{"id":17010,"date":"2017-04-14T01:00:18","date_gmt":"2017-04-14T05:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/southeastofheaven.com\/?p=17010"},"modified":"2017-04-14T08:28:41","modified_gmt":"2017-04-14T12:28:41","slug":"blowin-wind-with-troubled-horses-tom-jondelius","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/?p=17010","title":{"rendered":"Blowin&#8217; Wind with Troubled Horse&#8217;s Tom Jondelius: &#8220;We joke a lot about the dark times here in Sweden during the winter and fall.  Right now, it\u2019s pretty dark around here.  That kind of thing influences you and how you write.&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Sweden has been without a doubt leading the pack as far as turning out some of my favorite bands.\u00a0 Graveyard, Blues Pills, Enforcer, and notably a little band called Troubled Horse.\u00a0 Troubled Horse made a huge impact on me with their debut Rise Above album Step Inside but their latest release, Revolution on Repeat hit me hard with it&#8217;s sound of roots laden hard rock mixed with a punk attitude and even a touch of psychedelia at times.\u00a0 I couldn&#8217;t wait to interview someone in the band to try and get a little more into the story behind the band and their music.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Guitarist Tom Jondelius was such a great guy to talk to.\u00a0 In our interview we talked about the somewhat incestuous Swedish music scene, the new Troubled Horse album, what it&#8217;s like being confused with members of other bands, and why Empire Strikes Back is his favorite Star Wars movie.\u00a0 I hope you&#8217;ll dig this interview with Tom Jondelius and while you&#8217;re at it, go check out some Troubled Horse.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tom, thank you so much for taking the time to talk with me today.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Thank you, Don.\u00a0 I\u2019m happy to be here.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>Sweden definitely seems to be leading the pack when it comes to this kind of psychedelic\/occult hard rock.\u00a0 What is it about this kind of music that infected Sweden unlike any place in the world?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s a tough question to answer, Don.\u00a0 I don\u2019t really know.\u00a0 Maybe it has something to do with where we\u2019re from geographically.\u00a0 We joke a lot about the dark times here in Sweden during the winter and fall.\u00a0 Right now, it\u2019s pretty dark around here.\u00a0 That kind of thing influences you and how you write.\u00a0 Maybe you just want to lock yourself into the rehearsal space and just write hard music.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>How would you describe the sound of Troubled Horse to someone who\u2019s never heard you?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a mixture of guitar driven garage hard rock with punk influences.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>So I have to ask.\u00a0 What\u2019s up with the \u201cno bassist\u201d in the video for \u201cHurricane\u201d?\u00a0 The band\u2019s bio lists you as bassist but the FB bio lists you as guitar.\u00a0 Can you straighten things up for me here?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>[laughs] Well, there\u2019s actually no bass player that\u2019s a full time member in the band.\u00a0 We were like, it\u2019s just the four of us who were playing on the record so it would be natural for it to just be the four of us in the video also.<\/p>\n<p><iframe width=\"750\" height=\"422\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/eOIBwfoI9f8?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>There seems to be this incestuous thing going on with Swedish bands such as Graveyard, Spiders, Witchcraft, and Troubled Horse all kind of mixing members.\u00a0 Do you ever get confused as to which band you\u2019re in?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>[laughs] It was actually kind of confusing to know who was in which band.\u00a0 I\u2019ve actually been confused with John (Hoyles) who played guitar in Witchcraft and Troubled Horse who\u2019s now in Spiders.\u00a0 A lot of times when I was in Witchcraft, Magnus would refer to me as Jon and Martin in Troubled Horse has called me John a few times.\u00a0 We do have similar names [laughs].\u00a0 So maybe not so confusing for me but everyone else seems to confuse me with John [laughs].<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>I love that Troubled Horse didn\u2019t make an obvious follow up to the first album.\u00a0 This album definitely has a different feel to it while still staying true to the overall vibe of the band.\u00a0 Do you think it was a change in line-up that brought this about?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m sure that might have something to do with.\u00a0 I guess also we didn\u2019t really want to do the same thing over and over again.\u00a0 You always want to push boundaries in everything you do.\u00a0 I know Martin used to listen to a lot of punk music and so did I and Jonas (drums).\u00a0 It\u2019s also that the theme of the record is a more frustrated theme.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>Obviously, Troubled Horse is Martin\u2019s baby but how does the creative process go down?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Well, a lot of the time someone may have an idea for a riff and we\u2019ll just build from there to try and find the right attitude and the right feeling.