Garmarna - Rickard Westman
By: Dominick A. Miserandino
Garmarna's Rickard Westman talks about being a Swedish musician, and what brought him there.
DM) What are the instruments "the E-bow" and "the Mungiga" that you play on
the album?
RW) E-bow is a device used when playing electric guitar. Basically, it is
two magnetic poles that make the string tremble and, in that way, create a
tone which sounds as if the guitar was played with a bow. Mungiga is simply
a Jew's harp, a very common folk music instrument all over the world.
DM) What was the first instrument you learned to play?
RW) The guitar. I started playing when I was nine years old.
DM) Has music always been in your family?
RW) Not really. My brother plays the guitar, too, and somewhere far back
there is some legendary fiddler, but that's it.
DM) A legendary fiddler?
RW) Yeah, the Wernberg brothers, cousins of my grandma or something like
that. Stefan's father is a well known fiddleplayer in the area, though, and
Emma's father is one of the best known fiddle players in Sweden. So I
haven't got much to put up against that... Both Wernberg brothers drank
themselves to death, I believe. They usually did in those days.
DM) I know for me, not knowing Swedish, the music sounded great, but I was
almost blacking out the words, which were foreign to me, and just
concentrating on the melody. Growing up with such a heavy influence of
English music, did you find you had the same experience?
RW) Well, obviously, since we are all Swedish and speak Swedish, we don't
have that problem at all.
DM) No, I meant when you hear English music.
RW) Oh, sorry...It hasn't happened that often with music from the Western
world, which usually is, sadly, with English lyrics--except for when I was
younger and didn't speak English and sang along with Bob Marley tunes with
homemade words... It sometimes happens with music from other parts of the
world, though. Finnish music, for example.
DM) Were you very surprised when you learned what the music meant?
RW) Not really. It was more the "Wow, that's cool" reaction to it. Also,
I knew what the music was about before I got to the point where I could
understand the lyrics via articles written about it etc.
DM) Who were your musical influences?
RW) Neither I nor the rest of the band is very much influenced by any other
band. Garmarna works in a very democratic way: You may do whatever you want
to; and we've never done anything with the idea that one particular tune
should sound in any particular way. On the other hand, you could say that
we are inspired by any kind of music that we listen to, and in Garmarna that
stretches from everything by David Bowie via Beastie Boys to country music
and Pantera...
DM) How do you resolve conflicts within the group over song ideas?
RW) Well, we don't. We've always been a very democratic band in that
sense, where each one of us is free to do whatever he or she wants to. In a
recording situation it is different though; then, of course, our producer,
Sank has a lot of influence on what is going on. Which is good, because I
believe every band should have someone without any prejudices listening to
the material, saying what is good and what is not.
DM) It sounds like Sank becomes like a conductor.
RW) More like the sixthth member of the band when we work together. He has
a lot of influence but so do we. There is no orchestra around where the
violin player tells the conductor that his way of doing it is wrong.
DM) How long has Sank been with the group?
RW) He's been working with us since the previous album, God's Musicians,
which was released '96.
DM) On what page of the booklet is your picture?
RW) I'm the first Garm. Short-haired and standing at the left. (At least
in the Swedish release, but it could be different in other release
s.)
DM) What is the meaning of the first track, "Herr Mannelig"?
RW) It is a medieval ballad that tells the story of a mountain troll who
wants to marry Sir Mannelig (a knig
ht), because that would make her a human
being instead of a troll. She offers him all kinds of gifts etc., but he
refuses since she, after all, is not a Christian woman.
DM) That seems very deep for a pop song.
RW) Well, it was originally a medieval ballad.
DM) Do you find you have fans who do not speak Swedish?
RW) Yes. We play a lot outside of Sweden, and we do get plenty of e-mails,
letters etc., and we always have good crowds, so that is a fact.
DM) What was the best reaction you've ever had from fans? Any unusual
gifts, sell- out shows, people asking for autographs?
RW) The biggest crowd so far has been more than 10,000 people in Stockholm
a few years ago. A few weeks ago, we played two festivals in Portugal and
Spain. Portugal was sold out, and Spain more or less sold out. People who
want autographs are common, especially abroad, but gifts...that doesn't
happen too often. We got a painting once, a really ugly one! Another
highlight is the plate we received from the Mayor of Macon, Georgia, at the
Cherry Blossom Festival...
DM) Did you ever anticipate such success?
RW) No, you never do. At first you dream about it and hope for it. Now
the dreams are more or less gone and we just want to do our thing, hopefully
making some money out of it and having a good laugh at the same time. The
success, when it occurs (which is seld
om), always comes as a bonus surprise.
DM) And if the music doesn't work out, what will you do?
RW) Well, I'm just about to finish my end exams in history, which has been
my major at the university, and I'm thinking about studying journalism next.
Maybe something in that direction, or work as a tour producer or something
else that is connected with music--as long as I don't have to play any
instruments or be involved with productions of albums etc. You don't earn any
money being a musician unless you make it big, and even then it is too
demanding, I think.
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