Emerging from beneath the crumbling rubble of a long-abandoned Stockholm mental institution, Frusen Sorg – which translates to “Frozen Grief” – has forged a debut EP that’s as harrowing as it is cathartic.
Released worldwide on July 25th via Fiadh Productions/Void Sound, Jag Springer Med Avbrutna Ben channels raw emotion into a torrent of blackened punk that shuns civility and embraces chaos.
“We aim to tap into the most painful corners of our minds – the ugly, weak, and rotten places that have no real place in modern life,” explains guitarist/drummer Martin Sandström. “There is power, strength, and an awful beauty there. We bring it to the surface and record it, as it’s a valid but neglected part of us. It’s very personal, even private, but we also do it to share it with others. It’s a very human thing to do.”
Formed in 2024, Sandström (Stiu Nu Stiu, Möuth, Jeniferever, Literature) and bassist/vocalist Kalle Mattsson (Stiu Nu Stiu, Literature) are regulars amidst the darkened realms of extreme punk noise. As is evident on their latest single, ‘En Kall Famn’, an aural storm of broken rage, grief, and trauma, erupting through scorched vocals and relentless instrumentation.
“‘En Kall Famn’ means ‘A Cold Embrace’ in Swedish. It’s about being so used to suffering and depression that it starts to feel like a safe space. The anxiety can become a way to hide from whatever is haunting you. A prison that keeps you busy, excuses you from society and life itself. Comfort in pain, basically. It’s weird, and dangerous.”
To find out more about the Frusen Sorg and Jag Springer Med Avbrutna Ben we asked the band about their influences…
Entombed – Wolverine Blues
Martin: This record came out when I was a young teenager and I have listened and loved it ever since. In a way it’s the departure from their typical Stockholm sound of death metal and something some called death ‘n’ roll which I think kind of makes sense for some of the tracks on it. The riffs are often fast and death metal-like but there is more groove to it, and I must say more ‘fun’ to it. The opener ‘Eyemaster’ and the track ‘Contempt’ might be my favourites. The producer and sound magician Tomas Skogsberg and his legendary Sunlight studio played (and still play) a huge part in making records like this one sound the way they do. I’ve had the privilege to record two albums with two separate bands in his studio which nowadays is in the countryside by the coast, and it’s been brilliant. To get to see LG- Petrov (RIP) joining Converge on stage for their cover of the title track a couple of years ago was powerful. I can’t count how many times I saw Entombed live in the 90s and early 00s.
Breach – It’s Me God
Kalle: Rumour has it that the guys in Breach heard the post-rock godfathers Slint’s album Spiderland and tried to make hardcore in that vein. It might just be a legend, but it does make sense in the way it stood out completely from the rest of the northern Sweden hardcore boom of the 90s. The same movement that produced Refused and hundreds of other bands. There is something so impossibly perfect about this record. Every sound sort of explodes at you but it’s also strangely sparse, it’s so condensed and to the point, but also loose and odd. I haven’t found any record ever that tops this one in vibe, content and execution. I think it’s one of those things you can’t choose to make; it just needs to happen when some factors align. It’s like a bug in the system, a fluke, a lucky mutation. ‘Replenish the Empty’ and ‘Vaild’ are always playing somewhere in my mind, it’s ingrained in my DNA at this point. You should really listen to this album and see if it hits you the same way.
Sonic Youth – Goo
Kalle: No one else seems to hear it in our music, but in some way, Sonic Youth have guided us in every band Martin and I have had together since the mid 90s. There’s a lot to unpack with Sonic Youth, they combine elements which kind of shouldn’t fit, they’re loose and precise, it’s deranged but also silly, there are beautiful melodies and completely atonal noise. Sometimes at the same time. Unbelievable. ‘Tunic’ is the only song that always pulls me in, no matter what mood I’m in. If I had to pick one song to listen to for the rest of my life (I’ve thought about this surprisingly often) it would be this one. Or ‘Futurism Vs Passeism (Part 1)’ by Blonde Redhead, but that’s for another list.
Martin: I got this record in the autumn when I was about seventeen, so it’s still a very autumnal album for me. There’s a coldness to it that I like. The production is smoother than most of their earlier records, but the noise is still there and there’s almost a mysticism to it. The song ‘Mote’ is a track that I think has influenced a lot of bands or at least I can hear it in them. ‘Disappearer’ is probably my favourite track as I can never get tired of it.
