Photo credit: Tove Lise Mossestad
Tell us about your tour vehicle. Any notable breakdown stories?
Well, we’ve played in 36 countries on 5 continents with DATAROCK so our main vehicle has been airplanes, taxis, various rented cars & nightliners, I guess. We’ve also criss-crossed the US & Canada a number of times, but that’s usually been in rented Sprinters. But even then we’ve had the odd mid-tour flights to Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Chile and/or Argentina, so usually the management made sure there was a tour manager / driver to handle all the logistics.
If we owned our own vehicle and drove everywhere in that, the mileage would probably be impressive – or very disappointing in regards to our carbon footprints.
We once had a tire explode speeding mid-lane on a highway in Mississippi though. Luckily our tour manager / driver was on point.
How do you eat cheaply and/or healthy while on tour?
On the road in the US? Oh – that’s easy; you don’t really eat, period. It’s all hotel breakfast, backstage snacks & gas station pretzels – and of course the odd unhealthy fast food pizza or burgers. But every now and then Vietnamese or sushi, if you’re lucky.
And then when you need a serious break from the highway – a little bit of Cracker Barrel …unless you run into the real deal, family operated real versions.
Sometimes – if you’re super lucky – however, the venue has a sister business that happens to be a restaurant. That’s usually the few times there’s room for a low cost, above decent AND healthy meal.
How many strings do you break in a typical year? How much does it cost to replace them?
You won’t believe this but we’ve actually been sponsored by Steinberger with guitars & strings via Gibson ever since we played Coachella in 2008, but I used to break a string at every second show – and that’s about 75 a year I guess…
Now, with my solo stuff on the other side, I so gently strum a Gibson ES 335 from 1976 and a 175th anniversary edition Martin HD28 that I never ever break anything. I’m so careful with those pieces of art that I’m surprised they make any sound whatsoever.
Where do you rehearse?
It’s in the basement of a huge 1890s villa right next to where I live, but the building is where my accountant has his offices with a bunch of “shirts” who leave in the afternoon – so it kinda feels like a weird combo of total man cave & the kids’ basement in Stranger Things.
The accountants also have a bar & lounge down by our rehearsal space (for a few annual get togethers with their clients) which means we’ve had the best “speakeasy” EVER during the lock downs. And it’s been so nice to have everyone from Gaahl to Sondre Lerche come visit, you know.
I’d even go so far as to say that the ONLY reason why I ended up releasing Rona Diaries in 2021 is that very space – cause the offices where empty all day so I could write & records non stop during the lock downs from March 2020.
Same as the upcoming DATAROCK album. It’s mixed by Steve Dub & Mark Rankin alright, but it’s all written & recorded in that man-boy basement.
What was the title and a sample lyric from the first song that you wrote?
Oh – I remember: The film La Bamba has just been released, I was 11 and easily affected at the movies, so I went straight home and wrote a total copy of Ritchie Valens’ “Donna”, and though I can’t remember the title, I do remember the melody and the fitting words for an 11 year old Norwegian kid: “I wanted to marry you / but the marriage was lost”, hehe.
Luckily shortly after I discovered Metallica, Anthrax, Slayer, Sepultura, Kreator etc and tried to rip them off instead.
Describe your first gig.
As a kid? Well, I was 13 playing the legendary black metal hang out spot in Bergen called Garage. Our band was called “axe” spelled ØX (we even had a song called “motor axe”) and we supported the best thrash metal band in town called Wedan. It was a total kick playing for a large, adult crowd in the second largest city in Norway. The very serious journalist (who still reviews shows for the local paper, and one of the country’s biggest publications) however wrote that we just made a hell of a lot of noise. Good enough for us. He still remembers the show though, and we’re all close pals 🙂
What was your last day job? What was your favorite day job?
I’m still involved in running everything from a pizza joint “dive bar” called Hoggorm, a tonic producer called Norwegian Soda Company, an app called Flyer, the label YAP Records, and indirectly a beer company called Disko Brewing who released my very own juicy pale ale with kveik (called Disko Diary) for Rona Diaries – but my day job is as an Art Direction and project management at the design & communication company (that lots of the DATAROCKers are involved in) recently renamed FORM (as we just took over a 17 year old tech & sustainability focused company we’ve been worked for since 2019). Even DATAROCK’s original founding members Ketil Mosnes (Ket-Ill) & Tom Mæland (TomPuter) are in fact part of the gang, so we still stick with the old crew.
Favorite day job however was probably starting, shaping & running the acclaimed farm-to-table Michelin recommended restaurant (turn total nightclub every Thursday – Saturday) called Lysverket from 2013 – 2018.
