"Jesper often does complicated song with a lot of lyrics, Jörgen wrote most of the songs on the album and Per-Henrik does his stuff"

Read an interview with Tomas Amneskog
written by Urban Århammar, Popöga no.
116  back in 1995.
 


Human League releases a new album sounding just like in the old days. And Kiethevez are doing a good job managing the synthiepop legacy. Especially the songs written by Tomas Amneskog are classical synthiepop songs.
- Yes, that´s a bit sad, says Tomas Amnskog, one of four young men from the synthiepopband Kiethevez when I question the popularity of the genre in 1995. Between -79 and -84, all music was good. But I hope it will change again. There´s a lot of bands and Sweden is among the best when it comes to synthiepop. And I´m also an optimist, I think a new wave is coming though not quite as big as the last time.

Kiethevez took its form in the eighties in Älvängen outside Gothenburg.
- Per-Henrik (Petersson), Jörgen (Falmer) and me have been playing since 1986, we know each other from school. In 1990 we teamed up with the vocalist Jesper (Palmqvist) and in February of 1991 we did our first live performance as Kiethevez. When it comes to records, you might say that Kiethevez has grown with its label, October in Älmhult.
- We contributed one song to a compilation from Limur in Kungälv, then we distributed an MC on our own, and after that we were on the first October compilations. The debut album "Three Empty Words" was released this fall and has sold "proportionately well". Right now the double A-side single "Nothing I Can Do/Anything Higher" is what´s of current interest. It´s Jörgen that´s behind the lyrics of both of the songs and also the music of "Anything Higher".

So how do they come up with their songs?
- Sometimes the whole group is involved and sometimes it´s just one of us. Mostly we work in pairs in the studio, in some cases there are three of us. If someone gets stuck, someone else sometimes comes up with an idea that takes the song a little further. We don´t have a rule it has to be "synthiepop", we do what we think is good.

Are there any difference between you concerning your songwriting?
- Jesper often does complicated song with a lot of lyrics, Jörgen wrote most of the songs on the album and Per-Henrik does his stuff. I´m into the very early eighties stuff, that´s what I know. I´ve also been working on some newer things now, it´s fun and it gets you some new ideas. We´ll see if something comes out of it. We´ve started working on a new album and we´ve completed a few new songs. We´ll try to have it finished this fall and it will at least be out before next summer.
Live?
- We really enjoy that. There´s usually a group of synth-people in the audience that gets the people going. The rest are just people who´ve heard the album and liked it. That´s fun.

Written by: Urban Århammar / Popöga no.116 1995