Review Fix chats with Ask Carol’s Ask T. Borgen, who discusses the band’s origin, goals and plans for 2020.
Review Fix: How did the project start?
Ask T. Borgen: We, Ask and Carol, the two members of Ask Carol, became friends right after high school, when studying music in southern Norway. We were always talking about starting a band, but it would take about 7 years before we finally went through with the idea. The summer of 2015 we stayed at a cabin in the Norwegian mountains, with no electricity and no water, far away from people and civilization, only a few sheep outside the windows. That’s where our first songs were made, and where the seed to what would become Ask Carol started. One more year went by before we started for real, and Ask Carol was officially born, in 2016. Our first concert ever was at a small blues club in Seoul, South Korea, called Strange Fruit. At that point, Carol was already a somewhat known guitarist-for-hire in the Oslo music scene, and had never ever sung in front of people before, or at all for that matter. That’s why we wanted to try out our music and hold our first concerts far away from our hometown.
After thinking hard and long about the band name, with many pretty good suggestions, we ended up with the simple band name Ask Carol, the first names of our two members, Ask and Carol, put together. Ask is a real Norwegian name, coming from Norse Mythology, the Viking religion; Ask was the first human being, created by the God Odin, out of a piece of Ash-wood. You can read all about that story here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ask_and_Embla
Review Fix: What’s your creative process like?
Borgen: We write songs together, and we also produce together. More often than not, they tend to be about going your own way and doing things without caring what others think, the haters and stuff. Usually, we don’t think too much about exactly what the songs should be about, and instead let it come to us naturally.
Review Fix: What’s your standout song? How was it written?
Borgen: One of our first songs, which has become kind of our theme song, is «Gonna Do It». It’s not necessarily our best song, but up until now, it has always been the last song in our live set. It was also the first song we released ever, and the first we ever wrote together. It was an idea Carol for a chorus, and a guitar riff idea from Ask, put together, and through a lot of changes it ended up being «Gonna Do It». That was our thoughts at the time, and it still is.
Review Fix: What are your goals for 2020?
Borgen: Our main goals for 2020 is to 1) release our debut album, on both vinyl and CD (and of course digital) and 2) Do our first US tour.
Of course, we’re gonna do a lot of other stuff, but that’s our two big, and most important, goals.
Review Fix: How do you want your music to affect people?
Borgen: If our music could be on the soundtrack to people’s lives, mean something to them, help them through a difficult time. Make them forget the stress and worries of everyday life. That would make us happy.
Review Fix: What’s next?
Borgen: Next up is a short tour in the Philippines in February, and a new single to be released in Feb/March.
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