History The Ruling Class

Until Tomas Kubowicz , that is. The Swedish guitarist and songwriter was living in his native Norrköping when, years after it had first come and gone, he heard this music for the first time. "Sweden is, musically, quite Anglo-inspired; many of my friends listened to this kind of music, and that's the way I got hooked on it," he recalls. "Stone Roses was kind of an introduction - I never had any high thoughts of their debut album when I first listened to it, but when I picked up the album again a couple years later and had a listen, it totally exploded. It's a masterpiece. I've never left them since."

In 2005, Tomas relocated to Stockholm, where he met bassist Anton Lindberg. Unable to find simpatico bandmates after a year of searching, the pair moved to London in summer of 2006. "We struggled quite hard to find the right people," says Tomas. "The music we had to offer was [perceived as] being a bit uncool in London, which was more into post-punk, thousands of sub-Libertines and Arctic Monkey bands, and also the nu-rave scene was at its peak. But I never was disheartened by it, and just continued to write songs."

Eventually, however, they found drummer Alfonso Tammaro, and the newly solidified trio (with Tomas also providing vocals) quickly made an impression upon producer Mark Wallis, who has worked with the Smiths, the La's, the Go-Betweens, and many others. Also whilst in London the trio found Jonathan Sutcliffe (main vocals) and Andrew Needle (rhythm guitar). The fruits of the band's sessions with Mark make up their official debut, Tour de Force, a limited-edition CD/7-inch released by Shelflife Records.

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