Messed!Up
Mad as it might seem, it’s been nearly ten years since Pale Honey first formed when Tuva Lodmark and Nelly Daltrey met at school. At the time, the band’s line-up consisted of Tuva and Nelly and different live bassists, but with the release of their debut EP “Fiction” their producer Anders Lagerfors became a permanent band member although not officially – until now.
Celebrating two brilliant records together, the Gothenburg rock three-piece released their third album in five years just three weeks ago, coated in far more electronic sounds than we ever heard before. In fact, it’s made for an intriguing music mix, a soundscape more stark, direct and tuneful than a great deal of the band’s previous perambulations.
A few weeks ago we met up with Anders, Nelly and Tuva, and after several failed attempts to open a stubborn door to their practice space we took refuge in the nearby pub Crippas and chat about cancelled tours, the new record “Some Time, Alone”, including how Herbie made an impact on their new sound, and misogynistic behaviour in the scene.
“Billboard isn’t our target”
Of all bands we’ve met this year I don’t think anyone had such bad luck as Pale Honey. Two cancelled mini tours, the first in the spring and then a second time just recently right after you released the new album.
Tuva: Yeah, it has been quite a disappointing year so far and we’re kind of low after cancelling this mini-tour as well, it’s just too much. When it happened the first time it didn’t get to us that much, it was reasonable to do it at that point when we didn’t know anything about the virus, but when we had to announce it a second time, on Monday the week after the record had been released, you just got this feeling “What will happen with the record? If we can’t tour it, how should we reach out to people?”.
Nelly: It’s tough but it goes in waves. Sometimes it’s “Yey, we can have some days off – great” and the next day you’re like “Fuck, I just want to play gigs!”. It’s such a huge part of our lives to be on stage.
I guess as for most people in the music industry your daily routines have changed completely?
Tuva: Most definitely. Normally it all happens automatically, the whole routine with rehearsals, travelling to shows, play live and all that other stuff, but if we are to meet today we have to plan it, otherwise it won’t happen just because our daily routines have changed.
Nelly: Doing long tours is kind of tough, but the excitement you have when you plan for a tour and all the things around it is amazing. “Let’s rehearse this and that day” and “Prepare to go to Germany and play next week”. That feeling is so awesome because something happens in life. Today you need to deal with knowing that you can’t tour for quite a while and that you have to stay at home not doing anything of what you’re used to do. It’s neither fun nor any good for your mental health to get cut off from what you usually do. As a band you should be out there to play your music.
It’s a big part of yourself and your identity which you usually don’t think about because it just happens. I would never have imagined how much it has affected me, but the day after we cancelled the tour I just felt so empty.
If we change the subject to something more positive instead. It must be great to finally release your third album because you have been working on it the last three years.
Anders: Yeah, we have really worked hard on this one and started even before our second record was released. Some songs that didn’t work out on “Devotion” fit better on ”Some Time, Alone” and have been reworked a bit.
And Anders also became an official member of the band although he’s been a band member since you started. I’ve never seen you play live without him. Does it change anything at all to make it official?
Tuva: That’s the setup we’ve had from the beginning and it feels right to make it official as well. When Pale Honey started it was me and Nelly doing an EP together and Anders was our producer, meaning he was there from the start. But before we recorded that first EP we had different live lineups and played with different bassists, but we grew tired of it and after the release of the EP we just decided “It’s just the two of us, no one else”, just me and Nelly.
That brought about the understanding that we were a duo at the same time as we started to release records and Anders automatically became part of the band because he produced it all and has always played live with us, and it was hard to explain to people that we’re actually a band now, not just me and Nelly.
Anders: Maybe it’s not any different for the band but for everyone around us it’s a change. It makes a lot of things easier for me. I’ve been split between my roles as the producer and the live musician, and I have too many job titles. It’s easier to have one, “Anders, band member” (laugh). For the band it wasn’t any change at all. Tuva and Nelly just said ”With the release of this record you’re an official band member”.
We’ve been doing this together for such a long time now and have released three records and played loads of gigs, and it just feels right to do it like this. It’s also better to make it clear to avoid misunderstandings of what roles we have. Sometimes it has been tricky to explain.
Nelly: We always wanted to be seen as a band but when we started it was kind of cool to be a two-piece, especially a female duo like Icona Pop or Rebecka & Fiona. But Anders has worked with us on all our releases and has played at least 99% of all our gigs.
