The Bear Quartet is an indie rock group from Luleå in northern Sweden. They have been playing since 1989 and making records at a steady rate since 1992, always getting great reviews but never selling much.
The Bear Quartet are Mattias Alkberg on vocals and guitar, Jari Haapalainen on guitar, Peter Nuottaniemi on bass guitar, Jejo Perkovic on drums and Carl Olsson on keyboards. Peter and Mattias write the lyrics, Mattias, Jari and Carl write the music.|The Bear Quartet have spawned many side projects, they can almost be seen as the “hub” of Swedish pop music. Mattias sings and plays in Mattias Alkberg BD, whose debut album Tunaskolan released in 2004 was very well received by the critics and audience. Punk in Swedish. Jari produces lots of other artists, such as Nicolai Dunger, Ed Harcourt, Kristofer Åström, The Concretes and Frida Hyvönen, and plays with Maria from The Concretes in Heikki. Carl has Paddington DC, some kind of noise electro pop.
The name “Bear Quartet” is taken from Klas Östergrens book Gentlemen.|The album titles follow an interesting naming scheme: every title is two words, of which the first ends with a “y”.|All albums are released on Skellefteå-based independent label A West Side Fabrication. |
