-Shan Siva

Firstly lemme congratulate you on an immense debut and having seeing you play live at this years Sweden Rock festival I wanted to do this interview! Ok, so I’m guessing from the name that some of you must’ve have worked as traders on a stock exchange (or know people that do) so is that the case?

Yes this is correct! Both Ronny and I work as traders on the stockmarket. We wanted to play with the stock market and the financial situation.

So is this band a full time job or something on the side to fulfill the more creative aspects of your lives?

Well, it all started a project 2006. Soon we decided to take it all further. This is not a full time job, but of cause it all takes a lot of time. We all have other jobs.

The impression I get from people who’ve been traders (well, guys in futures anyway) is that once the initial buzz wears off and / or they’ve made their money they wanna move off and go do something COMPLETELY different - like buy a salmon farm in Scotland or something so is that the case with you guys or is the band an even faster way to make money?!

This thing with the band is a big hobby. Of cause we all are 100% serious and see the band as business as well. But you know it’s hard these days to earn money on selling CD’s with all the downloading and streaming.

Is the album title a reflection of the world you live in or your goal for the band cos along with your name it could be taken that you’re hoping to make a return by a certain time period, otherwise you want the option to get out before you make a loss - and become a moose farmer.....?

It is a kind of a refection. If you see album cover and read the album title you may see the connection between them. The stock market and the money never sleep. There are always money/stocks in action all over the world. As I said before we want to play little with the economic crisis because everybody has been in touch with that one way or another.

I was pleasantly surprised to hear AOR coming out’ve a Swedish band given we’re so used to associating Sweden with melodic death so when you chose to put the band together was that a definite intention to play your style?

That was the music that came out when we started to make music. We want to make music that people easy can connect with. Children to housewives can like our music, not only hardrockers.

I also found that style to lean very much towards US AOR in particular so who are your influences?

Van Halen is one of the influences we have together with Bon Jovi & AC DC. We all are in different ages and have different music styles we like. The mix of influences make the sound of Covered Call.

I’ve already mentioned how impressive the material was so is this the first time you’ve guys have written or have you been songwriting for a long time?

We all have been in different bands before. But if I speak for myself is this the most serious in songwriting band I have been in.

How much gigging experience have you had? At Sweden Rock, despite playing the smallest (Gibson) stage you guys seemed a little nervous (or did you hedge bets you’d beat the Danes at football that night <lol>!)?

Haha!! We all have experience of playing live. I think the reason it looked a little bit nervous was because we hadn’t rehearsed with our singer Thomas very much before Sweden Rock. Sometimes it’s difficult to find time to get together because Thomas lives 350km from us.

Having worked in the Finance industry how do you think the music business compares in terms of the people you have to deal with, the way things are done and the bullshit politics?

I think that both can be hard to work with. It is always easier if you have a big connection network.
Maybe the music business is harder to climb. It’s not enough that you are good or have talent. If you aren’t very lucky or knowing the right people you have to work your ass off!

Do you think a band can be viewed as a serious venture by the business world? How would you advise a band with talent but no financial awareness or any initial start up capital to get an investment from say, a private equity firm - how do you translate human emotions into a business case (or do you just deal with the numbers i.e. x sales in 2 years)?

If you got talent and are ready to work hard there are no limits! Cheers!

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Joel, Covered Call