EQ Interview With Erik Hassle - "I never thought that my hair could be something that was interesting! "

Erik Hassle's "Pieces" is one of the finest pop accomplishments of 2009 and will finally be unveiled to the UK and USA in early February.  Already a hit in Sweden with his debut single "Hurtful", Erik hopes to grow his fan base with the universal appeal of his gorgeous pop music.  Having recently finished a tour with Little Boots and Ellie Goulding, the soul pop quirkster is quickly gaining fans by the legions all the while being hotly tipped from influential tastemakers and UK newspapers like The Guardian.

I caught up with Erik Hassle to talk about his music, the experience of filming his music video to "Don't Bring Flowers" in Los Angeles and about life as a Swedish musician living in London.  And of course we had to talk about his hair too - enjoy!

EQ: Hello Erik how are you today?
Erik Hassle: I'm alright! I'm good. We've been on tour now for two week and the last show we all managed to get the flu!

Oh goodness!
Yeah, but I think I'm going to be ok...

So you just finished a few shows with Little Boots and Ellie Goulding - how did those shows go over?
It's been great - it's been very fun and I just like being on the road. It takes like three days and then you get into the tour mode and you never want to go back!

So let's talk about your song "Hurtful" - I wanted to find out if that song was autobiographical at all?
Yeah it was! The lyrics are quite easy to relate to for everyone I guess. For anyone whose ever been hurt and in love - they can relate to it. It's a knock on your shoulder by your conscious when you're starting to think things over and regret how you maybe handled some stuff. It's definitely autobiographical.

Lady Gaga Tranny Stalker Alert!

Lady Gaga needs to go into hiding immediately - these two stalker trannies are quite scary!

Darryl Haynes From Soundgarden - New Video Blogs..."Your Biscuit Loses!"

What do we have here? It's episode 4 of the "making the album" video blogs from my favourite male artist of all time - Darren Hayes!

So let's get into this, my thoughts on part one...

• Those synthy sounds from 22 to 45 secs sound really sexy. I want to hear more!  Such a tease Darren!
• A 20 piece orchestra?!  Wow - looks really challenging and very curious as to how it will sound on a Daz record - I'm sure it will be lush and gorgeous as ever!
• The floral goodness with a vest look NEVER goes out of fashion...
• These video blogs wouldn't quite work without a cheesy impromtu diddy inserted now wouldn't they? "The Greatest American Hero" - Brilliant!  Must download that song now...

And my thoughts on this one...

• Yeah, your biscuits may be cool - but the McVities dark chocolate ones will ALWAYS win.  Always. I challenge you all to a biscuit war.  Laughs - "YOUR BISCUIT LOSES!"  A new catch-phrase no doubt!  I'm going to shout that when Danyl Johnson finally gets kicked off the X Factor.
• It's so nice to see more of the elusive Robert Conley!
• The album is done eh?  Yay!  But whenever Darren says "in the can" I can't help but think of a toilet.  I don't know if that is good pop vocabulary or not...but it's funny!

Blake Lewis Live - "Heartbreak On Vinyl"

 

You know, I have never got to see Blake Lewis live yet, so you can imagine my excitement when Blake posted this new clip of him performing (according to him) the likely next single "Heartbreak On Vinyl" at The Roxy.  

The show looks fun live - you can bet I'd be at the front singing along to every song.  Now what do we have to do to lure either the band or the one-man band over to London Town for a showcase - everyone knows that the UK would totally eat his brand of commercial dance-electro-pop right up.

Whatcha waiting for Tommy Boy ? The UK beckons...

Further reading - EQ interview with Blake Lewis from September

JLS Album Advert - Amazing...

How bloody amazing does this advert for the new JLS album look?!  Can't wait to get my grubby paws on it!

However I'll only be buying one copy - the one with Ortise on the cover because he's an EQ supporter ;)

JLS - bringing back the boy band - one #1 hit at a time!

Simon Curtis Announces New Album "8Bit Heart"

 

Simon Curtis has announced his plans to launch his free download album "8Bit Heart" once he reaches 8000 Twitter followers, so make sure you are following Simon on Twitter because the faster you follow, the faster we'll have this electro-pop gem in our hands!

So what's the album going to be like? Simon had this to say about the album title and forthcoming tunes...

"The album is titled "8-Bit Heart" and is built around inspiration from 80's-early nineties video games, and sci-fi/fantasy. I've been making some seriously HOT tracks using old commodore 64 8-bit music - hence the title. All really smartly themed yet totally danceable, commercial pop - which is how I like my tunes..."

Excited much?  I am - Simon Curtis' music really means a lot to me.  He's my third most played artist of all time (well, ever since I started a Last fm account)...just right behind Madonna and Darren Hayes and he doesn't even have a commercial release yet!