History
How it all started
Naughty Boys was formed 1989 in Hagfors - Sweden under a lunchbreak at school by Mikael Persson and Morgan Sjöberg. Said and done, we started to practise a couple of days after that, and started to write songs directly, but I have to be honest, we did not sound so well back then... The first line up 1989-1990 was: Mikael Persson - Vocals, Morgan Sjöberg - Keyboard, Peter Sandberg - Bas Jim Rådman - Drums and Jan-Erik Sjö - Guitar
Shortly Erik Rautiainen joined the band on lead guitar and we got our first gig at a private party in "Hembyggdsgården" in Hagfors. Second line up 1990 was: Mikael Persson - Vocals, Morgan Sjöberg - Keyboard, Peter Sandberg - Bas, Jim Rådman - Drums, Jan-Erik Sjö - Guitar and Erik Rautiainen - Guitar.
Soon after that gig Erik left the band (for the first time) and we continued with just Jan-Erik on guitar. We decided that we should record our first demo, said and done, on a 4-track tape recorder we recorded the songs: Fallen Angel and In The Middle Of The Night. In late autumn 1990 Jan-Erik quited the band, and Erik R joined us for the second time. We joined a rock contest in Hagfors called “Rock Jonte” and we won the qualification - Best live act, and that gave us a ticket to the final. I remember that we rehearsed and rehearsed for that gig. We knew that the judges on the contest almost hated us, but we did not care, the fans loved us !! The final went as the qualification, we won the price for best live act again !!! The third line up 1991-1992 was: Mikael Persson - Vocals, Morgan Sjöberg - Keyboard, Peter Sandberg - Bas Jim Rådman - Drums and Erik Rautiainen - Guitar.
In early 1992
Erik left the band (for the last time) and Hans Olsson from the local band Rockio joined us. With Hasse in the band, we started to arrange the music better and it became more guitar heavy. We played a couple of gigs, biggest gig must be as support act to the Norweigan band Return or in "Rock Runt Riket" med Adam Alsing (Known as the program leader of the soap opera tv show Big Brother in sweden) Fourth line up 1992 was: Mikael Persson - Vocals, Morgan Sjöberg - Keyboard, Peter Sandberg - Bas Jim Rådman - Drums, Hans Olsson - Guitar
Soon after that Jim left the band and Jonas Ludwigsson also from Rockio joined. During that, the line up became as it should be for 10 years. Third line up 1992-2004 Mikael Persson - Vocals, Morgan Sjöberg - Keyboard, Peter Sandberg - Bas Hans Olsson – Guitar and Jonas Ludwigsson – Drums.
We joined the “Rock Jonte” contest the year after and won bouth qualification and final, we started to get a romour as a partyband on stage and we decided to go to the studio to record a demo for the first time, the demo was 3 songs: Stranger In No-mans Land, Desperate Man and Crazy And Wild. The sound was quite ok, but very flat .... a lot of people liked it anyway and we went back to the studio almost right away to record a 5 track cd. Summer 1993 the cd was released with the track list: Fallen Angel, Love For A Lifetime, Straight From My Heart, Stay The Night and Believe In You. The recording session also included a few songs that never made it to the cd, the songs where: Join Our Party (who should have been on the record) and Shattered Dreams.
The album was very well recieved both by media and fans. We where played several times on the radio station P4 and the songs Straight From My Heart and Fallen Angel was on the P4 chart “Värmlandstoppen” Soon after that we where interviewed on the national radio station P3 “Garage and Buskage” and also one TV apperiance at TV4. The summer of 1993 was quite busy, we played live alot, mostly as support act to bigger bands. The best gig that summer without any doubt must be at “Eldfesten” in front of 3500 people !! who could every word of our songs !!!! I think 7-8 different record labels came back to us and wanted to give out the music, but it all failed in some strange way exept for MegaRock Records who distibuted us in 8-9 countrys. But later that autumn something happend, we wasn't so hungry anymore, did not play as much as we should do, maybe the interest vanished, I do not know ?? and in 1994 the band quited to what I thought forever ......... But I was wrong ........
In 2001
We started to go through all the tapes of live and studio material that's been recorded, some new written songs that we only have been played live just before we split. I almost right away came up with an idea of making a album, a live, studio, demo album. When I have gone through all the tapes I started choose which songs who should be included. After 2 weeks the album Demo Anthology was finished. It included these songs: Stranger In No Mans Land, Desperate Man (Live), Join Our Paty, Fallen Angel (unplugged), Crazy And Wild, Is This Love (New song-Live) Every Rose Has Its Thorn (Poison Cover - Live), Shattered Dreams, Straight From My Heart, Crazy World (New Song-Live), Stay The Night, Sing Me A Song (Return Cover - Live), Fallen Angel, Join Our Party (Live), Desperate Man, Queen Of The Night (New Song-Live), Love For a Lifetime, Stay (New Song-Live), Believe In You. In late autumn 2002 I got a call from Jonas, and we started “really loose” to talk about a reunion, just one gig to celebrate that it was ten years then we released our first cd. He had heard that alot of people still talked about our songs, used to play them at partys and so on ... "I must admit that the idea has been in my head sometimes, but I never did anything about it", but when I talked first to Jonas, and then with the others it all seemed to be the right thing to do, we all wanted to do that, they all have been thought about it, but of some stupid reson non of us ever did anything, until now ! So at least when we all gatherd for the first time in 10 years to rehearse, I remember it so well, we just took up our instruments and started to play, just as we never stopped.
I heared right away that the sound was a better than ever and a little bit heavyer, we decieded right away that we should continue rehearsing, write new music just for the fun of it. But after a couple of weeks we contacted a local arranger, we told him about our plan about the reunion gig and he booked us right away. The 29th November 2003 should the reunion take place at Folkets Hus in Hagfors. We started to play new written songs and a new type of sound was growing, heavyer, more up to date. We decieded "I think" in April 2003 that we should go in to the studio and make a new recording, a cd with great sound and great songs, both for ourself and to let the fans and world know that we where back in bussiness.
In august 2003 we started to record the 3 songs: I Will, Believe and Crazy World. For the mini album X ( Ten) The songs where recorded at Starra studios and mastered and produced by Per Thörne at Greengate Production in Hagfors. One week before the reunion gig we released it ! The cd was recieved great, especialy by the fans, we sold out the first press of the cd in just one day, and the news paper Värmlands Folkblad had us on ALONE on the the newsbill, and a whole page inside with four colour photos and an interview. We just couldn't believe our eyes, how could it be such a storm for a band who hasn't done anything for 10 years ? Then the reunion gig .... We sold out the place, It was crazy ! They crowd could every word in the songs, 110% party !!! I think I speak for all of us when I say it was one our best Rock Nights ever ! The responce was increadible, one of the things I remember best is that during the extra number, in Fallen Angel, they broke the crowd control barrier !!!! and I have to climb up on the drum platform, just so they whouldn't drag me right out to the crowd. Well to end this story, “who I meant should be quite short” is that after new year 2003-2004 we did not know what we should do, should we continue or should we “as we meant” quit ? Well we decided to continue, and in february 2004 we went back into the studio to record 2 new songs: Stay Forever, Stay Tonight and Learn To Fly. But then Peter left the band and Hans went ill (to much work) so we had to take a break, just a couple of months to wait and see if we still wanted to continue.
So what will happend next ? well I do not really know, but I hope it will be as we planed, in that case we will continue play because the fun of it and make that full album that I hope will be out early 2005 and I promise you, It will be a killer !! ;-)
So till' then, Rock On !!!
Mikael, Morgan, Jonas, Hans - Naughty Boys
Text by Mikael