Kahsay

When I was fourteen years old, I played ice hockey and invested in it as a future opportunity for careers, beers and hot women. But then on an icy day in January, between the hits and the jabs that an unexpectedly tall teenager unprovokedly gave me, I found myself lying on the ice with blood running wondering if there was no easier way to women’s hearts than this. So I went home and saw the guitar hang on the wall and I could hear it say to me ” Why not try to be a rockstar?”.

I called up my good childhood friend Johan and we started a rockband called The Invaders. These were the times when none of us could play any instruments. I remember the first time we got the group together we sat down and draw the stages and the directions that the spot where supposed to shine.

I started out as a bass-player and we wrote some songs and played live for the first time after a couple of weeks rehearsal. After a couple of months the guitar player quitted and I switched to guitar and became a singing guitar player. I never really liked to play the bass. We played like this for 4 years. 

After the Invaders split up I started a band called Stockholm Dolls. We had my dear friend childhood friend Maria on the drums and I think we had one gig and then I quitted the band.

Back in Sept 1985 I got a phone call and that was a drummer called Paul and he asked me if I wanted to play rhythm-guitar with them. The name of that band was Scabby Hyenas. I joined and played with them for a year and then I quitted. I got myself a full time jobb, girlfriend and decided to call it a day.  

This was also the time when I gradually shifted focus from rock to more funky orientated music. I have begun to listen to Prince, Rick James, Cameo that all hugely impacted me.

In December 1986 I received a call from a guy who I gave my phone number to in a cab when I was on my way home from club hopping. This was Stu who had been seeing me performing with The Invaders back in the days. He himself used to play guitar in a band called The Weed. These guys could play some hard serious rock! He asked me if I wanted to sing in a funk band that he was going to start.

In February 1987 I became a full time member in SAY What as the lead singer. We had BJ on bass, Stu on guitar, Jake on keyboard, Fredrik on drums and me on vocal. We got a girl called Mio on background, (actually she replaced me as a lead singer cause I went to the States for six months without telling the band and when I came home I was fired).

During this period they played at the Hard Rock Café in Stockholm and that is the only gig that I missed) and Daddy Dee on percussion. Our aim was to play some original funk and not covers like all the other band did in Sweden. 1990 we won a nationwide contest and recorded a single.

In the same time me and Johan from the Invaders period started a studio project that we named The Boobie Brothers. It was most a fun idea to try to write some hip-hop oriented rock, pop songs that we had. To our surprise a major label showed some interest in the material and we did two songs on a compilation called Swedish Rock Graffiti.

We had over 17 people coming and going through a 10 year period of time and finally the band (SAY What) splitted. We did the last gig in June the 6th 1997.

In 1992 I started to collaborate with a guitar player that I had been knowing for a couple of years. He is in my opinon the best guitar player from Eritrea. We started to write some songs for singers from Eritrea and record them. It came singers from USA, Germany, Holland, Eritrea to Sweden for they wanted us to write and produce the music for them. It was a new experience and I learned a lot in arranging songs. I played guitar, bass and keyboard in three band simultaneously, one of them was MHRS.

These years really made me realize that it was music that I want do. So in september 1993 I quitted my job and went in Backbeat Studio. The owner was a DJ that I met when we was recording for a TV-show in 1991. He asked me if I wanted to help him out in the studio. That I think is the best choice that I ever made. It took me three months to understand how the mixer, computer, tape-recorder, effects and the keyboards worked.

The first song I wrote completely by myself in that studio was a song called “I’m Loaded”. It’s a song that most of my friend label as a mid-eighty-funk-warning. Like I care. I like it and that’s good enough for me.

The third song I wrote was ” Turn Me On” and that was the song who got me a record deal with Stockholm Records. The producer was the late Denniz Pop and Max Martin. In 1997 that song climbed the charts up to number 20 on the Swedish single list. During 1997 I spent my time in EZ-Studios working day and night with D. Papalexis and Rami Yacoub recording my first solo album.

In 2004 we started the band SAY What again this time under the name SAY What Sthlm. To this day the band still jams and write some new material. I have myself started to publish and release songs again after a couple of years of hiatus in the family life segment. I have since 2016 written, produced and released 2 albums and several songs. 

