Tigerbombs

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Interview : Pepe from Tigerbombs

When and how was your band created?
The band was a result of many years playing music together in different forms. Tigerbombs was finally born on July 2001 during extremely hot studio-jamming sessions. The band was formed by Pepe Trouble and Kido Retro.

Where is the name of the band coming from?
Well, there's no official explanation for that. We thought it would be cool to have a different story each time this was asked, but we failed. Haha. At least there's a Swedish firecracker called Tigerskott. Actually the name Tigerbombs just created itself during the hot studio day.

What musicians or artists did have a major influence in your life / work?
Well, there's too many to be listed. From the Beatles to Entombed. We love
especially 60's and 70's cheesy pop music.

What are the positive and negative aspects of being a musician in Finland?
The positive aspects are that there's not too much bands around, so there's room for everyone. There's also a very good vibe between musicians in general.
The negative side is that there's a very small audience for indie type bands. The mainstream music is the only way to get attention in Finland.

How could you define your style of music?
It's some kind of mixture of Japanese glam, 60's garage rock and 80's cheesy pop. The defining thing in our music would be the Farfisa organ and sing-along melodies.

During the years how has your musical style changed?
Not that much, I think. We have sharpened the melodies a bit and tried to widen the sound palette, but the basic building blocks still exist. Of course there are always new bits and pieces added when we get excited by some cool band or sound.

How do explain these changes?
It's important to give moving on to retain the freshness. It would be dull to remake same thing year after year. And then again, it's important for us to not move too far from where we started.

What are topics you treat in your songs?
Most of all there's very basic stuff found in our lyrics. Love in different forms is the most important thing. It's an issue you can write forever and there are always things that everyone can relate to. The lyrics might seem shallow at the first look, but there are always deeper meanings underneath.

What is your favorite song in your repertoire and why?
It keeps changing but at this time it's a song called Subtle Shaking for it is so much fun playing it live.

Do you actually prefer performing your music live or in a studio?
There are good sides in both. In studio you can really get the creative juices going and it tends to get really exciting sometimes. You have all the options in the world. Playing live is so overwhelming adventure that when we get on stage, it's the best thing in the world. There are also neat things regarding the exploring the world in a tour bus with bunch of guys. It's always fun to get on the road.

During the process of making a song, what is the moment that you prefer?
It's the first glimpse of new melody, rhythm or whatever. The first moment when you know that something special is on it's way. Of course it is superfun to get a song finished with lyrics and all and then record it.

A stupid question but... what is among all the songs you've been listening
in your life the BEST song?
That's an impossible one to answer to. It changes daily depending on your mood. Today, for me the BEST song would be "Everlong" by Foo Fighters. Yesterday it was "Hard to explain" by the Strokes.

What is your opinion, as a musician, regarding internet?
I think it's a great thing. You can get the word spreading fast as lightning. There are these new neat things like Myspace that I really like a lot. There's also negative sides regarding illegal file sharing and stuff, but I hope that people start to understand the harm they are doing to artists when using these p2p networks.

What are your projects?
We have an ongoing plan to record an album of some kind of metal. What it would be, only time will tell. But what comes to basic Tigerbombs, Pepe Trouble and Kido Retro, this is the thing for us now. There's really no time to concentrate on anything else. There's also three additional live-members in Tigerbombs and they have some other projects going on ie. Tapes and Laurila. Check the links from our website.

What "image" do you have of French music?
To be honest with you, I've just started to learn more European music dwelling under the surface, so I don't know much about French music that much. When I think French music in general I think of high quality. And an accordion. Haha. But hey, I really love the band called Phoenix.

Is there one French song that you prefer? If so, what song is it?
Well, that would be "Too Young" by Phoenix.

Interview by Vincent Lefrançois - 2006