‘Everyone has the place that they grew up. We have the good and we have the bad and that’s what has shaped us into the people that we are today. That’s what the name Vestli is all about.’
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It might not be a particularly original idea, but it’s one that’s almost universally accepted all over the world and when it’s combined with the fuzzed out punk rock power pop anthems of Spielbergs, it explains why the anticipation was palpable for their recently released sophomore album. Vestli is a suburb of Oslo, where two members of the band – guitarist/vocalist Mads and bassist Statil – grew up and shared their formative years.
‘There’s nothing to see there, just a pub and a mall’, Mads tells me. ‘A commuter town with lots of big buildings and not much going on. A great place to grow up when you were kids because there’s a lot of peace and quiet where you can run around and play, but not so great when you’re a teenager. Just a lot of drugs and smoking weed. That was it really.’
Sounds like pretty much every small town that every one of us grew up in right? But that’s what creates the magic behind the music when you listen to bands like Spielbergs. You get the idea that you could see ‘Vestli’ occupying the same place in the listener’s mind as the lore of other such bands, like the way that The Menzingers or The Wonder Years write so many songs about Philadelphia and The Gaslight Anthem pen their tales about New Jersey and New York.
We’re all a product of our environments and Spielbergs are no exception. You can’t escape the past.
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Sure, The Spielbergs aren’t as specific as those bands in their lyrical content with the names and places littered amongst the lyrics of ‘Vestli’. The fact that they named their album after it and the subject matter of their songs suggests that there’s a similar difficult love/hate relationship with their hometown there.
In that respect then, it’s sort of strange that the name ‘Vestli’ came about at the end of the record and was never the original idea, as Mads explains:
‘Like the first album, the album is about being trapped in the reality of everyday life, you have your job, you have to get up in the morning and do a lot of things that you don’t necessarily want to do and there’s feeling of being trapped. We were arguing about what to call the album, and Christian came up with the Vestli idea (album artwork below) and we just loved it.’
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Christian – who plays drums in the band and was speaking at the start of this article – goes on to expand on the idea behind this title further: ‘We got a bit of stick in Norway for calling it Vestli because everyone thought it was such a boring title, but I think abroad it works because it’s a universal thing. It’s a familiar feeling for everyone.’
It’s true, and this can be felt nowhere more clearly than on the first single from the album ‘Go!’ which showed up way back in May 2020. The song features the usual trademark machine gun drumming and impassioned raw yet sugary sweet vocals, as Mads emplores listeners to pull themselves together and ‘try again forever’, even though ‘you know you won’t get far’.
It’s a chorus that sort of sums up the mission statement of the band – except of course that they now do seem to be making waves in the music scene and busting out from their previous lives holed up in Vestli.
Spielberg’s first album ‘This Is Not The End’ may have been well received, but when ‘Go!’ dropped during the pandemic the hype was immediately doubled. The song even made its way onto Jim Adkins from Jimmy Eat World’s (pictured below) private playlist which is fitting, because they’re also a band that have written extensively about their hometown – most notably on their debut album track ‘Anderson Mesa’.
‘I’ve been listening to Jimmy Eat World since I was quite young so that really meant a lot to me’ laughs Mad. Adkins isn’t the only celebrity fan of the band either, with Simon Neill from Biffy Clyro also citing ‘We’re All Going To Die’ as the last song that really blew him away. Christian says that he couldn’t believe it was true when he heard about it – even paying someone to translate an Italian press conference for him to prove that it was real.
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You can understand why the respect of their peers – and two pretty humongous peers at that – hits so hard for the Spielbergs, as all three members were previously in bands that toured Europe and slept on floors every night for multiple years before jacking it in. They felt that they weren’t ever going to get anywhere, preferring to return home, get real jobs – Mads is a qualified librarian when he’s not on tour with Spielbergs – and start families.
Like Mads verbalises in ‘Go!’ though, it wasn’t long before that musical itch hit them again and Mads and Christian found themselves jamming every Friday night with a few beers, beating out the beginnings of the songs that would make up ‘This Is Not The End’. Once Stian joined on bass, it seemed like the momentum really took off and it wasn’t long before their record was recorded and released in the UK and they were embarking on an extensive 90 day tour all around Europe to support it.
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Even though there’s a thunderstorm in Oslo as I’m talking to Spielbergs via Zoom, it doesn’t dampen their enthusiasm for everything they’ve experienced since starting the band, especially as the project was initially begun with no real expectations. There’s a real sense of humility and honesty that seems to permeate everything that Spielbergs do and if you can’t tell this from listening to their music (you’re probably not listening right), then it certainly comes through when they talk about touring on ‘This Is Not The End’:
‘The first time we came to London there were 200 people at the show and people queueing down the street to get in. That was an unbelievable experience for a small band like ours from Norway,’ Christian tells me, before Mads chimes in and talks about playing Mad Cool Festival in Barcelona for the first time a few weeks previously:
‘I think we played the smallest of the stages. I was expecting it be like Roskilde festival in Denmark where the smallest stage there is literally in the forest/camping area with hardly anyone on it. When we arrived there it was this big stage with a tent and it was really surprising! There were all these people running into see us and almost a football stadium roar when we came out onto the stage!’
