MUSIKER MAGASINET 11/04
Europe - the comeback we’ve been waiting for
Hey – Norum is back in the band!
That’s the message Europe wanted to deliver with SFTD, a guitar heavy album.
We didn’t have any choice, says Norum about the reunion. I’ve made six solo albums, two with Dokken and a lot of studio work in the States. But we’re still like brothers. When we play we have the same feeling as Aerosmith, Stones and other big bands. It was an instant feeling when we started to do demos for this record, the guitar suited very well with Joeys singing and lyrics. I don’t know what it is, but it is unique. When we talk to the press people ask what the album sound like. It sounds like Europe, purely.
He admits the he “maybe now and then” regrets leaving the band just as TFC became a hit.
But I had a lot of own songs, I wanted to sing myself and I was tired of that bubblegum thing we turned into. We ended up on the covers of Teen Magazine, Okej and lots of girls magazines. I wanted to get away from that as soon as possible.
Its been 17 years since he went solo and 12 since Europe’s last record PIP. Joey got a good start on his solo career 1995 with APTCH. The followers flopped commercially and with all respect for the projects the members been involved in th4e last years - this is the album people have been waiting for. The compilation Rock the Night sold 30 0000 ex. SFTD was pre-ordered in 60 0000 ex. Mic Michaeli says that the band has reached a new audience, too young to remember the big days in the 80s. For them, Europe is not a sweet memory of nostalgia. Solo album has to wait.
Norum: The festival gigs were beyond expectation. It was super all the way. The band has been away for 12 years but the audience is still as hysterical as back in the 80s, its unbelievable. Maybe it has to do with the comeback of rock. With bands like The Darkness, Audioslave, Velvet Revolver. Grunge, that gloomy, depressing bullshit is gone.
Who has a refreshing old-school attitude of how rock should sound and he still thinks that rap sucks.
He has a new studio album recorded and mixed, but the Dutch company wanted to wait until Europe’s launch is finished. The album is power trio-rock. A crusher, like Thin Lizzy on steroids with Black Sabbath influences. We recorded it straight away. I play all guitars and sing.
It’s somewhat a bad timing, Europe comes first, but its hard to know my album has been on hold for a year.
On the other hand he goes heavy in Europe as well. In the first track GTHF – one of the songs he brought to the first rehearsal of the band. And he has tuned down the guitar since the 80s.
Dropped D tuning isn’t new, Fleetwood Mac did that back in the 60s. The first time I heard it was on Van Halen’s “Unchained”. It’s a fat sound and its easy to do heavy riffs. I learned that in Don Dokken’s band 1989. On the Europe albums I used only standard 440-tuning. That’s why its so boring to listen to them (laughs).
Ok, 440 is good but all the good riffs has already been done. It can easily sound like AC/DC and this time we try to make a different sound.
We use all sorts of tunings on this album.
Last spring Norum was one of the artists on a celebrity concert to honour BB King, when the King of Blues came to Stockholm to receive the Polarprize. Norum played a Thin Lizzy-cover “Don’t believe a word” together with the guitarist from TL, Brian Robertson.
I used my Gibson Les Paul 1956 Custom Goldtop with P-90 pickup. It’s my blues-guitar. It went straight into Marshalls JCM-800. I like 50 watts better. 100 watts are too squary for me. I have two JCM-800 that I brought from USA. They aren’t S-certified ( a security certification for electric products from Sweden) They have a volt switch between 110, 220 and 240 and also 4,8 and 16 ohm. The Swedish ones has only 4 and 8 ohm. I usually put them on 240 volts and 16 ohm. When he plays with Europe he uses the same 50 watts with chorus.
It’s a Boss Chorus Ensemble, on the other side I have chorus, the other one is dry. I have a small delay through the effect loop to get a little slap. Plus a Jimi Hendrix Dunlop wah wah pedal that is slightly modified with a by-pass switch that makes the signal pass through when the pedal is off.
I have put in KT 88s in my Marshalls, same big glasstubes as in Ricthie Blackmore’s 200 Watts Marshall Major.
A simple setup says Norum but he is the tech-nerd in Europe and knows all the details. I'm extreme. For example I must use special cables with copper-plugs cause it leads (flow of electricity) better.
All the rig must have it, if there’s a bad one somewhere, I have a problem all night.
That sounds like Eric Johnson the guitarist that can tell difference between batteries..
Its true! I use EMG mics sometimes and they run on battery. I can tell the difference between Duracell and Tudor. Tudor sounds less “frizzy”, I get a warmer tone. Its weird but as soon as I plug in the battery its like: “Wow”... and there’s only one place in town who sells them, so I have to go long distances to buy my boxes.
The favourite Strata
Norum has a dozen electric guitars. The most valuable is the crème coloured Stratocaster from 1965 which he used on TFC. I bought it in 1984 for 8000 kronor. Our light-manager had it at home. I tried it and fell for it immediately. Its an early –65, it was made a couple of months before CBS took over Fender. Its worth something between 50- 60000 kronor today. The only modification I did was to put in Di Marzio’s HS 3 mics in neck and lead position.
