Dogpound - Biography
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Biography
THE PREHISTORIC AGE
It all started somewhere around the mid - seventies when Hea, Micke, Figge and Tuka got bored of the comfort and warmth of their mothers bellies and decided to pop out.
Some years passed and thanks to Mickes mother throwing his dad out the door and that she worked nights he had to be placed at a night care family institution. The boss of this business was Heas mother...
So the two young boys (ten and eleven years old) started to get acquainted over 628.000 games of badminton (Which Hea won the most of...), many hours in front of video games and guess what?
A bit of music occurred!
Micke went to guitar school every Wednesday and Hea took piano lessons. Their musical interests were heavily focused on rock even though there's not much metal in a nylon stringed acoustic guitar and an upright piano but what the f...! Heas mom had albums by Nazareth and Queen that the guys got into really hard. Already being big fans of bands like Kiss, Iron Maiden, Def Leppard and a lot of other bands, Nazareth and Queen came in as a fresh breeze still being big influences on the guys. During the same time as Micke and Hea bonded heavily over a 3 day long game of Monopoly, something weird happened in the deep forests 250 kilometres north of them...
A couple of years later on Micke was playing his guitar with a drummer White Stripes style doing covers of whatever came the two boys to mind. Songs by Gary Moore, Guns ´N Roses, Black Sabbath, Toy Dolls and many more were executed with enormous enthusiasm.
But they needed a bass player...A friend of Mickes had told him about a friend of his that played a mean bass.
Contestant #1: the friend's friend.
Another friend of Mickes had told him that her brother played a mean bass.
Contestant #2: The female friend's brother.
To Mickes surprise, the two turned out to be the same guy. Figge!
And this is back in 1991...They formed a hard rock cover band that made the base for what later would turn out to be their first band with a recording contract, World Of Silence. The band made two albums between 1996 and 1998 and made quite an impact on the symphonic metal market, but disbanded due to musical and personal differences in 2000.
During the same time they also recorded a bunch of albums with death metal band Godgory...but that's another story!
And what's happening 250 km´s north of them still no one really knows...Rumour has it that there's a drummer with a 28" kick drum in a band called iNMiND who is about to move to Stockholm to search for fame and fortune...But fate will steer that boy in another direction...
More about that drummer a bit later on!
After a pause in their friendship Hea and Micke went to college together re - acquainting themselves for the first time in over 4 years.
But...still no musical projects between the two. It was about this time that Micke discovered that Hea had kicked the upright piano into the nether world and was now concentrating 100% on vocals.
And man, that guy could sing...
Early 1999 Micke and Figge had got slightly disillusioned with W.O.S. and decided to start playing some cover music focusing on the 1970´s.
A drummer came along. But someone had to do the vocal duties...A late night at the local pub Micke and Hea accidentally meet and had a drink together, discussing the possibility as future band mates. Decisions were made. A band was born. . A huge Led Zeppelin - focused repertoire is rehearsed and a bunch of gigs played. It all went very well...almost too well. The bands drummer had to do military duty, Micke, Figge and Hea are unemployed and desperately looking for jobs since the payment for the gigs they do ain´t enough.
How do you solve an unemployment situation?
You go back to school!
So off the three lads went. On the first day of school a long haired very 70´s looking guy appeared...Tuka. It took Micke two days to find out that he was a drummer and exactly what Micke had searched for all his life in a drummer. A John Bonham - ish style flavoured with what has happened in the world of drumming since Bonhams death in 1980.
The first time Micke, Figge and Tuka played together was at a
"be-careful-with-your-ears-when-you-play-rock music" kind of seminar.
The trio was asked to play as loud as possible with merely a 60 watt Marshall and a Pearl drum kit to show how loud and devastating to your ear playing music can be. They got the decibel meter to puke and before it died they were at a stunning 124 db....
Two other trios that also tried to play as loud as they could but only reached 105 db with the same gear...
Did I mention that DOGPOUND still is a lot louder than most other bands?
However, this little rendezvous led to instant love.
Hea was asked to sing and he accepted.
A will to mix the harmonies and melodies from the 70's and 80's with the heaviness and power inspired by more up to date bands was the plan....Micke wrote some tunes and the DOGPOUND story begins...
THE BIRTH OF THE DOG
The first unsteady steps of DOGPOUND takes place in the autumn of ´99. Micke writes two songs, "Bleed" (officially released on The Hellbum) and " Live my way" (never officially released), Figge comes up with the name and the band records their first demo.
A massive bombardment of DOGPOUND demos is unleashed upon the record industry with a very positive response. Enthusiastic from the response, the guys continue to write songs and rehearse on an almost daily basis. In the beginning of the new millennium a second demo is recorded, this time containing the songs "Made It Through" (never officially released), "Beast Within" (never officially released) and "Worries Of Yesterday" (officially released on A Night In The Gutter, these three songs being the first tracks Micke and Hea wrote together) and the bombardment continues.
