The Return of a Bluesman: Bror Gunnar Jansson interviewed

It’s fun to interview and write about Bror Gunnar Jansson, he’s so unique and always changing his game. He doesn’t fit any of the stereotypes we associate with blues and country. It’s impossible to grade him on the authenticity scale, because it’s irrelevant to his sound, and it doesn’t matter anyway because if you like blues and country, you’re going to love Gothenburg’s own bluesman Bror Gunnar.

Spending his childhood in Gothenburg’s jazz scene at legendary jazz venue Nefertiti where his dad, a highly respected Swedish jazz musician, performed with his bands, Bror Gunnar set out to follow the path of his father. However, growing an interest in country and blues, he set off for his own quest, and after ending up on French label Normandeep Records with his second album “Moan Snake Moan”, his popularity rapidly increased, especially in France. Home country Sweden wasn’t ready for the bluesman’s unique sound and busking-inspired performances.

A few years ago he turned his focus to home turf and with his latest album “They Found My Body In A Bag” (2019) he finally reached out to a wider Swedish audience, gained national attention by performing on popular TV-shows and was announced as the “Breakthrough of the Year” by a major Swedish music magazine. Suddenly his 1930s stage persona drew accolades from people in the scene leading to loads of shows in Sweden; last year, the worst year in the modern music history, he’s rumored to have played most shows of anyone in Europe.

While being in the studio to record his upcoming sixth album, we sat down with Bror Gunnar and chat about him being inspired by the 1920s and 1930s, having a breakthrough in France and working on his new album. And he also reveals that he plans to make a comic book of the characters in his songs.

Your tour photographer just told me a few minutes ago that you did most gigs of all artists in Europe last year despite the pandemic. You did a lot of small shows across Europe?
(laugh) I’m not really sure about that, but I did play a lot of shows last year and ended up at 65 gigs in 2020. I was supposed to have played in Germany and France in the spring already, which didn’t happen for obvious reasons, but I made it to France in the fall instead just ahead of the second lockdown.

It doesn’t matter to me whether it’s 25 or 250 or 1 000 in the audience, it’s not any different being on stage. It’s rather a bigger problem when it’s too many in the crowd, just like at festivals where you have thousands of people coming out for your shows. Having 30 meters to the crowd or security fences dividing you from the audience isn’t fun at all. I want to be close to the crowd and see the faces of the people I’m performing to.

You grew up in a music family and your dad is well-known in the jazz scene. Did jazz music have an impact on your decision to start a music career yourself?
Probably quite much, I more or less grew up at Nefertiti and spent much of my childhood and teen years there. As a child I wanted to become a jazz musician, and I also tried it out for quite a while but changed my focus and started doing something else instead.

When I work with music it’s about doing what I feel for in that moment, the things that catch my interest at a certain point in time. It’s also my motto: to have fun while writing and playing music, and not being afraid of trying things out.

When you perform it’s often as a one-man band where you play both guitar and drums, and it reminds me about the busking tradition and performing in street corners. Do you have any relation to busking or street performing?
Not at all, actually. Even if I do a lot of solo performances I’ve never really liked it, it wasn’t really how I wanted to perform my music from the beginning. I just ended up like that when I wanted to try what I could do myself. It’s basically about me challenging myself to be creative on my own.

It’s also about economy. At the beginning when I got my first gigs and was paid like 50€, it’s not really possible to share that with other musicians, it won’t be much money left (laugh).

The Bror Gunnar Jansson persona is also very interesting and draws on artefacts from another age. You seem to love the 1920s and the 1930s.
(laugh) Yeah, for several reasons. When I discovered American folk music like blues and country and my interest for the scene grew bigger and bigger, I wanted to find its roots but you can’t get further back than the 20s, that’s when the first recordings were done.

Old recordings are a major inspiration for me when I write my own music. There’s a magic in an old recording when you can’t hear how many instruments or how many people is on it because the quality isn’t that good, but it allows you to imagine what you hear.

The only thing left to do to complete your persona is to start releasing 78 rpm’s.
I was about to do it, at least I had an idea about it and did a genuine ‘30s inspired recording with just one mic which was recorded onto a tape recorder to get that authentic feeling, but it didn’t happen in the end. No one can play records like that anyway.

A bluesman in France

Unlike most artists who slowly climb the ladder to popularity at home turf before launching an international campaign, Bror Gunnar Jansson found greater fame elsewhere, far from home – in France. After releasing his self-titled debut album on a German label run by a Swede, fate brought him to France and American folk music label Normandeep Records.

