Northern Souls: Those Dancing Days

Backstage in a tiny box room, Sweden’s next big thing, Those Dancing Days, find time for a chat and a perfect introduction to those who’ve so far skirted the buzz. Their music is oozing with gaiety, and it’s not until you meet them that you become fully aware of their age (currently ranging from 17-19) – and they have no qualms about it. They’re definitely recognisable as individuals, and all have varying quirks in their stage presence, their influences and their personalities, and the best way to understand the excitement is to have a little delve into just what it is that makes them what they are, in between a united cacophony of giggles.

Linnea, she of the crazy hair, mostly takes a bit of coaxing to get anything out of. She’s every inch the Casablancas frontwoman on stage - bug-eyed, shuffly and fancy-free. The youngest of the band, she finishes school in a few months and describes the band as her “inspiration for life”. She’s pensive beyond her years. Cissi the power-drummer is helium-pitched ramble personified; bassist Mimmi appears the studious, sensible one. Guitarist Rebecka provides the jokes, the ditz, the eccentricities and synth princess Lisa may justwell be the crazy one.  If it was 1996 and this was for ‘Top Of The Pops’ magazine, they might well be described, respectively, as Unfazed, Exultant, Nerd, Madcap and Goofball. Maybe.

“We were so proud when we got a gig in Stockholm, we were like ‘we’re big now!’” Mimmi and the rest of the band continue to be amazed that they’ve made it to London from their small Swedish suburb.  She says they formed Those Dancing Days “to make happy pop music”. And they certainly seem very happy with what they’ve achieved so far. Although they never foresaw the band making it across the water, the decision to write in English was conscious. “It’s more international’, offers Lisa, whilst Rebecka says: “in Swedish it gets a little bit silly”. Linnea, in her soft, slightly nasal tones, on this occasion is free-flowing: “There are few bands who sing in Swedish but if you sing in Swedish you are stuck in Sweden and we didn’t know that we would get the chance to [go international] but we had it somewhere in the back of our minds.”

With so many bands being tipped for great things in 2008, Those Dancing Days could understandably feel like they’re lodged under a rock, trying to spread their name, break into the mainstream, and not let their fans down. But the only pressure they feel is to assuage fears that because they’re a girl band, they can only offer style instead of substance. “It’s not a genre” – Lisa’s right, and it is strange that is even gets a mention. Because when would you read a review beginning with “the all-male five piece…”? It’s a very interesting point, but one which Cissi is all too aware of:  “it’s bad because that we’re girls it has to be like some sort of competition”. So whilst they do plan their outfits – Mimmi describing a “summer festival kind of sports theme…we were really good looking!” – it means that they can stick their fingers up (chance’d be a fine thing as butter wouldn’t melt…) at anyone who claims that that’s all they’ve got going for them. “The band is democratic”, pronounces Rebecka.

“We want to be the female Rolling Stones!” “If people like us now they’ll like us more in a few years because all the time we get so much better so we’re going to be so good in a few years time.” Lisa and Cissi’s ambitions are part-joke, but who knows what the future holds for Those Dancing Days. With only a demo and an EP out there, it’s phenomenal the attraction that the band’s received – the album’s half recorded and the rest will be done in late February. Linnea: “It’s hard to combine [the band] with education. We are still in school, Mimmi and I, and the rest of them work and it’s hard to get some time when you can just be in the studio, focusing.” Their sound engineer is on production duties, and although the songs to be recorded aren’t quite written yet, there’s no rush on what Rebecka describes as “a good mix, the best parts of each person”.