Chapter 5
1991
FEBRUARY 1991
Without a label, the band recorded some demos for another album. I Wanna Go Home/Skyscraper/Slug it Out/No Time, Tomorrow/You’ve Got it All Wrong
Tue 12th – Kent and Chips sang backing vocals for a Blue Crow Men session.
The band contained two former Sator Codex members Björn Clarin and Leif Rosén.
Tue 19th – A short tour in Finland began in Jyväskylä.
APRIL 1991
Fri 5th – A big show and a two day party that celebrated the 10 year anniversary of the first Sator Codex show, took place in Gothenburg.
A lot of old and new friends from all over the world were invited and came to witness a spectacular show with a lot of special guests. Joakim Thåström once again performed with Sator. This time it’s the Sator song Wasting time.
Freddy Wadling from Blue for Two and Cortex took over the microphone for What you are is What you get.
Johan Johansson, another “punk legend” (of KSMB and Strindbergs) got drafted as the lead singer for Restless again.
Some really old songs were dug up again. The very first Sator Codex title Jag vill ut (Let me out) was played with Peo Ericsson on guitar. He was one of Sator Codex founding members from 1981. Björn Clarin rejoined the band for another Sator Codex classic Leech. The whole show ended with a multi-guitar version of Turn off the news with most of all The Nomads on additional guitars. A very entertaining show indeed.
Tue 9th – Chips produced The Nomads album “Sonically Speaking” at “Europa Studios” and “Polar Studios” in Stockholm. The album was completed in June.
Tue 30th – A one-off show was booked in Gothenburg with Sator/Thåström as one unit. Half of the set list was from Thåström’s latest solo record and the other half were Sator songs. A couple of old Ebba Grön classics showed up as encores. The show became a much bigger thing than anybody expected and was seen by over 15000 people. The biggest show for all the guys ever!
JULY 1991
Fri 5th – Sator/Thåström played Kristianstad. After the success at the April 30 show, promoters all over Sweden offered the guys a hefty sum of money to do a whole tour.
Michael – “We couldn’t find a reason to say no to a thing like this. Neither we or Thåström had any commitments that summer, we all had great fun doing this and they paid us a lot of money! So we said, yeah sure.”
The tour delayed the song writing a bit, but the band still didn’t have a record deal so it really wasn’t any hurry. Several record labels were interested in signing the band.
Sun 28th – The band entered Music-A-Matic studio to do another demo session. This time the tracks were Down, Heyday, Too Much Trouble and Joe.
AUGUST 1991
Sat 10th – The Hultsfred Festival: The last night of the Sator/Thåström tour.
The band could now concentrate on their song writing.
OCTOBER 1991
Mon 7th-The third demo session for the “Headquake” album included the titles Around/I’d rather drink than talk/Bound to be good. Around never got recorded again and remains unreleased. A version of Bloodstains by the band Agent Orange was also recorded for a Swedish fanzine-freebie.
Fri 25th – Sator left for New York. It was their second trip to USA, where they signed a management deal with “Fox Managements” and also played a couple of shows in Manhattan. One of the gigs was at the legendary club CBGB’S.
NOVEMBER 1991
Several meetings with various record labels. It would take a while before the band decided who to sign with.
DECEMBER 1991
Mon 2nd – The band signed a 3-album deal with WEA-Metronome in Stockholm.
Chips – “This time we didn’t even have to send out any of the demos to get signed. Suddenly everyone loved us, which we never got used to. We always felt like it was us four against the world, and I guess we still do today.”
Mon 9th – The recording of Headquake started at Music-A-Matic studio with Michael Ilbert once again as the producer.
Sat 14th – Between the album sessions, the very last chance to catch Sator/Thåström together, was at another 10 year anniversary. “Rockparty”, the promoters of the Hultsfred festival, celebrated their first 10 years in the business, and invited the team to perform 5 songs at their party.
1992
THE RECORDING OF HEADQUAKE
JANUARY 1992
Wed 1st – The recordings continued throughout this month.
