. The next step, of course, was for Japanese bands to start coming here.

Hoping some magic would rub off?

Yes, and fans started to come. Travel agencies in Tokyo were organizing trips. Buses were stopping out front. Some would come in and just spend the day. They have, like, one or two weeks vacation a year and they chose to come here? It was a good time though, and we made some friends. The first bands to come were fans of Eggstone. We had a lot in common, and it was really fun. Then... well, the Japanese budgets were so big, so when we were asked we thought, "How can we say no?" We made it work by setting up a "factory" of steady session musicians from here in Malmö. We started to feel cynical. "We don't like this... BUT IT'S ONE MILLION KRONA [approx. $160,000]!" Working with music you don't like poisons everything. We started to aim too high. We wanted a record label [Vibraphone]. We built a restaurant in the center of town. We were too young and had too much money. We weren't passionate about those things though; we just hired our friends and things went poorly economically. We gave vague directives like, "It has to be great!" and, "Make this bar the coolest bar!" We had to keep super clean books because we were also running a management company, and we thought anything [fishy] would spill over to Tambourine and create a disaster. Of course running a clean restaurant, when it comes to taxes, is unheard of! [laughs] We treated the staff well, we had the best food, the best prices, and cheap beer. You can't survive under those conditions! We were too busy doing Japanese recordings and minding our own career to pay attention to the details though. We just wanted to own it and be super cool. So we sold the restaurant and closed the label, except for a small online shop. [ Note: Vibraphone became Vibrashop, and is now run by the Copenhagen-based indie label, Crunchy Frog ].

Were you broke at that point?

No, even with the mismanagement there was still so much work coming into Tambourine we could [handle the setback]. The bands really wanted to work with Tore, because his credits list was growing. We were jealous because our endeavors weren't going well. He was the only one bringing in the money. The studio was booked all the time, and since it was booked, Eggstone couldn't get in to work. Then Tore decided it was time to go out on his own. He had really made a name for himself. He broke The Cardigans worldwide, and had done the first Franz Ferdinand record [ You Could Have It So Much Better ] too. So he moved to London to try to become a songwriter, and we had to step in to produce again.

You had no choice!

We had three studios by then — this one, Gula, which was in this building, and one outside of town called Country Hell. Gula was occupied by a band called The Mopeds, as well as a collective of producers. They eventually bought the gear and moved the studio to a new location [in 2001, to the Möllevången district of Malmö] where they are today. Tore worked out at Country Hell. The Cardigans did Gran Turismo out there, which was our first Pro Tools session. We had been all tape, up to that point. That entire record was recorded on 7 gigabytes, which is a funny number now.

So Tore came back?

He was in London for four years, but then he came back. You know, he is one of the only true great artists [in this business]. He always looks ahead. He's full of ideas, greatness, and weirdness. He went to churches to learn about choirs. He chases ideas. Now he has this big bus, which is both a recording and living space.

He said, "Listen closely, because I'm only going to tell you once! First lesson: It starts with a microphone and it has to go somewhere, and it does that through a cord." From there it was just, "Knock yourselves out."

Is the bus like one of those classic mobile units? Like the Rolling Stones used?

Yes, and he put solar panels on it. If it's been a sunny day, and the batteries are full, he can record from 10 p.m. until 8 in the morning. He'll keep the lights off to save power and mix with a headlamp!

So now Pro Tools had come into the picture...

We were running both. Tore was ahead of the game and [the rest of us] still used tape.

Were you reluctant, considering how classic rock minded you were?

In a way, but when we started we didn't know anything, so we weren't snobby. When Eggstone formed, we were looking for a place to do demos. We disliked the MIDI studios, which were run by engineers who were mainly interested in technology, but not music. The DIY thing that happened here in the '90s made it so future studios were started by musicians. The first stuff we bought was just what was available, old, and out of fashion. We made do, but then we realized that it was the secret to the classic sounds. The main thing that made the transition to Pro Tools slow was we had finally figured out how the analog gear had worked and we were used to it. We saw the advantages though, and wanted to be compatible with other studios.

What came with the big gear purchase?

Some Neumann mics, which was a great catch, some Sennheiser mics, a Lexicon reverb that we sold (because we didn't know how it worked), a Roland sampler, and an E-MU drum machine. The studio we bought it from had been doing what we call "Danseband" music. It's this awful German music — pop, sleaze, country — with lyrics so bad they make you shiver. Very sentimental like, "I love you, grandma!" Everyone in the band wears the same outfits. People line dance to it. It's a huge thing, and it's sort of like what the Germans call Schlager. So the drum machine had all of these folk samples on it. [laughs]

When did you find that you needed to expand?

We became more aware of what we wanted, and would look for it when it was needed. Of course we often just asked Tore. Our options were automatically narrowed because of the sounds we were trying to get. It's like when you're 60 years old; you say, "Yes" to one identity and reject the rest. So the trademark sound we were looking for efficiently ruled out a lot of options. So it was always going to be Neumann and Sennheiser mics for us, for example. We got into the Neve thing when it was time to upgrade. We had the money, and they weren't that expensive at the time. We found someone who was renovating leftover BBC consoles. We drove to London Studio Exchange to get it. Over four years we bought three Neves. One is still with Gula, one is here — we found that in Sweden — and the third was chopped up into modules [and racked up]. We were in that mode of thinking, "Neve! It has to be Neve! Neve is the coolest!"

