It’s been well over a year since Nestor dropped their first video for their debut track “On The Run”. The video was a huge – an immediate success, with the retro and hilarious clip now at well over 400 thousand views! The band followed with videos for the tracks “1989” and “Tomorrow” (the latter featuring Samantha Fox). Eventually came the band’s awesome full length album, and numerous live dates in Europe, with the band’s own hometow “NestorFest” being their latest highlight. In this exchange singer Tobias Gustavsson details the band’s last year and what is to come. As a fan, I am looking forward to the band’s debut album getting a major re-release next month, as well as talk of a follow-up album coming in the (hopefully) no-so-distant future.
*Be sure to check out links at the end of this interview…
Kids In A Ghost Town has been quite a success so far. How has the whole success of the videos, the album, and recognition changed your life directions over the past year? And has it all exceeded any expectations when you put out the album?
Well it has made life a little more interesting for sure, haha! No but it has absolutely exceeded our expectations. I think we had an idea that the music would be received well when we started working on the songs and everything. But you never know when releasing music, so much has to do with timing, luck and other stuff. But the stars seem to have been perfectly aligned and we are totally overwhelmed by the reception we’ve had! We’re super happy, super humble and it’s been super fun!
As to how life has changed, it’s been kind of weird because we’re all grown up men with families, jobs, and ordinary lives. So in one sense things are kind of normal, during the weekdays. But then we have been out quite a lot on weekends lately, playing festivals all over and that’s a totally different beast! We get to be rockstars for a little while you know! But then it’s back to reality, fixing breakfast for kids, going to our regular workplaces and so on. It’s been kind of good to have this happen now, when we can handle all the things happening and keeping our feet on the ground. If this would have happened when we were young teenagers I don’t think we would have handled it as good – or appreciated it like we do now. It’s like we can really take it in and enjoy it now, if you know what I mean.
You guys have played a lot of shows , festivals, opening slots… I am sure there have been many, but are some of the biggest highlights for each of you? Can you mention any favorite bands [ie Kiss] that you have got to check out or meet? [any stories — You have got share stages with a few of my favorites like Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, Europe…. ] , biggest crowds, etc..
Opening for KISS was awesome for sure, they’re real childhood idols to all of us. We also got to meet them briefly backstage and take a picture. But that was about it, no small talk with Gene really you know, haha! But still very cool! Generally, honestly, we haven’t had the time to watch many other bands. We played the same festival as Europe for instance, but different days. So we missed out on that. But we have met a lot of nice people backstage and talked to a lot of cool people, both artists and others! A fun side note was that when we played Atlas Rock a sound engineer passed us after the gig and complemented the live sound. He told us that he’d better step up his game. So we asked who he was there with, and it was the sound guy for Uriah Heep! Haha, nice compliment! (PS, our sound guy Emil is truly the best btw!)
How much of the album is performed in the band’s live show? And is there any ‘new’ tracks or covers included on occasion?
Depending on how much stage time we have, we’ve played pretty much all the tracks from the album. The only one we haven’t aired live yet is We Are Not Ok, but that might change in the future, we’ll see. Just recently when we played our own hometown Falköping and what we called NESTOR FEST, we played the album tracks, and our new single Signed In Blood, AND the two additional tracks that will be included on the Deluxe Edition of our album that comes out at the end of September. One of those is a cover by the way, and a pretty unexpected choice too I would say! It’s an 80s track, but a big pop hit, but our version sort of! And we also did Gary Moore’s The Loner so our guitar player Jonny could shine a little extra too!
Nestor has signed to Napalm Records. How did that come about and what is the plan – including a 2nd album? [Has writing begun for a 2nd album or is there an estimated released date?]
There will be a 2nd album! Work on that has been started. But as I mentioned, Napalm will release our debut album Kids In A Ghost Town in a Deluxe Edition with 3 additional tracks. The signing with them was pretty undramatic. We had been holding off signing with a label because we were looking for the right partner. And the guys at Napalm seemed to get our thing so we made a deal to work with them, and yeah, the Deluxe version comes out late September. As for the next proper album, when it comes out and so on, nothing has been set yet, but it won’t be another 30 years at least, promise haha!
What might fans expect on a 2nd Nestor album? Anything you guys would like to try differently, cover, or do more of ?
I think that if you liked what we did on the first album, you will like the next one. It’s going to be all centered around the same era, with the 80s music as a stepping stone, sound wise. For us it all comes down to great songs and great melodies. That’s kind of what the 80s was a lot about. But at the same time, we will absolutely look for ways to push boundaries and what Nestor can be, you know. Hopefully it will be awesome, and it definitely won’t be boring!!!
Has there been offers to get on to some tours outside of Europe, such as the UK, Australia , or Canada and the US ? Any plans or wishes to get to certain territories you haven’t played yet? [Would be great to see the band, along with a number of other Swedish acts over here]
There have been some stuff, offers and suggestions, but these things take time in my experience (from being in the music industry for many years). You kind of have to bide your time and work each region or geographical area one step at a time. With that said, we would love to come over to North America for instance. But at the same time, we want to do it properly from the start, and not, you know, half-ass it. But hopefully we’ll see you soon!
Lastly, from Canada here, curious how familiar you guys are with Canadian bands and if you might have a few favorite Canadian bands and albums?
Oh, Canada! We kind of feel that you’re our northern sibling from another time zone, friendly, uncomplicated and just great people! There are a lot of awesome Canadian acts. Rush for sure is one that comes to mind first, I mean, who doesn’t love Rush! And Big Wreck, do they count as Canadian? They were awesome! And you can’t be an 80s admirer and not mention Saga, or Loverboy! And honestly, Nickelback gets a lot of bad rep, but man, Chad knows how to write songs, right? As for newer stuff, The Weekend has been doing some amazing things lately, also with a bit of 80s touch in a way, right? And best album? Tough one, but Reckless by Bryan Adams – Come on!
Links:
Live photos courtesy of Basse Hellgren, taken at Nestorfest . To see more check out – http://www.rockbladet.se
https://www.facebook.com/nestortheband
https://napalmrecords.com/english/nestor
https://www.napalmrecordsamerica.com/search/?q=nestor
*thanks to Peter Kjellin
08/’21
Outsider Rock 