Roger Nilsson & Jolle Atlagic – The Quill – Uber Rock Interview Exclusive
Written by Nev Brooks
Sunday, 18 August 2013 04:00
After receiving the seventh LP from The Quill, ’Tiger Blood’, and giving it the Uber Rock seal of approval, I could hardly refuse the opportunity of a tete a tete with both bassist Roger Nilsson and drummer Jolle Atlagic to find out all about the Swedish rockers and what went into making the new album.
Hi both, I’d like to take some time out to thank you for talking to us here at Uber Rock. I have to admit prior to ’Tiger Blood’ coming through you had somehow managed to escape my attention! Since I first goit to hear the record though I’ve managed to work my way through your entireback catalogue, which just showed me that I’d been missing out for a long time. There’s some cracking stuff buried in there.
But, I have to start with “Where did the name come from?”
Roger: The name actually came from an old band Christian and Jolle had way back in their youth named Quil. When the group evolved and things got more serious they decided to have a name-change and bada-bing The Quill was decided as the winner. Jolle has told me they wanted something different and around that time not many bands had a “The” in their name, all hard-rock bands had double names like Judas Priest or Iron Maiden and the idea was to be distinct. There’s also influences from the ‘60s and ‘70s in The Quill’s music a “The” as an also reference to bands like The Beatles or The Doors made a lot of sense to us as well.
As with me, The Quill will be a new band to a few of our readers, can you give us a brief history lesson?
Roger: Well, as I explained earlier. Jolle and Christian have been playing together since the day of dawn. But in the early ‘90s things became more serious with the addition of Magnus Ekwall on vocals. I joined roughly a year before the recording of our first album which was released in 1995. We then made our homework playing all over Sweden in the mid-90’s and released our second album ‘Silver Haze’ in ’99 on a small Dutch label. In the beginning of the new millennium things got a lot more serious when we signed with one of hard rock’s biggest independent labels SPV/Steamhammer. We stayed with them for three albums with quite a lot of touring all over Europe. The last few years of the ‘00s were a bit tough, I personally bowed out first and the original singer Magnus Ekwall decided to leave. Jolle joined Hanoi Rocks for their last year of touring. So the band was more or less on hold there for a while. Everything changed with the addition of new singer Magnus Arnar. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes everything started to come together again. The band signed with new German label and released album number six ‘Full Circle’ in 2011 which were followed by touring over Europe and the US. In early 2012 I was asked if I was interested in re-joining which I obviously was and did. During the last winter we recorded our latest album ‘Tiger Blood’ which was released in May to rave reviews.
With your history and the fact that ‘Tigers Blood’ is your seventh LP you’ve seen a few styles of music and various bands come and go, what has influenced you the most?
Roger: The boring but true answer is all the classical rock-bands we grew up with. Around the time when we made the first album the grunge-era was at its peak and you can hear some influences from that on the album. But bands like Soundgarden or Alice In Chains were also raised on Sabbath, Zeppelin and Kiss so it all comes around eventually. Within the band there’s also quite a wide range in musical taste so we all bring something different to the table when it comes to songwriting.
When I received the press blurb with the ‘Tiger Blood’ LP I have to say it was “a bit brief “so I went looking for further information, and all I could find was the fact that you were a stoner/metal band, not a category that I would necessarily put you in, how would you describe the Quill’s music?
Roger: I agree with you, the stoner tag was put on us somewhere in the late ‘90s and has been with us ever since. I don’t know why really. If you listen to ‘Tiger Blood’ you hear that there’s a lot more to us than that. But if anything I’d say you could label us as classic rock or why not only “good music”.
Good music is definitely where it should sit and I agree with the non- labeling and pigeon- holing. Anyway looking a bit deeper into the band member’s histories I then found that, as you said, Jolle had actually spent some time with a band that are still one of my all-time faves, Hanoi Rocks, appearing on the ‘Buried Alive’ DVD, what are your memories like of the time Jolle?
Jolle: Even though the tension between Michael and Andy was always there (you never knew what the day would bring or how it would end), I have great memories of that period. The strongest one is playing at Tavastia Club in Helsinki. We did eight shows in six days. Even though everybody knew it was the end of Hanoi Rocks and not everybody was happy with that decision, everybody was in a great mood and spirit. There are a lot more memories, of course, but I’ll leave them to my memoires…
Okay enough of the past. The new LP ‘Tiger Blood’ got the Uber Rock seal of approval and being honest it currently sits at the top of my releases of the year list, how would you describe the LP to potential new fans?
Roger: The goal with the latest album was actually to try making it as varied as possible, showing all our influences. So for example there’s one stripped down acoustic track on the album which is more in line with the mellower stuff Zeppelin did on their third album. There’s also a track called ‘Go Crazy’ which somehow resonates early Van Halen to my ears, there’s a playfulness in that track which I’m really fond of. ‘Getaway’ has some Beatles-influences especially in the vocals-harmonies. ‘Purgatory Hill’ is stomping track which has some heavy string-arrangement, which is also a first for us. (A track that was made for listening to while driving thru’ the desert at sunset). The last track on the album ‘Storm Before The Calm’ even has a full church choir singing together with Magnus. And in between all this you have a bunch of classic sounding hard rock tunes. So I’d say we managed to achieve what we aimed for.
Sweden seems to be riding the crest of a musical wave at the moment, we’re getting some cracking stuff through, what bands are you listening too and watching live that you would recommend to our readers.
Roger: This last weekend I saw a new band called Free Fall that was extremely good. They just released their first album but the guys are no rookies. The guitarist used to play in The Soundtrack Of Our Lives and the drummer was in The International Noise Conspiracy. Great song-writing and extremely good players. Highly recommended.
After working my way through your studio output, what are the chances of some live dates over here in the UK?
Roger: We’re hitting the UK for three shows in November together with Aussies Mammoth Mammoth. Wolverhampton November 12th, Manchester November 13th and London November 14th. Be sure not to miss us!
Thanks both for taking the time out to speak with us here at Uber Rock and good luck with the new LP.
Roger; Thanks a lot. Be sure to check out ‘Tiger Blood’ if you haven’t already and don’t miss us when we’re hitting the UK in November. Come see us and we’ll have a pint or three.
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