FEBRUARY 1992
Sat 8th – We’re Right, You’re Wrong were mixed at Polar studios in Stockholm. A second song, Only the Stones Remain, was completed the day after. It was originally released by The Soft Boys in 1981. It took a few more days in the Gothenburg to complete the remaining songs for the album.
Fri 21st – (7:00 am) The band took the ferry to Denmark. During the next two weeks, 13 songs were mixed. Someone got shot/Too much trouble/No time, tomorrow/I wanna go home/Heyday/Slug it out/I’d rather drink than talk/Bound to be good/Skyscraper/Down/Turnpike/Haywire/We’re right you’re wrong (Slightly different from the single-version). All of them ended up on the album except Too much trouble that found it’s place on the I wanna go home single.
Chips- “This was the hardest recording session we had ever done. It was an immense amount of work to achieve the sound we were looking for.”
Kent – “This session almost turned into a nightmare, some days it felt like we would never make it.”
Hans – “The band and Ilbert had decided that this would be the last album we do together for a while. I guess that made us work even harder for perfection.”
MARCH 1992
The first single from the album was released. The band was rehearsing and appeared on a couple of TV-shows to promote the forthcoming album.
Mon 23rd – The boys made a chaotic appearance at the Swedish TV-show “Popitopp”, where they ‘mimed’ their single and, pretended to be The Who (smashing up all their gear just for the sake of getting good pictures).
Wed 25th – Video shootings for the first single off the album. The video was directed by Henrik Schyffert, who later started the band Whale.
Fri 27th – Chips played guitar on two songs with The Nomads at a show in Stockholm.
APRIL 1992
Fri 3rd – The album was released and reached number 12 in the Swedish charts, but just when everyone thought the troubles was over, a new shock arrived. Several major movie companies threatened to sue Sator if they didn’t remove all the sampled dialogue, that could be found between the tracks. 20 000 copies of Headquake had already been sent out to the shops. There was nothing to do about that. Starting a war with 5 of the biggest companies in the world wasn’t such a good idea, so the band quickly replaced the sampled stuff with other ‘cleared’ ones. A new version of the album would hit the market just two weeks after the first edition. A major crisis was prevented.
Between rehearsing and doing promotion, Chips was also working on a new Blue for Two album.
Wed 15th – Sator dressed up as Kiss, (with make-up and everything!) for a Swedish evening paper. It was part of a series where different bands got dressed up like their heroes. Since the paper had only have one picture of a later edition of Kiss with make-up, Hans has to be Eric Carr instead of Peter Criss. Michael looks perfect as Gene Simmons and so did Kent as Ace Frehley. Chips got the part of Paul Stanley and does his best to get the moves right.
Sat 25th – A Blue for Two show with Chips at Chalmers in Gothenburg.
Thurs 30th – The tour finally opened in Ålborg, Denmark.
MAY 1992
Sun 3:rd – On their way back to Sweden the band did some backing vocals at the Puk studios on a track by their Norwegian friends, Backstreet Girls, forthcoming album.
Tue 12th – Nothing hurts was recorded for a compilation at Music-A-Matic studio. At the same session Chips also produced I Remember You with The Nomads for the same record. Later that month Chips and Kent would also do some additional vocals for an “all star jam-session” for the album. (A Neil Young composition called T-bone.)
Fri 22nd – The tour continued on and off all summer long. That night Sator was seen in Stockholm, where also a video for the next single gets done. Once again it’s directed by Henrik Schyffert.
JUNE 1992
Sat 27th – One of the highlights of the tour. The Roskilde festival in Denmark, in front of their biggest audience ever. The band was joined by Campino of The Toten Hosen for a version of the old punk classic Ready Steady Go (By Generation X). Hans and Kent returned the favor by guesting The Toten Hosen on First Time (by The Boys) at their show the next day.
JULY 1992
I Wanna Go Home, the second single from the album gave the band another hit single. The song wasn’t even supposed to be on the album, but at the last minute the band changed their mind. A lucky move!