After three records in five years and almost ten years in the scene you have lots of experience of the music industry. I remember when we met at the Roskilde Festival a few years ago and you were quite tired of misogynistic behaviour in the industry. But much has happened since then. What are your experiences today after working in the industry for almost a decade?
Nelly: It’s still misogynistic but the bigger we get and the better venues we play, the better treatment we get. It’s also dependent on where in Europe we play, it’s quite different. At some places in Eastern Europe we’re still a tiny band that plays on underground clubs and sleep on floors, and don’t get the best treatment.
It’s also about who we work with even if it’s in the same country. I remember when we played in Hungary once and the first day we played at this venue with only girls in the front doing crazy mosh pits, and the next day we played a pizzeria where the owner was an asshole and was really pissed off because we didn’t came out to watch the support act.
In general it’s a huge difference today because we’re older and it’s easier to stand your ground.
Tuva: Yeah, you don’t take whatever crap they throw at you. If I would meet a shitty misogynistic sound technician today I would…No, I would probably not say anything (laugh). But it doesn’t get to you that much anymore, it’s easier to just let it go.
Anders: All these years I’ve been touring with Tuva and Nelly I’ve seen and heard things that is just sick, especially when we were new in the scene. Guys can be such dickheads and misogynistic in ways you won’t believe until you’ve seen it yourself. And I can say that because I have been touring with lots of other bands, with just guys, and have never experienced anything like what I’ve seen and heard with Pale Honey.
Tuva: The worst is when guys meet us at the merch table after the show and really believe they say something nice like “Hey, that was a great show, it doesn’t sound too bad when you play the guitar” or a lot worse things. It still happens, even after three records.
Nelly: Or ”I’ve listened to the record and it sounds very out of tune but it’s great that you try at least”.
Anders: We’ve been through too much misogynistic crap, and here’s the point: it never happened to me, just Tuva and Nelly. I’ve just been an observer.
I’m super happy that we’re an established band today and play better venues. They’re professional and have professional people, and with professionalism comes gender equality. 
Experimenting with new sounds on the third record
Pale Honey’s ascent has been monumental and the band’s first two albums have been nominated for several awards, and in 2018 they won the Manifest Award with “Devotion” as the “Composer of the Year”.
With their third album “Some Time, Alone” Pale Honey are bolder than ever and have discovered a sense of purpose – and a handful of synthesizers to put in the songs. It’s post-eighties and alt-rock nineties, glittery synths, lush vocals and catchy melodies converging in ten songs. And Anders “blames” their new electronic influences on his sister and Herbie.
“Some Time, Alone” is an amazing record and it sounds like a new and fresh Pale Honey sound where you experiment more with more electronic sounds than ever before.
Nelly: We have a few more synthesizers on this one, Anders is a collector although it’s an expensive hobby (laugh).
Tuva: We do have a more electronic sound on this record, but it has been a slow development because we had more synthesizers on the second record than on the first. It’s just another step to become an electronic band (laugh).
I started to play keyboard on stage when we released the second record and that changed how I think about music when I write. With synthesizers you can make more dynamic and diverse music, and I was stuck as soon as I started using it.
Anders: But I know the reason why we’re using a more electronic foundation on this record. When we drive to gigs we have this thing that we get to pick every third song in the playlist and you just sit there and think “Hey, it’s my turn soon, what should I pick?” and quite often you chose something from the past, like music from your childhood, just to resurrect some old memories.
My sister always listened to the Absolute Dance albums [compilation records series in Scandinavia] when I was young and even if you didn’t liked it you couldn’t stop her from playing it, and one of the songs she always played was “Pick It Up” by Herbie with these awesome bouncy basslines. That’s one of the songs we often play in the car while driving to shows (laugh).
We were too afraid to do something outside the box on our first albums because there are rules on how to write music and what is allowed to do in the genre. And that’s quite stupid, isn’t it? On this record we just thought “Fuck it, it’s just so cool to have these electronic sounds on that song”.
Nelly: And we didn’t sort those songs out in the recording process either, usually we do it because we have been stuck in the thought that we need to follow the rules on what is working on our records and not. Let’s say that the record is a palette that offers surprises that a rock album won’t do (laugh).
Anders: When you do your first album you’re like “Who are we? How do we sound like? How do we want to sound?”. This is our third record and whatever we do it will sound like Pale Honey because it’s us. We have lots of confidence in how we sound and who we are today, and you will hear it in our music.