I had it on tour with Europe and on my first solo album, it’s the only guitar I use.
Now I only use it at home or in the studio. If anything happens to it I’m done.
My first proper guitar was a cheap Les Paul copy, an Arbiter. But I’ve also played Explorer and SG. I’m quite tired of Stratos at the moment, I use them mostly when I do clean stuff, like Steve Ray Vaughan- blues-rock.
But I never use the tremolo arm. Well on one song “Rock the night” I did some dive bombs. That was my least favourite solo. I didn’t use it later on.
P-90 was the favourite pickup. Norum didn’t do so many additions in the studio this time. I always dub my comp-guitar in stereo, left and right but otherwise it’s a solo in the middle and maybe in the end. Not as before; doing licks here and there. We want to play the songs live. Gibson was mostly used, Les Paul Gold Top on 80% of all solos. Favourite is the short solo on “Got to have…” Otherwise he used Les Paul Custom Shop –54 and a Gibson SG-67 (Song Nr 12). All three guitars has Gibson P-90 pickups. Its one of the best mics ever made. It buzzes a lot if you have much gain and don’t play all the time. It’s ok to add some space between the notes so you can hear the guitar breathe. The SG with tremolo arm he bought cause he’s a die hard Frank Marino fan.
I don’t use the tremolo arm but the big lump of metal gives the guitar a lot of resonance. I've made a song on a coming Marino-tribute and we’ve mailed a couple of times. I was the one who initiated the contact, I wanted to know how he builds his preamps and so on.
He thought my song on the tribute was very good. He’s now married and has three daughters so he’s a family man these days. He toured with Uli Jon Roth and Jack Bruce in England, they will release a double live album if they reach a deal. In the studio they used Celestion Vintage 30 W with Beyer M 88 and Shuve SM57 to mic up the guitar speakers. We listened to all speakers in a box and put a mic to the one that sounded best. The element always sound different, mostly the ones in the bottom are the ones with more resonance. I always put a mic to in the middle of the cone and another one on the side.
Then you’ll get all the frequencies, the big mighty sound in two channels. It runs through my Neve-preamps from the 70s. 33115s , the same warm and good stuff as ABBA used back in the 70s. Norum tried an Engl Blackmore signature amp in the studio. But it sounded too much like German metal, almost like Rammstein. Europe is no metal band. I chose one of the Marshall tops mostly. The other top, it sound a little worse is an old one from Michael Schenker. That amp was the main reason to my sound today.
I saw UFO 1996, they were reunited with the original setting and Schenker’s sound was awesome, it blew me away.
After the tour, his guitar-roadie said Schenker was going to sell parts of his backline. Apparently he had freaked out and wanted to go acoustic. A week after Id bough the Marshall he called me and wanted it back. Too late!
Final Countdown
That wasn’t the first time UFO passed something good to Europe. In the mid 80s the American producer Kevin Elson tried to make an album with UFO in England. The members were constantly arguing so he gave up.
When he asked his company if there were anything else he could produce instead, he was given a demo with the song to become “TFC”. It was mostly Joey and keyboards remember Kevin who heard similarities between Journey (another band he’d produced) and Europe. When “TFC” was done, Norum left the band. That’s why it’s interesting to see that Europe has reunited with Kevin Elson on the new album.
I was actually the one who most wanted Kevin back, says Norum. I thought we needed one who had done more records than us, older than us, someone we knew and look up to. We discussed to bring in someone new and fresh but I’ve got bad experience of those things. I myself have done over 37 records. We don’t want to go into the studio with a guy and ending up teaching him how to do the job. Europe paid for the recordings themselves and signed for Sony, that had released their records before. The album was made in the Solna based studio Sound Trade (now called Studio 301). It was the place where they taped the first version of “Rock the night”.
Nowadays it’s a school for studio people, says Mic Michaeli. We wanted the big studio and got it. Most things are the same and the analogue recording equipment is still there. We combined analogue and digital. Drums, bass and some guitars are on analogue tape, we wanted the warmth and the compression.
Start From The Dark
Kevin Elson was in the rehearsal studio when the songs and the arrangements were polished. Both he and the band wanted the record to sound heavy and live. It was important not to create a digital project where you make changes in the computer. Everything was ready when we went in to the studio, Kevin says. Several songs were taped live with the whole band. “Settle for love” was done in one shot.
Tempest song was taped with Neumann 149 mic through Focus rites Producer Pack, a Lang EQ and Empirical Labs “Fatso JR” compression. Kevin Elson: I love the 149, it’s a copy of Neumann M149. With Steve Perry (singer in Journey) we used M49 through Ureis 1176 and Pulted EQ. We tried other mics but M49 was always the best. (To be continued) |