Sat 4th – The band managed to do an afternoon show in Bollnäs then they had to run to a waiting helicopter to take them to another show at the Dalarock festival later the same night, where they were joined on stage by members of both The Sinners and Die Toten Hosen for a really messy version of Pigvalley Beach as the last encore. It was only 50 kilometres away from their former hometown, Borlänge. But Sator had come a long long way from the basement were it all started.
Thurs 30th – Östersund: Claes Yngström from the band Sky High joined Sator on stage for some extra guitars on We’re Right, You’re Wrong and Turnpike.
AUGUST 1992
Fri 7th – Sator once again played the Hultsfred festival. The set started with a cover of Stiff Little fingers “Suspect Device” with Hans on lead vocals.
The day after Chips and Kent joined Docenterna on T-Bone and two more songs Chips also found the time for a Blue for Two show at the same festival.
Mon 10th – The band arrived to Puk studios to do their version of Ring Ring for a tribute album to Abba. One more song was also put down on tape, So much time, so little to do.
Mon 17th – Sator backed up Johan Johansson on the track “Om du över huvudtaget bryr dig” at the Music-A-Matic studio.
Fri 21st – The tour ended at Liseberg in Gothenburg.
SEPTEMBER 1992
Sat 5th – I’m gone was written, and the day after, No place to land/Don’t wanna talk about the weather anymore. Another song called If you could see me now (written during the mixing sessions of Headquake) was also completed this week. A total of 9 songs planned for the next album would be written before Chips went on another Blue for Two tour, which would end on October 31.
NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 1992
Very few new songs were composed. The Big Shakedown and Sleep. In December, Chips produced a 4 song demo session with Rhinos, a band that included Peo Ericsson, a founding member of Sator Codex, that appeared at the anniversary show year before. Chips and Hans can be heard on some tracks on backing vocals and percussion.
The Abba tribute album was released.
1993
JANUARY 1993
Tue 12th – Next to nothing was written. The working title for the next album was at that time “Dirty Sweet”.
Mon 25th – Sator received “The Måzart Award” for best Swedish album of 1992. It’s a prize voted for by the readers of the evening newspaper “Idag”.
FEBRUARY 1993
Fri 19th – The band began another tour containing 19 dates. The whole tour was sold out in advance. On some of dates, Sator brought along Bazooka! and Rhinos as support acts. In Borlänge, March 18, they performed The Suicide Commandos 1977 classic Attacking the beat with the original ‘Commando’ Steve Almaas on lead vocals.
Sat 27th – Sator received a “Grammis award” for best hard rock act 1992.
Chips – “We just picked up the award and left in a private jet ’cause we had a show in Trondheim the same night. We celebrated by drinking champaign on the plane. This night we really felt like major pop stars.”
APRIL 1993
Sun 11th – Another award was picked up. This time it was the Zeppelin Award for best band and Michael Ilbert got one for best production.
MAY 1993
Sat 1st – The band decided to take a short break. Chips left for Spain to produce the “Wild weekend” album by the Spanish punk rockers La Secta.
Mon 31st – Chips arrived back in Gothenburg, and started producing The Psychotic Youth’s “Juice” album. The album was finished on August 21.
During their “time off” Sator still managed to do 12 extra shows. And late at night, after the Psychotic Youth sessions, they recorded The Other Newest One, a song for an American Germs tribute. The fans had to wait 3 years for the record to be released.
JULY 1993
Sat 17th – The everlasting Headquake tour finally ended in Hedemora, Sweden.
AUGUST 1993
Tue 3:rd – The Other Newest One was completed.
During this month, Sator wrote and recorded a two minute horror-movie soundtrack for a commercial. Two songs were written especially for this occasion since the band didn’t want to use an original Sator song for a commercial. The titles are Long Hot Summer/Love All, Serve All. Both songs were produced by Henryk Lipp of Blue for Two. The later was rejected by the agency, and is still collecting dust in the vaults. This short-movie would later get an award as “best commercial of the year”.
Fri 13th – A secret gig under the name Lardbyrds at the Hultsfred festival. The set was a mix of early punk and country classics. Chips and Hans also joins Bazooka! for a blistering version of Nancy Sinatra’s How does that grab you darlin’?
Sat 21st – The Psychotic Youth session was finally completed.