EB: The band has recently aligned with Eurobands Promotions to form an international street team. What do you most look forward to in bringing ShamRain to a wider, more diverse audience?
KALLE: I don’t usually have many expectations. So there are fewer disappointments.
EB: On your personal myspace page you have quite an eclectic list of musical favourites… from A-Ha to Katatonia to Nick Cave. Who has been the prevailing inspiration for you, songwriting wise? The Cure, of course, is a big influence for ShamRain but personally is there something out there that to this day just rocks your socks?
KALLE: True. I love music and listen to a lot of different kinds of music. Whatever sounds good. Lately I’ve got inspiration from bands like Radiohead and My Bloody Valentine (I’ve listened to their album ‘Loveless’ for the last 3 weeks!). Some inspiration also comes from bands like Joy Division and Interpol.
EB: There are bands with staying power (U2, Aerosmith, The Cure) and bands that have just simply stayed too long (The Who, the Stones). Where do you see ShamRain say in 10 years? Do you think you will still be together making the same style of music or do you think you will have moved on and morphed into something else?
KALLE: I rarely plan more than week ahead, so I don’t think I can answer where we will be in 10 years. But I think we’re morphing all the time, but still recognizable. At least I hope so. I don’t want to get stuck and do 30 same albums.
EB: What constitutes success to you? What would you like to say about your musical career when you look back on it years from now?
KALLE: Success, hmm. I don’t think there has been much success, hehe. But I think it’s better to sell 1000 albums than to be a shooting star, which disappears after one album and no one remembers them after five years.
EB: Is there any other news you would like to share with us, for example, when will we see a new ShamRain album and are there any new tour dates coming up?
KALLE: I hope a new ShamRain album will be ready soon. As I said earlier, we’ve a bunch of almost-ready new tracks and we hope to start recordings of the new album during winter/spring. So I guess it will be released during 2007. And no, no new gigs at the moment.
EB: Finally, anything to say to all the North American fans who have discovered ShamRain?
KALLE: Hope you like it and will continue following our work. And try to buy our albums, not download them. By buying you support our small band best. Peace.