Still with positive response but it's still not enough.
"THE HELLBUM"
Not being able to get the recording of the debut album going the Pound was inches from calling it a day. On the autumn of 2002 a fourth demo session was carried out. Recorded with no budget what so ever, and with borrowed recording gear DOGPOUND laid down 4 new tracks:
"Diamonds In The Sun" (never officially released) "Loser On A Kings Throne", "Ready To Believe" and "You Remain" (all officially released on The Hellbum) and the demo was sent out to some special friends of the band.
One day early 2003, the guys received a phone call from producer/engineer Ola Sonmark. He gave DOGPOUND a couple of days in the studio he worked in for free. All because he believed in the band and thought that that they deserved better than their latest self produced, self recorded self engineered demo (the guys are great musicians, but studio technicians...naahh!!)
Two songs were cut, "End of Our Days" and "...For My Sins" (both officially released on The Hellbum) and theses two songs was what it took to convince Lasse Mattsson on Lion Music that DOGPOUND was worth a shot.A review of the second demo said: "Probably the best demo I´ve heard in many years. Someone has to unleash these dogs!"
At this time Micke, Figge and Tuka share a three room apartment and...Well put it this way, the walls of this poor apartment has seen more than enough to put the trio in straight jackets for a long, long time... Though never loosing focus on their vision of what modern melodic rock should be all about. A third recording takes place this time the first time they work with producer/engineer Ola Sonmark.
The songs this time were "When The World Comes Down" and "Welcome To the Mystery" (both officially released on The Hellbum),
two more songs from the pen of Micke/Hea.
This time things are starting to happen.
Two record labels show major interest and one of them decided to release "When The World Comes Down" on the compilation album "Rock The Nations - The Sequel" about a year later.
This would be a disastrous move by the band.
The label signed the band, promising this and that, but the only fruit of this labour was extreme frustration when it seemed like the label just wanted to lock the band up so no other label could get their hands on DOGPOUND.
The guys was signed to a label that did not even answer e - mails...
The debut album, The Hellbum, (with its now notorious cover painting) was recorded and mixed in three weeks and released in November of 2003.
Reviews of the debut were overwhelming all over the world. The cover, showing the guys in a cartoonist fashion, standing inside a Dogpound with a particularly mean dog waiting to take a bite out of any of the guys behinds, was made by Heas brother Danny Boy (who has done all covers and taken all the photos ever published on DOGPOUND) and the entire idea was very tongue -in -cheek.
But boy, was it misunderstood... Some magazines wrote: "I thought DOGPOUND was a boring punk band or maybe a hip hop act.
This is a clear case of not judging the book by the cover...."
Another wrote: "The cover makes me want to throw up, but the music is so good it makes up for it...".
One guy even suggested that the album should be taken away from the market in its original form and re-released with a new cover!
This made the guys in the Pound laugh...a lot! And of course, an idea for at the time the then forthcoming album cover was born...."as long as it irritates someone it's great" got to be the album cover philosophy...
"A NIGHT IN THE GUTTER"
The next album was recorded here and there between October 2004 to May 2005 due to problems with making the 24 hours of the day be enough...But in October 2005 the new effort titled "A Night In The Gutter" saw the light of day.
And this time the cover featured the band in suits with Tuka holding a glass of brandy, standing in a back alley street. This time, just as before, raving reviews world wide, and some comments here and there about the cover. The best one is probably "these guys must love their looks if they're serious about that cover".
Well then.... Let's put it this way once and for all: "as long as it irritates someone it's great" IS the album cover philosophy!
But, no one knows what will happen in the cover area in the future...
Or with their music for that matter.
You just never know with these guys!
"DOGPOUND - III"
In February of 2005 Micke start to write the songs that would become the 3rd album. A bash of 25 songs is written before the band has even met to rehearse. Which is a hell of a lot more than what have been written such a long time before the recording sessions ever before.
Before the recording starts the amount of songs is cut down to 14, which all will be on the album. Tuka starts it all off by laying down the drum tracks in October 06 and hammers out some of the best drums that has ever been heard on a DOGPOUND album. Micke, Figge & Hea starts off their duties in late November 06 and the album is sent off to Peter Tägtgren so he can start the mixing duties in early January 07 for what becomes simply "Dogpound - III".
And this time it all just fits like a glove.
The cover art made by Daniel Andersson (who has done both their previous covers) is better than ever.
The music is better than ever.
Everything has gone in just the right direction, don't you agree?
And it's without a doubt the best record the guys have made so far.
And it can only get better, eh?
The future will tell...
