10 Records Worth To Die For: #167 mit Viktor Skatt (The Drippers)

As a songwriter, you can’t only listen to the music within the genre that you play.
You gotta open your mind and be receptive to whatever’s good.
As a swede, of course I grew up with ABBA. And I always liked it. Later on, I started noticing how extremely well written their music was and fell in love with it all over again.
The way Benny Andersson writes music is such an inspiration, and Arrival is their absolute peak. The fact that Swedes are good at writing music has a lot to do with the success of ABBA, they really paved the way for all the Swedish artists that came after them.
In Sweden it’s considered ”ugly” to boast yourself or think that you’re better than anyone else, it’s called Jantelagen (”the law of Jante”). ABBA really broke down those walls and inspired people in this small country to believe in themselves.

I love British hard rock and heavy metal from the 70s and 80s. While Saxon, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden are among my favorites, I always found Judas Priest to be the band that satisfied me the most. The Tipton/Downing twin axe machine never failed to deliver the most relentless riffs the world has ever seen. And with Halford’s vocals it’s just magic.
On Defenders they really peak, although fans back then tended to prefer the previous album Screaming For Vengeance (1982) to it.
Defenders has fewer fillers and more sinister riffs, I’ll always go for the best riffs.

Should I choose Raw Power, the New York Dolls debut, Radio Birdman or The Sonics here?
I think I’ll go with Back In The USA. I used to listen to this album like crazy when I was a teenager. It’s got the coolness, the songs, the guitars.
The sound is kinda thin and it lacks that live feel since it’s‘ just short songs stacked, but it’s still one of the great albums that made me choose the action rock life.
The MC5 were true pioneers.

There’s always the fight between the Ass Cobra fans and the Apocalypse Dudes fans.
Then there’s also the edgelords that claim that the best stuff came out before Hank joined.
As(s) much as I love Ass Cobra, you can’t deny that Apocalypse is the band’s masterpiece.
It’s a monumental album, exquisitely crafted to perfection. Euroboy gives the band several dimentions and the big classic rock sound blends beautifully with the Turbonegro filth.
This is one of the most dangerous albums for a teenage brain. Nothing would ever be the same after hearing it.

I could’ve chosen several of their records here, The Beatles changed history in a way that no other band or artist has done. The songwriting is out of this world, they were in a league of their own.
While the ”cool” people often praise the albums from Revolver and forward, I’m more drawn to the earlier stuff. On Rubber Soul, things really started to happen.
The Beatles had something truly magic, and they’ve been with me for as long as I can remember. They created perfection when they were still kids, every artist since has been inspired or affected by their revolution.

Playing in a Swedish action rock band means being compared to The Hellacopters.
I mean it’s what we grow up with and love, it’s in our DNA.
Nicke is one of the greatest musical geniuses in the world, that’s why it’s so great to go back to the early days when he still played shitty Rock N Roll.
Although Paying The Dues may be my favorite album from the Sunlight era (the songs are more structured and together) and High Visibility might be the band’s finest moment, you just can’t argue with the power of Supershitty. There’s so much essence there, the raw stuff that we love. It really started something.

Everyone picks this one, but maybe it’s for a reason. The goddamn guitars, the goddamn groove and the goddamn vocals. Tell me you listened to this album without getting pumped up, and I’ll know you’re dead. One of those studio albums that really have the punch of a live show.
Ridiculously good songs, and the energy is insane. The whole album sounds like a train going of the rails with a hard-on. Every time I hear this album I wonder why people listen to Pink Floyd.
Have you ever heard electric guitars sound this electric?!

How punk rock, right?! Well fuck it, I’m not here to lie to you guys.
At age 11 I discovered Queen, and it became my first real favorite band. I grew up in a home with a broad taste in music, from my Colombian father’s latin albums to my mothers more classic record collection. But Queen was the first band that really became MY band, and their greatest moment is of course their 1975 masterpiece A Night At The Opera. They really went through every genre on this one, the songwriting is beyond genius and it’s just a creative explosion of pure talent.

Before The Hellacopters and The Hives etc. there was a band from Columbus, Ohio, named New Bomb Turks.
While the grunge wave was taking the world by storm, these guys were cooking up their own mix between punk, garage rock and hardcore.
With the witty and clever lyrics by Eric Davidson, the neverending riff assault by guitarist Jim Weber, the intense bass of Matt Reber and the lightning fast drums of Bill Randt, the Turks went on to revolutionize the underground.
Their debut full lenght album Destroy-Oh-Boy! is one of the finest records ever made, I still listen to it regularly for inspiration and it never gets old. The intensity and the individual skills of these guys is something else. It’s like The Stooges on steroids.

After Queen, I discovered KISS. They’re still my favorite band of all time and I’ve asked myself a million times what my favorite KISS album is. In the end, it might just be the debut from 1973.
You can hear that youthful hunger and feel the 70’s New York vibe (kinda like when you’re listening to the Dolls, but less decadent and drug-fueled).Half of the the songs have remained in the setlist for almost 50 years.
They were nobodies when they recorded the album, but they had their aim set at the top. They were just belting it out, the guitars are great and the vocals are soaring. Parents were scared shitless when they saw these monsters back then. It might not sound scary or heavy today, but back in the 70’s this was the fucking Antichrist.

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