When I was fourteen years old, I played ice hockey and invested in it as a future opportunity for careers, beers and hot women. But then on an icy day in January, between the hits and the jabs that an unexpectedly tall teenager unprovokedly gave me, I found myself lying on the ice with blood running wondering if there was no easier way to women’s hearts than this. So I went home and saw the guitar hang on the wall and I could hear it say to me ” Why not try to be a rockstar?”.

I called up my good childhood friend Johan and we started a rockband called The Invaders. These were the times when none of us could play any instruments. I remember the first time we got the group together we sat down and draw the stages and the directions that the spot where supposed to shine.

I started out as a bass-player and we wrote some songs and played live for the first time after a couple of weeks rehearsal. After a couple of months the guitar player quitted and I switched to guitar and became a singing guitar player. I never really liked to play the bass. We played like this for 4 years. 

After the Invaders split up I started a band called Stockholm Dolls. We had my dear friend childhood friend Maria on the drums and I think we had one gig and then I quitted the band.

Back in Sept 1985 I got a phone call and that was a drummer called Paul and he asked me if I wanted to play rhythm-guitar with them. The name of that band was Scabby Hyenas. I joined and played with them for a year and then I quitted. I got myself a full time jobb, girlfriend and decided to call it a day.  

This was also the time when I gradually shifted focus from rock to more funky orientated music. I have begun to listen to Prince, Rick James, Cameo that all hugely impacted me.

In December 1986 I received a call from a guy who I gave my phone number to in a cab when I was on my way home from club hopping. This was Stu who had been seeing me performing with The Invaders back in the days. He himself used to play guitar in a band called The Weed. These guys could play some hard serious rock! He asked me if I wanted to sing in a funk band that he was going to start.

In February 1987 I became a full time member in SAY What as the lead singer. We had BJ on bass, Stu on guitar, Jake on keyboard, Fredrik on drums and me on vocal. We got a girl called Mio on background, (actually she replaced me as a lead singer cause I went to the States for six months without telling the band and when I came home I was fired).

During this period they played at the Hard Rock Café in Stockholm and that is the only gig that I missed) and Daddy Dee on percussion. Our aim was to play some original funk and not covers like all the other band did in Sweden. 1990 we won a nationwide contest and recorded a single.

In the same time me and Johan from the Invaders period started a studio project that we named The Boobie Brothers. It was most a fun idea to try to write some hip-hop oriented rock, pop songs that we had. To our surprise a major label showed some interest in the material and we did two songs on a compilation called Swedish Rock Graffiti.

We had over 17 people coming and going through a 10 year period of time and finally the band (SAY What) splitted. We did the last gig in June the 6th 1997.

In 1992 I started to collaborate with a guitar player that I had been knowing for a couple of years. He is in my opinon the best guitar player from Eritrea. We started to write some songs for singers from Eritrea and record them. It came singers from USA, Germany, Holland, Eritrea to Sweden for they wanted us to write and produce the music for them. It was a new experience and I learned a lot in arranging songs. I played guitar, bass and keyboard in three band simultaneously, one of them was MHRS.

These years really made me realize that it was music that I want do. So in september 1993 I quitted my job and went in Backbeat Studio. The owner was a DJ that I met when we was recording for a TV-show in 1991. He asked me if I wanted to help him out in the studio. That I think is the best choice that I ever made. It took me three months to understand how the mixer, computer, tape-recorder, effects and the keyboards worked.

The first song I wrote completely by myself in that studio was a song called “I’m Loaded”. It’s a song that most of my friend label as a mid-eighty-funk-warning. Like I care. I like it and that’s good enough for me.

The third song I wrote was ” Turn Me On” and that was the song who got me a record deal with Stockholm Records. The producer was the late Denniz Pop and Max Martin. In 1997 that song climbed the charts up to number 20 on the Swedish single list. During 1997 I spent my time in EZ-Studios working day and night with D. Papalexis and Rami Yacoub recording my first solo album.

In 2004 we started the band SAY What again this time under the name SAY What Sthlm. To this day the band still jams and write some new material. I have myself started to publish and release songs again after a couple of years of hiatus in the family life segment. I have since 2016 written, produced and released 2 albums and several songs.