Looptroop... Looptroop...
Interview geführt im März 2003, als Looptroop in München im Backstage waren.
what’s your cultural background or have you made any special experiences which influenced you to kick this type of political rap-lyrics
cosmic: I am coming from the graffiti scene and so I was feeling like I was outside the society, I was like the enemy of the state, the enemy of the police. So I think that is where my inspiration comes from to write political rhymes.
supreme: even as a skateboarder you feel like this and you get bust from police. And then you grow up and start to smoke and drink, and thats illegal, you know.
yeah, whats the political situation in sweden like.
what are the main parties.
S: the biggest party is the social democrats.
C: yeah, it used to be left-wing but now it’s right-wing... or quite in the middle.
just the same situation as in germany and many other europian countries
C: yeah, I guess so.
although you got not that much industrial support like many other artists (especially from the US), you are very well-known here in germany and other europian countries...
C: it comes mainly from touring around. And I guess because we are europian; I dont really know why, but perhaps it’s the same mindstate; like the countries and the kids are very much the same.
S: many europians might think about the same topics, that we right about. So they say ‘that was the topic I talked about with my friend’ But I also think we work harder than people who got backed up by big record companies. They got a lot of people who do everything for them, but we did everything on our own and still do. And I think people enjoy to see us doing everything by our selves. Like we go on tour for five weeks in whole europe and sell records.
So can we expect some other artists coming out from your own label david versus goliath or was it built only to put out your own records?
S: More like that. We put out this one guy, PST, in sweden with his first 12inch, but now it’s more like doing it straight for our selves like a production company.
C: Maybe in the future there will be some other artists...
Aren’t you accepted in the USA as well? Because you mentioned that people in Europe could relate to what you’re saying...
C: We probably have a strong fanbase in the US as well, but it’s hard to know because we never toured there. But we get e-mails and so...
S: We haven’t put out any album there until now! We only dropped a few 12inches. The “modern day city simphonie” LP was never coming out there; the actual album will be released in June there, so we will see.
In Summer 2001 the EU summit took place in Göteborg. Did you take part at the protests against or have you got any connections to that anti-globalisation movement?
S: Cosmic und Promoe were supposed to do a show there, but they couldnt do it...
riots broke out, people throwing rocks and so on...
C: yeah, we couldn’t do it because the police cut the show. So we were standing there and watched it from a distance... the whole riots. Some connections... I don’t know. We got friends who are very political...
S: Some of our friends are in jail now because of that thing. But it’s not like we have a working relationship, but we know a lot of those people, like they are friends.
Because we don’t speak very good swedish, could you explain the lyrical content of songs like “Jög Skot Palme” and “Ring Snuten”?
S *laughing about our swedish pronounciation*
C: Jög Skot Palme means I shot Palme. Palme was Prime Minister at the time when he got killed in 1986. And this song is a cover of that Non Phixion track “I Shot Reagen”; So it is more like a funny cover.
S: But people in Sweden showed strong reactions to it like he was the hero and people think, that he was the only good guy among all the politicians. And then we got killed and they don’t find the shooter and then we make a song that said that we had shot him. That made people really get obset. The other song means like “call the cops”. At that time there was a police murderer in Sweden. So one of the guys one the track (he is not from looptroop) he doesn’t say exactly but his verse is like he describes that murder of the policeman... kind of, you know. So the police took it to the police academy and showed it to all these young policemen and they were really angry. The were like “these guys shot not walk the streets” and sumthin like that... yeah, that was fun.
In the song “fruit of babylon” you referre to some of those topics like what wars are about in real. So do you wanna say sumthin about the upcoming war on Iraq... Is this one a special type of war or the same shit as ever?
S: I think basically all of the wars are about money... and power. And this time it’s the same. It is always sad. But I think this time it’s extra-stupid because the UN-inspectors said that they didn’t find weapons of mass destruction and still George Bush wants to got in there. Even though the whole world is saying no... We try to dedicate our shows every night to people who want peace and not go to war...
What was the experience like to go on tour togheter with International Noise Conspiracy? Could the crowd which came to see these shows relate to your style of music, or how did they react?
C: Ya, in some places it was cool, like in Spain they went crazy because they just liked the music, I guess. But in england they were tired as punkrocker...
S: But actually it was better, that there was a punkrock crowd listening to hiphop. It would have been worse if it was us that were the headline band. If it had been a hiphop crowd which was supposed to hear punkrock music, you know, people would have left the place and start throwing bottles. So in a way I think, that punkrock audience was really open, because they were listening to our show. And you could see that some of them even if they didn’t know the songs, they liked some of the music. But I mean there was more fun things to do... I don’t think we made so much new fans or sumthin like that. But int. Noise Conspiracy, they are really nice people and it was nice to go with them.
So why have you choosen “punk’s not dead” for one of your earlier tapes? ...Have you ever been playing in punk bands or sth like that?
S: Ya, I was singing in a hardcore band. And me and Cosmic are listening a lot to hardcore music, punkrock, skater music. But it was like people always told us, that we had this punk rock mentality and then we felt like we was more punkrock than most of the punkrock bands; because most of them or not that punk. So we thought let’s do it;
“punk’s not dead” because we are the biggest punk band right now. But it was not all that serious, because we had big ass and tits on the cover. But it was a funny name, because a lot of people still ask us about the title...
Any last words to the reader, like “buy our album”...?
C: peace out, no wars, smoke the grass, dont walk on it...
S: buy our album, or steal or download our album; if you like it, it’s great... and come to the show!