Or perhaps even booking & promoting the venue Landmark at the gallery Bergen Kunsthall from 2002 – 2007. Here’s a few of the acts that performed at my own club night called Fredrik’s Wonderful Evening:
CENTRAL (US) • AFRIRAMPO (JP) • AI PHOENIX • ALOG • ALPHA COLLECTIVE • ARCHER PREWIT (US) • ALWYNNE PRITCHARD (UK) • BANJOBANDEN • BEAT SCHOOL (UK) • BIRDS (NO/JAP/USA) • BLACK FOREST/BLACK SEA (US) • BLIND • BLIND STEREO • CASA ELECTRO NOVO (UK/US/GER) • CEX (US) • CHEAPMACHINES (UK) • CHERUBS • CHEVAL DE FRISE (FR) • DATAROCK • DEMARNIA LLOYD (NZ) • DER BRIEF FEAT. THOMAS DAHL • DIJF SANDERS (BE) • DJ ANNIE • DJ BJØRN TORSKE • DJ MAKELOVE (FIN) • DJ MIKAL TELLE • DJ PLEASURE • DJ PÅL WOLD • DJ RALPH MYERZ • DJ SÄRMÄ (FIN) • DJ TIMO (FIN) • DJ URB • DJ WOO • EIRIK GLAMBÆK BØE • ELEKTROFANT • ELECTRONICAT (FR) • ENKELTMANNSFORETAKET OLE MADS VEVLE • FAT BATTERY • FLOORA • GOCAB • GORGE TRIO (US) • GYAN RILEY (US) • HÄCKER & HASSWELL (AUS/UK) • IO • JASON FORREST AKA DONNA SUMMER (US) • JAZZKAMMER FEAT. MAJA RATKJE & JØRGEN TRÆEN • JET JAGUAR • JIM STÄRK • KANAGAWA • KARIN PARK • KHANATE (US) • KJEMPETJUKK BUSSJÅFØR • KOBI • KULTURAKUTTEN • KYBERIA • LEIV REED • LUPO • MATIAS TELLEZ • ME AT SEA • MENTAL OVERDRIVE • NUTEQ • OFFICE-R(6) • PAAL NILSSEN-LOVE & ANDERS HANA • PAVAN (SWE) • PEDRO CARMONA ALVAREZ AKA MOONPEDRO • PETIKO • PHONOPHANI • QUASIMOJO • REAKTOR • RUINS (JP) • RYFYLKE • SAM PREKOP (US) • SCANNER (UK) • SEX TAGS • SGT. PETTER • SHORT CIRCUIT • SISSY WISH • SKATEBÅRD • SKOLTZ_KOLGAN (CAN) • SPOOT & BUILT TO CHILL • STEN OVE TOFT • STOCKHAUS • SYME • SYNTAX TERROR • TEEBEE • THE JNMGNS • TØYEN • UGRESS • ULLAN GENSA • ULTRALYD • UNKNOWN JOE • USA/USB • WÄLDCHENGARTEN (DK) • WILLIAM HUT • X3D FRITZ
Those were the days…
How has your music-related income changed over the past 5-10 years? What do you expect it to look like 5-10 years from now?
We were always so into extremely alternative, underground and/or experimental music that we never thought we’d ever be able to live off our own weird shit – which we of course simply thought was a weak rip off on tons of random stuff we (and not too many of our friends even) liked. So being able to release several albums and play more that a 1,000 shows (incl. all the festivals we ever knew around the globe) was something that took us so much by surprise that we never thought it was gonna last anyways. However – we’ve been able to invest in some gear over the years, and thereby to cut down cost by recording everything ourselves (both for my solo stuff & for DATAROCK) after the fall of income from live shows (party due to covid) & record sales …replaced by the basically non-existing income from streaming. We luckily still do sell some merch & physical copies though – and luckily we also still get synchronizations request for films & series etc that we think are OK to “OK”, so we still make a little on that.
But damn – it’s near impossible to make a sustainable income on music nowadays with the over saturated and low paying wonderful world of steaming, and the over saturated reopened live market that EVERYONE tried to tap into after 2 years of no live income – so I can’t help but to wonder how recent years & the new reality affects the recruitment among the next generation. Surely they must be pushed away from music unless they’ve got financial help from family or public support …in the few cases that exists.
Personally I have to admit I’ve felt extremely liberated creatively during covid though – when there basically wasn’t any reason to try to release music that would generate enough attention to pull a crowd to the “non-existing shows & other events”. And again not first and foremost depending on the income from my music career has made everything about being involved in music so much closer to what pulled me to music when I was young – not worrying about carrier, revenue, expenses & profits.
And I like it this way, so to be honest I don’t plan to go out of my way to try get back to the rat race of 250 days on the road and spending everything we made on new recordings & live shows. So unfortunately I see the decline of our income as relatively permanent.
However – I am so lucky to live in a country that supports their artists with grants and various aid, so we’ll probably continue releasing new music till we die – even if our audience don’t pay our bills so to speak.
What one thing do you know now that you had wished you knew when you started your career in music?
That you should always just do it for the hell of it – and that the journey in itself is the goal. Music is a timeless place of magic where beats and storytelling communicate in the most wonderfully, inclusive communal way – offering both a sense of belonging physical & intellectual, friendship, comfort and uplift. And the music business tries to capitalize on that magic in an often terribly damaging way. So from the ashes of a partly failing music-business-model one can only hope that a Phoenix will rise where the main intent is to do what music was always intended to do. Which wasn’t to make a quick buck – though artists of course have to be able to live from their art.
Can’t wait to see what that Phoenix will look like.