The Erlend Øye-produced Norwegian ska-pop outfit Kakkmaddafakka manage to transform live orchestral chaos into something convincing and upbeat. Hang with their hangover at Astra on Saturday, October 19.
Who’s been your worst audience?
AXEL VINDENES: Namsos in Norway.
STIAN SÆVIG: They were totally wasted.
AV: And then they stole shitloads of t-shirts. At this point we were really poor and then we decided: we’re not going to do Norway anymore.
You have a big German following. Bigger than in Norway?
AV: Ooh, way bigger. In Norway we are not popular… they don’t like Bergen people in Oslo.
So why do you need Oslo?
AV: We don’t, that’s why we don’t bother.
SS: If you want to be big in Norway, you have to be liked by the four bosses in Oslo. And the four bosses don’t like us so much and that’s why it’s not happening.
Did you burn your bridges?
PÅL VINDENES: We were just young and had a party and they didn’t like young guys having fun, I think.
SS: Maybe it has something to do with our first song: we were saying something about Oslo being not so cool.
Is Bergen competitive?
AV: Not in a bad way at all, just in a positive way.
PV: You can show your music to this guy you meet in a café and say, “You want to hear my new stuff?” and then they’ll just say, “That one was shit.”
SS: And you know they don’t say it’s shit because they’re jealous.
AV: They just say it’s shit to help you. In Bergen, it’s not like if you just do a song, everyone is just, like, [claps] “Great, man. Another Bergen classic.”
SS: So we help each other out, in Bergen. In Oslo, they just destroy each other.
Is it one particular person or many?
AV: Shitloads of shit people. The first guy decides what’s coming on radio in the whole of Norway. He has terrible taste, terrible taste. Not educated, he doesn’t know shit about music and he hates Bergen. But we in Bergen, we hate him. And if you get invited to Music Norway – they have an office in Berlin now – it’s run by Oslo people, shit people.
I’m surprised there’s not more Bergen punk music as a reaction.
PV: Well Norway’s such a rich country that I hope that there is a punk movement coming because everything is so uptight and clean these days with kids. It’s cool to be good at school, it’s cool to have expensive clothes… I think in three years some cool, young people will just say “Fuck this!” and make some cool stuff out of it.
Kakkmaddafakka w/ Roosevelet Sat, Oct 19, 20:00 | Astra
Originally published in issue #120, October 2013.
