An interview with Eight Arms AKA Förebilden

Eight Arms (right) and interviewer (left)

For the benefit of all non-Swedes among our readership: an interview with Förebilden in English! As the interview is held in English, the artist is referred to as Eight Arms. Why? The explanation is found somewhere in the text below. 

Is Eight Arms a group or an individual?
Yes. We are an individual. 

Is the artist Eight Arms identical to Förebilden?
No. Different names. In all other respects the same.

How many musicians make up Eight Arms?
None. I would not call myself a musician.

Why did you choose the name Eight Arms?
I have eight arms.

Who plays the drums on your recordings?
The computer. I tell it what to play.

Do you write the songs yourself?
Yes, but sometimes I unconsciously borrow melodies or phrases from others. Sometimes I borrow from myself. 

Do you perform live?
I don’t, and I however much you try to coax me into it, I won’t. There is no reason so don't ask.

What instruments do you play?
Whatever is at hand, with equal deftness. I am being ironic.

Is that a Swedish accent?
Yes. I generally strive for a mid-North-Sea mix of Scandinavian and British English, with a hint of transatlantic rhotacism in places. 

Is it hard to write songs?
No. If people knew how little effort is required to write a half-decent song they would lose all respect for songwriters. A really good song is another matter, but I wouldn’t know anything about that.

Is Förebilden still a thing, or will you be Eight Arms from now on?
If you want information about Förebilden you need to ask the questions in Swedish.

How would you define the kind of music that Eight Arms play?
Songs with words, melodies and chords. 

What are your main influences?
The Magical Mystery Tour double-EP.

Who is your favourite singer?
Golden-age calypso singer Neville Marcano, who performed under the moniker Growling Tiger, sometimes just Tiger. 

Are you planning to record more music as Eight Arms?
I am. 

What is your background?
I was born in a small municipality in the north of Sweden, in the wintertime. I travelled south in stages until I happened upon the capital city of Stockholm. I settled there. As I had spent most of my youth hiding from the blistering cold in libraries of various kinds, I chose to work in that sector. I also like books, as they are a good insulator against the cold winter climate of the north. In fact, it was the main form of insulation in the house where I grew up. 

I started playing the acoustic guitar during my teenage years. A wooden guitar with nylon strings, what is usually called a Spanish guitar. But mine was made in Finland. In the beginning I only played other people’s songs, but soon grew tired of that, and thirty years later I started to write my own. Two years into my songwriting I had managed to write approximately fifty songs, and decided to start making some of them public by releasing the music onto various streaming platforms. I called myself Förebilden (“The Role Model”) instead of using my real name. Why? There were already artists out there with the same name as me, and I didn’t want to embarrass them. 

A while later I started writing songs in English together with a colleague from work. We released an EP and a full length album and are soon to release our second album. We are calling ourselves The Exploding Breakfast Society. 

As I started to write songs in English I soon found that I had stockpiled a number of songs that could not easily fit the otherwise generous mould of the band’s music, and so I decided to release some of them myself. I made up a new stage name since I wanted to separate the English language music from the Swedish. While umlauts look cool to (some) foreign eyes, they are mostly reserved for metal bands who use it as some sort of ornament with evil or exotic connotations. To a Swede Ö is simply a letter like any other, and not a decorated version of O. Nothing special. I am reserving the name Förebilden for my Swedish audience who would find the name commonplace but also quite memorable. For this new project I wanted a name that would create an image in the mind and still be plain and simple. The working title for The Beatles’ second film Help was “Eight Arms to Hold You”. 

What is your real name?
No it isn’t.

Eight Arms can be heard on the internet.

On YouTube

On Spotify

And other places.