In 1963, two friends from the
military service, Lennart Hegland and
Christer Petterson formed
what later would become the Swedish
popgroup "The Hep Stars". At the same
time, the organist
Hans Östlund joined the band and later
also the guitarist and singer Janne
Frisk. At this time,
they called the band "Quartet Yep" and
played mainly decent restaurant music.
After Janne
joined, rock'n roll slowly grew in the
band's repertoire, and it didn't take
long before they realized
that "Quartet Yep" had to be replaced.
Janne came with the idea "The Hep Stars"
which was rapidly
accepted by the other band members. The
name change also pointed on the band's
new musical
approach, from mediocre folk dance to
refined rock.
During the preparations for a gig
at Rörstands youth recreation centre,
Janne was absent for a
side job, a tour in Norrland together
with accordion player Erik Frank. Svenne
Hedlund, singer in
Clifftones, was requested to reinforce
the band and sing a few songs. He
accepted and his
presence in the band whet the appetite.
Lennart soon realized that The Hep Stars
would benefit
from having Svenne with the band, in
addition to their lead vocalist Janne,
and soon Svenne left
the band Clifftones to become a
permanent member of growing The Hep
Stars.
After pressure from Lennart, Åke
Gerhard, a music producer, songwriter
and owner of the label
Olga, became the manager of the band. An
experienced and stable man from the
north of
Sweden with valueable contacts in the
branch would, with some hestitation,
release the Hep Stars
as a rock group and finance their first
record, Kana Kapila. The single, with a
terrible cover showing
Svenne in a cannibal pot, didn't succeed.
The only appearence received was a small
press item in
the Swedish paper Bildjournalen.
Hans Östlund left the band in
1964 and was replaced by Benny
Andersson, organist from
"Elverkets Spelmanslag". The Hep Stars
was now complete and had finally
received enough
attention to be able to work as
musicians full-time. Their energic pop
music would eventually
become a remarkable success within the
youth generation. |
Saturday, the 17th of April 1965,
must be considered as a historic
date in the group's career. The Hep
Stars had acomplished
something that no band ever had done
before, they had three
songs on the Swedish Top10 chart
at the same time. In a time
when British pop music dominated,
world-wide. Their spectacular
appearance in the TV-show "Drop In" with
the song "Cadillac",
on the 23rd of March 1965 opened the way
for a breakthrough.
Cadillac was voted on the first place on
the Top10 chart. Farmer
John made it to the fourth place, and A
tribute to Buddy Holly,
which was previously on the list, moved
up to the eight place.
As The Hepstars grew even more
successful, it became the most commonly
requested band in
the people's amusement parks. When
Lennart "Felle" Fernholm (the sixth
member of the band
and tour leader) introduced the band for
a fanatic audience, in a park somewhere
in Sweden at
the year of 1965, the gig was
characterized by, in the Swedish pop
history, unparalleled hysteric
idolatry. The Hepstars dominated Swedish
music market and charts the following
years.
The Hepstars musical development
during the later part of the sixties
would split the fans in
two groups - the disconsolated and those
with unbounded happyness. With their own
record
company, planned movie release and other
business activities their financial
problems grew
bigger and bigger every day and The
Hepstars disbanded during the end of the
sixties. The
final concert was held in
Kungsträdgården, Stockholm, late summer
1969 with an audience of
thousands of fans. The successful story
of The Hepstars had ended. Around the
corner was
the seventies, a decade with plenty of
challenges and success for some of the
band members.
1965 was probably the greatest
year for The Hep Stars. Cadillac, the
break through song for the
band, became synonymous with the whole
career of the group, from 1964 and ahead.
The fine
cover photo by Norwegian photographer
Robert Meyers, for the first LP, shows a
hungry band of
the sixties, who was to write several
pages in the Swedish music history.
Perhaps thanks to a
...Cadillac. |
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