Thåström

Thåström, more formally known as Joakim Thåström, is a chart-topping Swedish rock singer/songwriter with an illustrious career that dates back to the 1970s punk uprising. In addition to his solo album output as a singer/songwriter, which commenced in 1989, he served as the frontman of the punk band Ebba Grön (1977-1983), the post-punk band Imperiet (1983-1988), and the industrial rock band Peace Love & Pitbulls (1992-1997). Born Sven Joachim Eriksson Thåström on March 20, 1957, he grew up in the working-class suburbs of Stockholm. In 1977 he co-founded the punk band Ebba Grön, which made its album debut in 1979 with We're Only in It for the Drugs. The follow-up albums Kärlek & Uppror (1981) and Ebba Grön (1982) were big hits, reaching numbers five and one, respectively, on the Swedish albums chart, and a couple one-off singles were big hits as well. In 1983, at the height of Ebba Grön’s success, the band dissolved, and Thåström founded a new band, Imperiet, whose membership fluctuated over the years. Essentially a post-punk continuation of Ebba Grön that had originally begun as the side project Rymdimperiet in 1981, Imperiet made their album debut in 1983 with Rasera. Over the course of its five-year existence, the band released several full-length follow-ups, Blå Himlen Blues (1985), 2:a Augusti 1985 (1985), Synd (1986), and Tiggarens Tal (1998), all of which were Top Ten hits. There were numerous Top Ten hit singles for the band as well. Following the dissolution of Imperiet in 1988, Thåström embarked on a solo career as a singer/songwriter with a wide-ranging musical style that varied from album to album. He made his full-length solo debut in 1989 with the eponymous album Thåström, followed by Xplodera Mig 2000 in 1991. While these initial couple albums proved popular, charting at numbers four and six, respectively, Thåström put his solo career aside for several years and founded yet another band, Peace Love & Pitbulls, an industrial rock project. In existence from 1992 to 1997, the band released three albums that proved fairly successful from a commercial standpoint: Peace Love & Pitbulls (1992), Red Sonic Underwear (1994), and 3 (1997). Upon resuming his solo career as a singer/songwriter, Thåström topped the albums chart with Det Är Ni Som E Dom Konstiga, Det Är Jag Som E Normal (1999), the most successful full-length release of his career to date. The follow-up albums Mannen Som Blev En Gris (2002), Skebokvarnsv. 209 (2005), and Kärlek Är For Dom (2009) were similarly popular, hitting the uppermost reaches of the charts and spawning smash hit singles such as “Fanfanfan.” ~ Jason Birchmeier