Isn’t that what all bands want to hear? Whatever you release there’s a Pale Honey identity in it.
Nelly: Most definitely, a band’s sound is the Holy Grail. You will always be compared to other bands, “They sound just like Radiohead” or something like that, but when the day arrives when you sound like yourself, then you’ve made it. And that’s where we are at the moment, we have a Pale Honey sound.
Tuva: It’s great when people start to say it as well because then we won’t be compared to other bands anymore.
The album already received some great responses both in Sweden and in the international music press, but does it get harder to make records on the back of the success of your first two albums? It may be a lot of pressure when you know it will be compared to what you already have done.
Tuva: We’ve raised the bar a bit and wanted to do something that we feel proud of. People will always compare new records with what we’ve already done, but at least we’re being compared to ourselves. I’ve pushed myself quite much this time and experienced some inner stress like “I really want this record to do better than the others”. But no one has ever told us “Hey, you really have to make an even better record this time”, it’s just me pushing myself too much.
It’s a stupid stress because it’s all about the stress of making the band visible and reaching out to people. I know we’re already established and that we always get booked for shows but I want to reach higher, to play bigger and better venues, and just take the band to a new level.
In the end, when you look back on what happened, you realize you can’t predict anything anyway. It’s more important to release something you are really proud of, not what people want.
Nelly: Yeah, that’s how it should be. We make music that is fun to play live, and that makes it fun to be on stage. That’s what’s important.
It’s weird to read reviews on the new record because most journalists expect something amazing. They think “Hey, it’s the point in your career when you will make your best record and have that huge international breakthrough”. But that’s not how it works out. We don’t write music and think “Ok, let’s write a hit song”.
Anders: I found it quite relaxed to work with this record just because we’ve been doing this for a while by now and know what we’re doing. We’re better musicians and more relaxed in the studio.
Concerning reviews, I can’t do anything about it because I don’t know if people will like it or not. Some people love it, others hate it. It’s always like that. My advice is to watch us live, then you will love us (laugh).
Nelly: The point with pressure is that it never stops. Being creative is dangerous because you can always do something better. How do you measure success or what’s good or not? The Billboard chart isn’t our target when we write music although it would be awesome to end up there.
At this point I’m just happy that we have released a new record, and I don’t really care if people like it or not at the moment, it’s enough for me that I like what we did.
About the cancelled album tour then; if you try to imagine a normal world next year, allowing for touring, is your plan to resume the cancelled tour and head off for Europe?
Nelly: Absolutely! We had great plans for Germany when we started recording this record and we did a stopover there last year to meet a few labels and agencies, but obviously it’s all been stalled because of the pandemic.
Germany is difficult because we need to work with local PR agencies and have to pay lots of money for it, and if we can’t tour Germany, just like now, we won’t get anything back for it. It’s just so sad that all this happened when we were about to take off there.
You’ve done so much already in the scene but as you said, Tuva, you want to take it to the next level. What is left for you to achieve? Is it still something you need to prove either for yourself or the world?
Tuva: I have nothing to prove for myself anymore, I’ve already done it by releasing three records. But I won’t tell you my dreams, maybe they won’t happen then (laugh).
Nelly: To win an American Grammy (laugh)! It’s all fine with a Swedish Grammy as well – or getting the STIM scholarship (STIM is the Swedish copyright organization).
Anders: Maybe it’s just me but the more records you release and the more gigs you play, the less those awards mean to me. I don’t care actually. Sure, it’s awesome to get that kind of appreciation, someone who tells you that you did something good enough for being awarded, but it was a lot more important when I was younger. It’s not me trying to sound like “Hey man, I really don’t care about any crappy awards”, it’s still great to be nominated, but I don’t care as much as I did when we released the first record.
This may sound a bit cheesy but just getting attention by magazines, like here and now, is appreciation enough because it means that someone is really interested in what we do. We’ve got lots of attention for this record already and that means really much to me.
Nelly: A milestone in my life is that we still exist and release records, that’s way more important than getting an award although it means a lot to get one because it’s a sign of appreciation; everyone wants to be appreciated for their work. But it’s not on my mind at all.
It doesn’t need to happen today or tomorrow, if we get a Grammy when we’re sixty and release our twentieth record it’s fine as well. What I really would love to do is to play a support slot for Ghost!. I promise to have special makeup (laugh).
Photographer: Björn Vallin
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