MILLENCOLIN

In the month of October 1992, Millencolin was found by Erik, Mathias and Nikola in Örebro, Sweden. At first they all played in other punkbands, and they were singing in Swedish. Erik played guitar in Charles Harfager. Nikola and Mathias had their band called Seigmenn.

They all started skating in the nineteen eighties and they listened to Descendents, Operation Ivy and Odd Man Out, so they decided to start their own band. They got the name from a skate trick, "Melancholy", and they adjusted the spelling so it sounded more like a name. They recorded a 10 song demo tape called "Goofy" in the beginning of 1993. They did a few shows, and then Larzon joined the band. Mathias, who was drumming before Larzon joined them, switched to guitar, so they could play better.

In the summer op 1993 they made a new ten song tape which they called "Melack" (the songs are now spread out on different compilations). That one was recorded with Dan Swanö in Unisound Studios where they still record their stuff. Someone sent the tape to Burning Heart who wanted to release them, at that time they only had two cd singels out.

They recorded the six song cd-single "Use your nose" (which contain "Pain" from Goofy and "Melack" from Melack) early 1994. Five month later they went back and made "Skauch" which is also a single with two of their own and four cover songs. In august they went back for the third time that year and recorded their first full-length album called "Tiny Tunes". They played allot live that year, over 100 shows in Sweden only.

In 1995, Burning Heart Records and Unisound Studios moved to Örebro, and their second full-lenght album was a fact, "Life on a plate", released in October. They played some more live shows in Sweden and in the summer, they did 124 festivals, in Norway, Denmark and Sweden. In September 1995 they played for the first time outside Scandinavia, in Germany. They did 10 shows there. After that, they did a little European thour, through Switzerland, France, England and Germany. At the end of 1995 Epitaph came to sign Life on a plate, so they could release it in the United States. They did so in March 1996.

They toured most of the time in 1996. Japan, Australia, two US/Canada tours, European festivals in the summer and a south European tour. It all ended up being almost 150 shows that year. Then Burning Heart got sued by Warner Bros. because of the cover and the title of "Tiny Tunes" so they had to change the cover and the title. They decided to call it "Same old tunes" because it still contain the same songs.

In 1997 they released their third album, "For Monkeys". It was released in April in Europe and the US. One month later, they released Lozin' Must on single. For Monkeys was one of the last recordings made in Unisound Studios. Dan Swanö sold most parts of the studio to Mathias and companion Miezsco, who already had some studio stuff together. The studio was called The Punk Palace but they recently changed the name to Sound Lab studios. That is where they recorded "Vixen" for the Lozin' Must single.

They started touring in May in 1997 with a European tour, then the Vans Warped tour in the States/Canada and Europe. Australia and Japan in October. It all sums up to around 100 shows. They'll start 1998 with a month long US tour together with Pulley. The first show is in Miami the second of January.

Source: http://millencolin.freehosting.net/biog.html