With his second album “Moan Snake Moan” he drew accolades from French media, and Les Inrockuptibles announced him as “the revelation of the year”, and the following years he toured the country frequently.

However, rooted in Sweden he wanted a share of the Swedish scene and a year ahead of the release of ”They Found My Body In A Bag” he started working hard to make himself a name in the Swedish scene. And all that hard work, where he toured frantically across the nation, finally paid off.

Strolling back in history, your solo career started in France, not on home turf in Sweden. How did that come about?
It was just a coincidence like it usually is. I don’t have a connection to France or the label, Normandeep Records, at all. In fact, my debut album was released on a German label run by a Swede and I was supposed to have released my second album “Moan Snake Moan” at the same label, but he couldn’t pull it together financially and recommended me to check out Normandeep and talk to the labelboss, Nicolas. He was selling my first album in his online shop and knew my music well. That’s how it started in France. And it has worked out quite well ever since.

I know from another interview that you wanted to start focus on Sweden a few years ago, and the last two years a lot has happened with you being covered on national TV among other things. Was it hard to find your place in the Swedish scene?
It’s always hard and you always need to work hard for it. I’ve always worked hard and continue working hard which means that people will find me in the end. This is what I do and what I want to do, and I’m prepared to work hard to make it happen.

My kind of music isn’t super popular in Sweden in general which means that I have to work even harder, especially when media is quite conservative in what type of music they cover. Swedish radio isn’t really open-minded about different types of music and it’s difficult to get air-time if you’re not playing a very narrow type of music, like modern pop music.

At the beginning, when I mostly played in France, I didn’t care about the Swedish scene at all. People weren’t interested and I just thought “Let’s skip Sweden then”, but in the long run it felt stupid to leave Sweden out and just play abroad.

It never struck you to settle in France which has a much bigger music scene than Sweden and a lot more potential fans and concert-goers?
Not at all. France isn’t my home country although I love to play there. I love how they care about culture and that culture has a political value, but there are other things I don’t like at all, things I don’t feel comfortable with like gender politics and misogynistic behaviour in general.

But you finally had your breakthrough in Sweden two years ago, playing on Swedish TV several times and being awarded for “Breakthrough of the Year” by one of the big music magazines.
That actually made a difference because I reached out to a lot of people by performing on national TV, and it opened doors that had been closed to me. It made a difference in terms of being booked for shows.

Not many murders left

Bror Gunnar Jansson’s latest album ”They Found My Body In A Bag” unleashed the mysteries of true crime stories and revolved around some of the most horrible deeds in the Swedish criminal history. Apparently it was a concept that made people curious and the record climbed high up the charts in 2019.

However, his next record won’t continue exploring the world of crimes, it won’t even be a concept album. It’s rather a “mix of things”, and for the first time he has written a love song.

On your latest album ”They Found My Body In A Bag” you worked with a true crime concept. Do you work with a new concept for the next album as well?
Not this time, it’s just a mix of things, but there’s a music theme at least. You will find songs about murders again, mixed with some stupid songs (laugh) and, for the first time, a love song. I never did that before, but it’s a tribute to my girlfriend and first child, we recently became parents, and felt that I wanted to write something about it.

Writing about murders like on ”They Found My Body In A Bag”, is a tool for me when I write the lyrics. I’m tired of lyrics that really doesn’t mean anything, just crap lyrics. It’s too much like that today and I don’t want to contribute to it. I guess it’s one of the reasons I haven’t written any love song until now, it must be authentic.

In general I don’t like to write about myself, I prefer to work with what happens in the world or with made-up stories where you can use your imagination.

You’re not that type of artists who needs to experience what you write about? Many artists usually point out that it’s easier to write about real-life stories.
I’m just not good at it. If you’re a good storyteller I guess it will work out to write about yourself, but I’ve never been good at it, maybe because I can’t find much interesting things in my life to write about. It’s much easier to write lyrics about what inspires me instead.

Like the characters that frequently occur in your songs? They’re almost like superheroes.
It’s exactly like that (laugh). When I started using characters it just happened because I found it interesting and tried it out, but I didn’t plan to continue doing it. But quite soon I realized there was this feeling I liked when I did it and I thought “Why not build stories around my characters”. That’s the reason I’ve done a lot of stories about my main character, William Joseph Dean, who’s like a comic book character.

My plan is that it will end up in me doing a comic book about him and other characters (laugh). I’m not at the point where I can make it happen yet, but it will happen.