Biography by B.S Zkotzman
Source: http://www.dogpound.da.ru/
It all started somewhere around the mid - seventies when Hea, Micke, Figge and Tuka got bored of the comfort and warmth of their mothers bellies and decided to pop out.
Some years passed and thanks to Mickes mother throwing his dad out the door and that she worked nights he had to be placed at a night care family institution. The boss of this business was Heas mother...
So the two young boys (ten and eleven years old) started to get acquainted over 628.000 games of badminton (Which Hea won the most of...), many hours in front of video games and guess what?
A bit of music occurred!
Micke went to guitar school every Wednesday and Hea took piano lessons. Their musical interests were heavily focused on rock even though there's not much metal in a nylon stringed acoustic guitar and an upright piano but what the f...! Heas mom had albums by Nazareth and Queen that the guys got into really hard. Already being big fans of bands like Kiss, Iron Maiden, Def Leppard and a lot of other bands, Nazareth and Queen came in as a fresh breeze still being big influences on the guys. During the same time as Micke and Hea bonded heavily over a 3 day long game of Monopoly, something weird happened in the deep forests 250 kilometres north of them...
A couple of years later on Micke was playing his guitar with a drummer White Stripes style doing covers of whatever came the two boys to mind. Songs by Gary Moore, Guns ´N Roses, Black Sabbath, Toy Dolls and many more were executed with enormous enthusiasm.
But they needed a bass player...A friend of Mickes had told him about a friend of his that played a mean bass.
Contestant #1: the friend's friend.
Another friend of Mickes had told him that her brother played a mean bass.
Contestant #2: The female friend's brother.
To Mickes surprise, the two turned out to be the same guy. Figge!
And this is back in 1991...They formed a hard rock cover band that made the base for what later would turn out to be their first band with a recording contract, World Of Silence. The band made two albums between 1996 and 1998 and made quite an impact on the symphonic metal market, but disbanded due to musical and personal differences in 2000.
During the same time they also recorded a bunch of albums with death metal band Godgory...but that's another story!
And what's happening 250 km´s north of them still no one really knows...Rumour has it that there's a drummer with a 28" kick drum in a band called iNMiND who is about to move to Stockholm to search for fame and fortune...But fate will steer that boy in another direction...
More about that drummer a bit later on!
After a pause in their friendship Hea and Micke went to college together re - acquainting themselves for the first time in over 4 years.
But...still no musical projects between the two. It was about this time that Micke discovered that Hea had kicked the upright piano into the nether world and was now concentrating 100% on vocals.
And man, that guy could sing...
Early 1999 Micke and Figge had got slightly disillusioned with W.O.S. and decided to start playing some cover music focusing on the 1970´s.
A drummer came along. But someone had to do the vocal duties...A late night at the local pub Micke and Hea accidentally meet and had a drink together, discussing the possibility as future band mates. Decisions were made. A band was born. . A huge Led Zeppelin - focused repertoire is rehearsed and a bunch of gigs played. It all went very well...almost too well. The bands drummer had to do military duty, Micke, Figge and Hea are unemployed and desperately looking for jobs since the payment for the gigs they do ain´t enough.
How do you solve an unemployment situation?
You go back to school!
So off the three lads went. On the first day of school a long haired very 70´s looking guy appeared...Tuka. It took Micke two days to find out that he was a drummer and exactly what Micke had searched for all his life in a drummer. A John Bonham - ish style flavoured with what has happened in the world of drumming since Bonhams death in 1980.
The first time Micke, Figge and Tuka played together was at a
"be-careful-with-your-ears-when-you-play-rock music" kind of seminar.
The trio was asked to play as loud as possible with merely a 60 watt Marshall and a Pearl drum kit to show how loud and devastating to your ear playing music can be. They got the decibel meter to puke and before it died they were at a stunning 124 db....
Two other trios that also tried to play as loud as they could but only reached 105 db with the same gear...
Did I mention that DOGPOUND still is a lot louder than most other bands?
However, this little rendezvous led to instant love.
Hea was asked to sing and he accepted.
A will to mix the harmonies and melodies from the 70's and 80's with the heaviness and power inspired by more up to date bands was the plan....Micke wrote some tunes and the DOGPOUND story begins...
THE BIRTH OF THE DOG
The first unsteady steps of DOGPOUND takes place in the autumn of ´99. Micke writes two songs, "Bleed" (officially released on The Hellbum) and " Live my way" (never officially released), Figge comes up with the name and the band records their first demo.
A massive bombardment of DOGPOUND demos is unleashed upon the record industry with a very positive response. Enthusiastic from the response, the guys continue to write songs and rehearse on an almost daily basis. In the beginning of the new millennium a second demo is recorded, this time containing the songs "Made It Through" (never officially released), "Beast Within" (never officially released) and "Worries Of Yesterday" (officially released on A Night In The Gutter, these three songs being the first tracks Micke and Hea wrote together) and the bombardment continues.
