Europe count down to Birmingham again

It will be almost exactly a year to the day since they last played there that Swedish rockers Europe hit the stage again at Birmingham Academy next month.

Last year the band, still famed for their 1986 breakthrough hit The Final Countdown, performed there on February 19, this time they will play the Academy on February 18.

Singer Joey Tempest is in sparkling form as he chats about the latest tour which sees the band still promoting 2009's fine Last Look At Eden album and looks ahead to work starting on its follow up.

"The amazing thing is we're still touring Last Look At Eden," he says.

"We've done around 100 shows for that album. It's just been so nice that this album has been welcomed, especially in the UK, critically and by fans. And we're just working that album still.

"And this year we're working and recording. We're going into the studio in the autumn, so we'll be doing writing and recording as well and some more touring even."

In a year that saw them perform at many festivals around Europe, the band has been taking photographers and film crews on tour to chronicle the rebirth of the band.

"We've recorded a lot of stuff, we've been filming stuff and taking photographers on the road. So we're all working on things for the fans. We're going through all the material and there's a lot of stuff."

Joey adds: "Both iTunes and Sonisphere festivals were big highlights because we do still think it's a special thing to tour the UK and when we do these big festivals it's fantastic for us. If you do it well – we were lucky enough to do a good gig and it came across well - it really helps.

"Rock fans, they seem to stick together, they know what's going on. And journalists and rock fans in the UK love their music and their job and everything – if they find something they'll tell the next guy."

Joey has also been getting extra exposure to British rock fans with his weekly Sunday programme on the Planet Rock radio station.

"It's been really good. I was at first shocked because they let me play exactly what I wanted. When I came they blocked me in for a test run and they let me do what I wanted to do and play the songs I wanted to play and they've not yet told me not to play a song!"

"I think sometimes in the UK, there are so many people here and people may not know about me but maybe this way they'll say 'Hey, he's just a guy from Stockholm, he knows a bit about rock music.

"It's a new area for me. When they said you can play what you want, I thought 'Oh great' and I started looking through my record collection and thought 'What did we listen to in the band? On the tour bus what did we do? What influences? What made us the band we are today?'

"It's sort of been a journey now, I've done 11 shows now and finding all these songs and calling up all my mates and saying do you have this song because I don't have it and Planet Rock don't have that particular one.

"There's a big search going on but it's fun though, to rediscover tracks and you realise how you wrote the music you wrote and the music you used to listen to. It's a great, great feeling to share and it's a different thing playing it for yourself . . . as soon as you get another person or a big crowd listening to it with you it's a different experience."

As a teenager living near Stockholm – he is now based in London - as well as discovering Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Thin Lizzy and UFO, Joey was influenced by the likes of David Bowie and Elton John and, like them he dreamed up a stage name that he would carry forward to fame, something with a superhero ring to it.

Born Rolf Magnus Joakim Larsson, he was known as Joakim Larsson, until a family trip to the USA when he was about 12 where the hotel staff Americanised his name.

"My parents brought me to the US when we were kids and I tried to introduce myself as Joakim to people in the hotel. I tried to say Joakim but they called me Joe or Joey as a nickname and I thought 'I must remember that'.

"Then at school I used to sneak out to the library, I was about 15, 16 and I'd sneak to the library, reading NME and also looking at the book jackets. I remember seeing Shakespeare's The Tempest and I thought 'Joey Tempest'!

He adds: "I think it was the last generation of people who used stage names. You look at Elton John or David Bowie or Bono or Edge – a lot of people did it but not many people do it now. It was probably the last generation trying to dream up a character, if you like.

"I was there sitting and practising my autograph at school, dreaming up lyrics and in my spare time I was teaming up with (Europe guitarist) John Norum trying to plan our songs."

* Europe play Birmingham Academy on Friday, February 18, 2011. Tickets cost £17.50 plus booking fees.

Interview and photos by Ian Harvey