‘It was a really special experience and really reminded us why we do this, especially after the pandemic.’
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Of course, with the good also comes the bad – especially on the road – but Christian looks back on one such day in Munich where he hit rock bottom and still manages to laugh now:
‘We were on the back of 100 travelling days and 70 shows and we played to about 15 people and then slept in a band room next to a place playing 90s Europop all night (see below for a special playlist). That’s something I did not appreciate that much.’
That last line might be down to the fact he’s Norwegian – they always seem to manage to not be too pissed off about everything no matter how bad things are when I speak to them or see Ole Gunnar Solskjaer on TV – but it only endears me more to the band and their sense humility at the opportunity they’ve been given in their later lives. Sometimes everything might suck, but it’s all part of the ride.
I hope you didn’t actually click that link. Anyway, Spielbergs will no doubt be sharing other such experiences on the road both good and bad for a long time now given the quality and impact of the songs on ‘Vestli’. Another favourite of mine comes towards the end of the album in the form of ‘Get Lost’.
The song channels the classic quiet/loud formula of most rock songs as Mads laments about lost love and a relationship that didn’t work out over noodling guitar work – wistfully reciting that ‘last night your name came up, but I said it didn’t matter’ – before blasting into a huge soaring chorus that fully emulates his heroes in Jimmy Eat World. It then builds to a beatdown that you might think was more suited in a hardcore song as Mads screams ‘I was being myself’ over and over again, another refrain that perfectly sums up the ethos that Spielbergs are trying to reflect in their music.
You can catch a special live performance of it from Studio Paradiso in Norway below:
I’ve already mentioned how Spielbergs aren’t short of celebrity fans, but whilst it’s not surprising that they would have enthusiasts from genres of music that are similar to theirs, the owner of Paradiso Studios and the producer of both of their records might come as surprise to you. Tord Øverland Knudsen’s day job is playing bass in Liverpool indie band The Wombats and he met Christian back when the pair of them both lived in the city and were cutting their teeth in the city’s underground scene.
I was kinda surprised to hear that someone who was in The Wombats would be interested in a band like Spielbergs – and even more shocked to find out that The Wombats were still going and had recently sold out Wembley arena – but Christian assures me that Tord (pictured below) has a love for alternative rock and punk and hardcore, despite playing in what you would probably describe as a pop band. He was also one of the driving forces behind the band even getting started, as the drummer explains:
‘I was on a night out with Tord and I had some phone clips and stuff from the songs we were jamming and Tord just grabbed me and said ‘Christian I can see that this is very important to you, let’s get into the studio and start recording this and stop fucking talking about it.’
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The rest is history. The relationship between the band and Knudsen worked so well that they enlisted him again for ‘Vestli’ and pretty much count him as an extended member of the band at this point, as Mads tells me:
‘He’s not calling the shots but he has a lot of ideas and he helps us. He brings out the melodies and he brings out the hooks. He’s a co-producer. He even played cello on the new record!’
Mads is talking about one of the more unusual and ambitious tracks on ‘Vestli’, an instrumental piece that serves as an interlude between the frenetic energy exploding on the rest of the album. It’s the kind of track that you wouldn’t expect Spielbergs to record, but still fits perfectly within their body of work, much like the 7 minute post/stoner rock opus about someone fucking up their McDonald’s order from the first record.
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Much like the album title it wasn’t something that the band sought out to put on the record, it just sort of happened organically in the studio. Mads describes the process:
‘I was just playing the guitar riff on the piano and then recorded like five minutes piano over and over again. We wanted to have it as an outro for the song before as that ended in a crescendo of noise, but we sent it to this guy Magnus we know – he plays violin on like 80% of indie recording in Norway – and he did his thing and then Tord played cello and it turned into a whole song.’
It’s a welcome change of pace on the album and whilst this isn’t uncommon amongst their peers – Japandroids have that really long song about mosquitoes in the middle of ‘Near To The Wild Heart Of Life’ for example – it still feels fresh, important and vital and is a great segue into the second half of the record:
Normally when I write these features, I tend to focus on the music videos that a band have released, but Spielbergs are a bit of an exception to this rule as they don’t do music videos. ‘We just don’t feel comfortable trying to look and act cool in front of a camera,’ explains Christian. ‘It’s also fucking expensive,’ laughs Mads.
Again that just seems typical of the attitude displayed by The Spielbergs. Grateful and happy for everything they’re getting, but at a point in their lives where they’re not going to compromise their ideals and do anything they don’t want to do for a quick shot at the big time. Humble and weathered, but exactly where they want to be and doing everything on their terms without expectation and seeing where they end up.
And for now it seems like that’s going to be a long way away from Vestli – even though it will always remain in their hearts.
NB However, Spielbergs are interested in making a video with a really good idea where they don’t have to show up, so if you’ve got an idea and want to work with them then hit them up! Was really tempted to make ‘Spielbergs Need A Director’ the headline of this article but it just didn’t feel right – I wanted to give someone the chance though. They’re great dudes so just go for it, just like in their song!
Catch Spielbergs on tour in September/October.