\u00a0 Martin usually tries to steer the ship in the right direction and we just have to try to keep up follow.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>Did this album come pretty easily to you guys with this new line up or was it a bit more challenging?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Well, it took actually quite a while to write all the songs.\u00a0 We re-wrote a lot of the songs actually.\u00a0 We just tried so many versions of the songs and finally we came up with the way the songs had to be.\u00a0 We tried so many different ways to get to the final versions of a lot of these songs.\u00a0 We worked on it for maybe two years.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>When you\u2019re working on something for that long, how did you keep the songs feeling fresh and not feeling old and overdone?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The thing is we rehearse a lot before we go into the studio.\u00a0 We didn\u2019t play together for almost a year.\u00a0 I think that was necessary because we rehearsed day and night for a few months before going into the studio.\u00a0 We kind of needed the time off so we wouldn\u2019t kill each other [laughs].\u00a0 We were actually very excited to start playing and rehearsing with each other again.\u00a0 We had the first rehearsal a few weeks back and it was fun to play the songs.\u00a0 A few of the songs we hadn\u2019t even played together because they came together in the studio so it was just fun to play songs from the album.<\/p>\n<p><iframe width=\"750\" height=\"422\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/rlPqO0n84KM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>What is different about Trouble Horse compared to the other bands you\u2019ve been a part of?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Troubled Horse is definitely more garage punk influenced and I can relate to that a lot.\u00a0 It comes very naturally, this type of aggressiveness in the music.\u00a0 There\u2019s no fucking around and it\u2019s just playing from your heart and getting your message across.\u00a0 There\u2019s no fooling around with it.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>While I would love to, I have never seen a Troubled Horse concert.\u00a0 What could I expect from your live show?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Well, it\u2019s really right in your face [laughs].\u00a0 Usually we try to get a very fast show so that you don\u2019t get bored.\u00a0 You don\u2019t want to just stand there waiting for a band to play.\u00a0 You want to fucking just hear the songs and get kicked in the face [laughs].\u00a0 It\u2019s very loud and aggressive for sure.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tom, you are a huge Star Wars fan.\u00a0 What\u2019s your favorite movie?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Empire.\u00a0 It\u2019s the best directed movie.\u00a0 I just love the tension between Luke and Darth Vadar and the huge reveal that he\u2019s Luke\u2019s father.\u00a0 I just love everything about that movie.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>Did you like the newer releases?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Oh yeah.\u00a0 I saw them both on their premiers.\u00a0 I liked the characters in The Force Awakens a lot but it was kind of like the same story as A New Hope but I loved the characters.\u00a0 That\u2019s the thing that did it for me.\u00a0 Rogue One was good too.\u00a0 I love the ending of course.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>Are there any Swedish bands that have yet to get a break that you feel we should be keeping our eyes and ears opened for?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Our friends from Horisont are just great.\u00a0 They\u2019re starting to get a little bit more of the attention they deserve.\u00a0 I love their stuff.\u00a0 Also, well, we have Blues Pills but they\u2019re pretty big now actually.<\/p>\n<p>======================================<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tom, thank you so much for taking the time out to talk today.\u00a0 Best of luck with the new album and I hope you guys will make it to the states eventually.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Thank you so much, Don.\u00a0 It was really nice talking to you.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sweden has been without a doubt leading the pack as far as turning out some of my favorite bands.\u00a0 Graveyard, Blues Pills, Enforcer, and notably a little band called Troubled Horse.\u00a0 Troubled Horse made a huge impact on me with their debut Rise Above album Step Inside but their latest release, Revolution on Repeat hit me hard with it&#8217;s sound of roots laden hard rock mixed with a punk attitude and even a touch of psychedelia at times.\u00a0 I couldn&#8217;t [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[194],"tags":[1164,1786,1418,989],"class_list":["post-17010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-interviews","tag-rise-above-records","tag-tom-jondelius","tag-troubled-horse","tag-witchcraft"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17010"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17010\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southeastofheaven.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}