Still with positive response but it's still not enough.
"THE HELLBUM"
Not being able to get the recording of the debut album going the Pound was inches from calling it a day. On the autumn of 2002 a fourth demo session was carried out. Recorded with no budget what so ever, and with borrowed recording gear DOGPOUND laid down 4 new tracks:
"Diamonds In The Sun" (never officially released) "Loser On A Kings Throne", "Ready To Believe" and "You Remain" (all officially released on The Hellbum) and the demo was sent out to some special friends of the band.
One day early 2003, the guys received a phone call from producer/engineer Ola Sonmark. He gave DOGPOUND a couple of days in the studio he worked in for free. All because he believed in the band and thought that that they deserved better than their latest self produced, self recorded self engineered demo (the guys are great musicians, but studio technicians...naahh!!)
Two songs were cut, "End of Our Days" and "...For My Sins" (both officially released on The Hellbum) and theses two songs was what it took to convince Lasse Mattsson on Lion Music that DOGPOUND was worth a shot.A review of the second demo said: "Probably the best demo I´ve heard in many years. Someone has to unleash these dogs!"
At this time Micke, Figge and Tuka share a three room apartment and...Well put it this way, the walls of this poor apartment has seen more than enough to put the trio in straight jackets for a long, long time... Though never loosing focus on their vision of what modern melodic rock should be all about. A third recording takes place this time the first time they work with producer/engineer Ola Sonmark.
The songs this time were "When The World Comes Down" and "Welcome To the Mystery" (both officially released on The Hellbum),
two more songs from the pen of Micke/Hea.
This time things are starting to happen.
Two record labels show major interest and one of them decided to release "When The World Comes Down" on the compilation album "Rock The Nations - The Sequel" about a year later.
This would be a disastrous move by the band.
The label signed the band, promising this and that, but the only fruit of this labour was extreme frustration when it seemed like the label just wanted to lock the band up so no other label could get their hands on DOGPOUND.
The guys was signed to a label that did not even answer e - mails...
The debut album, The Hellbum, (with its now notorious cover painting) was recorded and mixed in three weeks and released in November of 2003.
Reviews of the debut were overwhelming all over the world. The cover, showing the guys in a cartoonist fashion, standing inside a Dogpound with a particularly mean dog waiting to take a bite out of any of the guys behinds, was made by Heas brother Danny Boy (who has done all covers and taken all the photos ever published on DOGPOUND) and the entire idea was very tongue -in -cheek.
But boy, was it misunderstood... Some magazines wrote: "I thought DOGPOUND was a boring punk band or maybe a hip hop act.
This is a clear case of not judging the book by the cover...."
Another wrote: "The cover makes me want to throw up, but the music is so good it makes up for it...".
One guy even suggested that the album should be taken away from the market in its original form and re-released with a new cover!
This made the guys in the Pound laugh...a lot! And of course, an idea for at the time the then forthcoming album cover was born...."as long as it irritates someone it's great" got to be the album cover philosophy...
"A NIGHT IN THE GUTTER"
The next album was recorded here and there between October 2004 to May 2005 due to problems with making the 24 hours of the day be enough...But in October 2005 the new effort titled "A Night In The Gutter" saw the light of day.
And this time the cover featured the band in suits with Tuka holding a glass of brandy, standing in a back alley street. This time, just as before, raving reviews world wide, and some comments here and there about the cover. The best one is probably "these guys must love their looks if they're serious about that cover".
Well then.... Let's put it this way once and for all: "as long as it irritates someone it's great" IS the album cover philosophy!
But, no one knows what will happen in the cover area in the future...
Or with their music for that matter.
You just never know with these guys!
"DOGPOUND - III"
In February of 2005 Micke start to write the songs that would become the 3rd album. A bash of 25 songs is written before the band has even met to rehearse. Which is a hell of a lot more than what have been written such a long time before the recording sessions ever before.
Before the recording starts the amount of songs is cut down to 14, which all will be on the album. Tuka starts it all off by laying down the drum tracks in October 06 and hammers out some of the best drums that has ever been heard on a DOGPOUND album. Micke, Figge & Hea starts off their duties in late November 06 and the album is sent off to Peter Tägtgren so he can start the mixing duties in early January 07 for what becomes simply "Dogpound - III".
And this time it all just fits like a glove.
The cover art made by Daniel Andersson (who has done both their previous covers) is better than ever.
The music is better than ever.
Everything has gone in just the right direction, don't you agree?
And it's without a doubt the best record the guys have made so far.
And it can only get better, eh?
The future will tell...
Biography by B.S Zkotzman
Source: http://www.dogpound.da.ru/