Formed in 2007 as Spice and the RJ Band, Swedish five-piece Band of Spice will issue their sophomore full-length and first outing in half a decade on April 28. Economic Dancers is the name of the album and it’s coming out via Italian imprint Scarlet Records, which has a relationship with Band of Spice frontman and principal songwriter Christian “Spice” Sjöstrand — noted for his past work in co-founding Spiritual Beggars and singing on their first four records, as well as fronting The Mushroom River Band  — going back a decade to the debut album of the more aggressive project Kayser. Spice and the RJ Band, which was initially the trio of Spice himself on guitar/vocals along with drummer Bob Ruben (“R”) and bassist Johan (“J”), expanded to a foursome after 2009’s Shave Your Fear, the follow-up to their 2007 debut, The Will, and with the inclusion of rhythm guitarist Anders Linusson, the name no longer applied. Spice and the RJ Band became Band of Spice.

The fifth member is pianist/organist Hulk, and while “You Can’t Stop” from Economic Dancers is short, it doesn’t take long for Hulk to make his presence known. Pretty much the first riff, actually. The song is a two-minute rush, constant movement propelled along by Ruben‘s kick drum, and in addition to taking a solo after the second chorus, the organ follows the start-stop riffing early on, leaving Spice plenty of room to soulfully belt out the verse lines, the whole thing sounding rushed but still in control. How “You Can’t Stop” portends the rest of Economic Dancers, I couldn’t really say, but Spice is a proven entity in terms of songwriting, so I’d expect some shakeup within the band’s framework of classically styled heavy rock and roll, traditional in its construction but pulsing with an energy all its own. Oh yeah, and it’s catchy as hell. The video, fittingly, captures the band on stage tearing it up to a vibrant crowd, booze, moshing, the whole bit. Looks like a good time to me.

On the player below, you’ll find the video premiere for “You Can’t Stop,” and some more info from Scarlet Records with some comment from Spice about Economic Dancers, which, again, is out April 28.

Please enjoy:

Band of Spice, “You Can’t Stop” official video

Band Of Spice, the new band featuring Swedish singer/songwriter Spice (Spiritual Beggars, Kayser), have released the video for the song ‘You Can’t Stop’, taken from their new album ‘Economic Dancers’, which will be available available starting from April 28th, 2015 on Scarlet Records.

Here is how Spice himself commented this new release: “When I wrote these songs I was listening a lot of music from the end of the Seventies and the early Eighties. As we recorded them, the songs came out quite smooth, organic and melodic, with a touch of “dirt” I would say. This time, instead of renting a studio to record the album, as we did with the previous albums, we decided to build our own studio. We felt that we needed the time to get it right. We didn’t want to rush it. We wanted to fill the songs with just the right amount of warmth, love and justice. The lyrical concept is about abuse, hope, hopelessness, weakness and strength. To try to live life without safety nets and still be able to stay sane. I hope you will enjoy it.”.

Economic Dancers preorder at Scarlet Records’ Bandcamp

Economic Dancers on eBay

Economic Dancers iTunes preorder

Band of Spice at Scarlet Records

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Tags: Band of Spice, Band of Spice Economic Dancers, Economic Dancers, Scarlet Records, Sweden

This entry was posted on Friday, March 27th, 2015 at 1:26 pm and is filed under Bootleg Theater. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.