Aesthetics are a big thing when you're young. What happened next?

We got more responsible and I took on more production jobs. Bob Hund came to do the second record, and I was the only one who had the time, so I produced it. When Tore left someone had to fill his shoes, and it only made sense for it to be me because I was more interested in production than my bandmates [in Eggstone]. After that I spent a lot of time in Copenhagen and ended up working with a lot of Danish bands [Figurines, Junior Senior, TV-2].

Even before the bridge was built? [Note: The 8 km. long Ørsund bridge links Malmö to Copenhagen and was opened in July 2000.]

Yes. Sweden has a "Stockholm Complex," so the contrary people of Malmö always said, "Well, we have Copenhagen!" But the Danes speak funny [laughs], and big cities are intimidating, so nobody went there except to buy cheap beer. I met [Crunchy Frog label's] Yebo Petersen, and eventually ended up in his surf band, The Tremolo Beer Gut.

Peter Bjorn & John did Gimme Some here. Aren't they known for doing all of their records themselves?

Yes. I wondered why they wanted to work here. Peter used to be in a band called Piggy in the Middle, and I used to see him in the crowd at Eggstone shows when he was 15. He sent his demo tapes and first record to me back in 1998. Then he sent me the first Peter Bjorn & John record [ Forbidden Chords ] when that came out. The biggest surprise was when Kim Larsen came here. He was in a huge Danish band called Gasolin' [1969-78], and has recorded with people like Roy Thomas Baker. They were my favorite band when I was 12. One of Kim's records from the '80s, Midt om natten , sold more copies in Denmark than there are households, so I guess people bought more than one!

How are things in Malmö now?

The whole city has become very cultural! The studio is more like what it started as, originally. I recently finished my studies and became a clinical psychologist. It's a fantastic job, but no one told me how tired you get from working nine to five. Now I doze off at 9:30 on Friday evenings! I have a patience I didn't have when I was younger, so it was the right time to take up studies. Plus my ears were beaten and ringing, and the breaks were nice. I've done so much recording, so now I want to enjoy it as much as I did when I was learning by more selective and only working with bands I really like. These days, I pace through the studio and do a "Queen's Wave." Sometimes the people working here need some advice about arrangements, second opinions on mixes, how to negotiate a deal, or how to handle a narcissistic guitarist. I still produce when I have the time, and it helped me financially through the five years of study. Also, I love playing in The Tremolo Beer Gut. It's the best experience ever. Being a little drunk and playing with that band is something I can do until I get old.

These days do you have people track here, bring the project home, and then come back to mix?

Other than a project I started in Copenhagen with a band called Davenport, which we moved here for overdubs and mixing, most records are started and completed here. My nephews, Fredrik and Erik, work on things outside of the studio. They were going to buy some equipment and I suggested they just put their money into a good editing room. So they track here, but they have what they need for overdubs and mixing in the box later. There was point where we thought we would have to close, but this recording revolution, where people are working on their own projects? They reach their limits. They get an urge to do a good recording, in a good room, on good equipment, and to get some experience. That's because they had the ability to start at home on a computer, though, and get inspired.

So the studio is still really healthy?

Yes, it's like springtime here! Great people are working in the studio constantly. A Finnish guy has been here doing operas and short films — big, state funded, cultural projects that I have no experience with. He's on a Nordic Artists' salary. Things that are jointly funded by Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, and Norway for niche projects. My nephews have been working with their friends' bands. I'll go so far as to say the most exciting project in the last two years has been the fulfillment of the long-needed generation shift at Tambourine. There are younger people working in here on a regular basis again. They have brought us some interesting new recording projects, and they have the energy to be inspired by old, broken, tape machines and stuff that the older guys, like myself, have developed a far too cynical attitude towards. Also inspiring is the fact that among the 15 regulars in the studio, five are female. There is a buzz in the studio right now that I haven't experienced in a decade. We also started hosting "Live På Tambourine" evenings last summer. They are soirées where we invite a band to do a live performance that is recorded and filmed, and we try to have someone speak as well. One evening we had an old Malmö-based photographer who made friends with The Beatles in Hamburg. He went over to London in '62, and was staying in John Lennon's flat when The Beatles had their breakthrough. He showed us photos from his very happening life.

What are the rules of Tambourine's famous game, Bonving?

Two teams of two players each stand in marked squares, at the end of a field. Each player holds a standard, office- sized, plastic garbage can. One team throws a size nine or ten shoe at the opponent's end of the field, and they try to catch it. If it bounces out it doesn't count! If it lands in the square, the throwing team gets a point; but if the team guarding the square catches it, they get one. Seventeen points wins the set; two out of three sets win the game. Don't hold the can by its top, though. You have no idea how much it hurts when a flying shoe hits your thumbs, so hold the can like you're hugging it!