The Delta Shake from Sweden
Meet Raimond (guitar and vocals) and Mattias (drums) the mysterious duo behind the current sensation that is Sweden’s The Delta Shake.
Their underground garage, delta blues, punk rock aesthetic, punctuated with blasts of raw, distorted, lo-fi, high energy and broke down, busted speaker vibes is sweeping the nation.
Their most recent master stroke, the aptly titled Shit Creek Blues album, was released early last year to thunderous applause.
We took a moment with The Delta Shake recently to get their reaction to all the excitement surrounding the new album. This is what they had to say…
1. **CDs, Vinyl or Download?**
– R: When we grew up, CDs and downloads were the norm, but I’m glad vinyl is having its revival. My answer is vinyl.
- M: I’d say vinyl, even though I’m a terrible vinyl listener.
2. **First album you ever bought (regardless of format)?**
– R: My memory is a bit hazy, but I think U2’s album *Pop* from 1997 on CD was my first proud purchase.
- M: If I recall correctly I bought Black Sabbath’s self titled album in the 7th grade.
3. **Most recent album you bought?**
– R: Roxette’s *Look Sharp!* on vinyl. I found it in a second-hand store.
- M: I honestly can’t remember since it was such a long time ago that I bought an album, but I would guess it was Heartbreaker by Ryan Adams.
4. **How did it come about that you first started playing music?**
– R: As a child, I watched a lot of MTV, and I think my parents had a small interest in music, which became a big interest for me.
- M: I think it was the combination of bad in school and even worse in typical swedish sports like football (soccer) and hockey. Nothing of that was interesting to me but then a teacher at school in 7th grade gave me the album Highway to Hell by AC/DC and I was instantly hooked by rock ‘n’ roll. I started playing drums in a rock duo with a classmate the same semester and we played our ears out, sounding like horse shit, but loving everything about it.
5. **First song you ever played?**
– R: The first tune I learned on guitar was “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” The first song I played live with a band was “Summer of ’69” by Bryan Adams when I was in elementary school.
- M: On guitar I think it was “älgarna demonstrerar” (translates to The Mooses are Protesting) on guitar which is both a child song and protest hippie song from the 70’s.
6. **Do you ever perform cover songs, and if you do, what is your favorite to play?**
– R: We haven’t played any covers live yet, but we have recorded covers of “Look What All You Got” by T-Model Ford and “Cocaine Blues” by Rev. Gary Davis.
7. **Do you play the majority of the instruments on your recordings? If not, who have you collaborated with and what do they play?**
– R: We record most of our music ourselves. On our first recordings, we brought in my father-in-law on harmonica and slide guitar on two songs. He’s an old blues rock musician.
8. **Seeing as your music is deeply rooted in the birth of the electric blues, do you consider yourself a revivalist, and if so, how?**
- M: I would say we’re revivalist in the sense that we aim for rock ‘n’ roll blues feeling more than getting fixated on pointless details and perfection.
9. **Tell us a bit about your experience being part of Sweden’s underground music scene.**
– R: There are underground scenes all over Sweden, mainly in the bigger cities. However, Sweden is very successful with commercial music, so I find it difficult to reach a larger crowd with more DIY and underground music. But there is definitely an audience for that too.
10. **What is your favorite era of music and why?**
– R: It can vary from time to time. I think we live in exciting times where you can recreate the sound from different eras with fairly simple methods. So you can almost relive different eras when you create your own music. But we probably get a lot of inspiration from the ’60s sound.
11. **When you’re writing songs, is it the music or lyrics first?**
– R: I like it when the lyrics and the music come at the same time. Otherwise, it usually starts with a guitar riff or chord progression that feels interesting.
12. **How did you learn to write songs?**
– R: I’ve always been more interested in making my own music than learning other people’s songs, so it came naturally. Many years of training and it’s important to dare to write the bad songs to find the good ones.
13. **Charley Patton, Howlin Wolf, Muddy Waters or Blind Willie Johnson?**
– R: Howlin Wolf is a favorite that I often return to.
- M: They’re all legends! Hard to choose.
14. **What are your thoughts regarding music streaming?**
- M: What is good is the ability to reach out and what is bad is the lack of return on investment in both time, money and soul. Also what really bugs me about today is that everything is supposed to be short and fast making the act of listening to an entire album slowly die out.
15. **iTunes, Apple Music, Bandcamp, Amazon or Spotify and why?**
– R: I’m currently a Spotify user but wish I was more familiar with Bandcamp.
- M: Recently switched from Spotify to Apple Music. Can’t say I’m a big fan of either.
16. **Do you feel a presence on social media is vital for your music to be heard?**
– R: The most rewarding way is to go out and play live and meet people along the way. You have to keep up with the latest developments on social media to reach out in the best way. However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to reach out without having to pay for promoted posts. Otherwise, the posts will not reach all of your followers.
17. **Social media platform of choice and why?**
– R: We put the most energy into being active on Instagram. We’re probably a bit old-fashioned, so we’re trying to be more active on at least one platform.
18. **Does YouTube play a key role in getting your music heard?**
– R: I think YouTube is a difficult platform to reach out with your music. Maybe it’s because music videos aren’t made the same way they used to be, and people don’t take the time to watch videos like before.
19. **What is the most beneficial platform for you to sell and distribute your music: Bandcamp, Official Website, iTunes or other?**
– R: I think Bandcamp is good at informing and keeping you updated about whether someone has purchased your music.
20. **What is your biggest aspiration in music? What do you hope to achieve?**
– R: The fun thing about The Delta Shake is that we are a long-distance band. But we still want to sound and be a garage band like it was when you started your first band. It’s more about just playing fun music and not overthinking the sound on recordings or getting a record deal.
- M: Proof that overall feeling and rock ‘n’ roll spontaneousness wins over detail fixation.
21. **What are your thoughts on the relevancy of Billboard’s Top 200 Albums chart?**
– R: We try to stay away from it as much as we can. I think album charts were more relevant back in the day. Now they’re pretty predictable and full of ”expensive” music.
22. **Favorite latest music discovery?**
- M: A trio of young guys from Avesta called Hästspark that plays stoner doom metal. They give me hopes for the future generation of music.
23. **Tell us about your future plans and any upcoming releases.**
– R: We’re going to record our third album and hopefully do some more live shows.
24. **What is your dream concert to attend? Regardless if the band is still together or if the artist is still living, who would you like to see most and in what period of their career?**
– R: It would be fun to experience The Black Keys live, but is it strange that they don’t choose to play in Sweden on tour? I’m going to Bob Dylan’s concert in Stockholm in October. It might be more like going to a museum, but it will be interesting to experience him live at least once.
- M: Radiohead, which I hope to be able to get a ticket for in Copenhagen this fall.
25. **Is there anything else you’d like to add?**
– R & M: Thank you for discovering us in the haystack, and thanks for a nice interview!
Find The Delta Shake on Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Bandcamp, Facebook and YouTube
https://thedeltashake.bandcamp.com/