David Sandström

Backengrillen is coming to town. On Friday we play @acolossalweekendcph in Copenhagen. On Saturday we return to Stockholm and @kollektivetlivet_bar @stadsgardsterminalen It’s going to be a wild evening together with @kriget.official and @isotope_soap There’s still tickets left. Come on down and hang out.

Final Exit, Umeå 2007.

Backengrillen is heading out on the road to play some rock’n roll. Or at least improvise our way through some doom jazz noise music. Hope to see you there.

Backengrillen + Kriget + Isotope Soap kommer till Kollektivet Livet den 9 maj! Backengrillen kallar sig kvartetten vars programförklaring utlovar ”antifascistisk friformsdödsJazz”! För er icke redan invigda, backengrillen är en RYKANDE färsk ensamble. En ensamble som måste klassas som någon typ av supergrupp? Med rötter i HC, punk, noise och frijazz. Alla medlemmar kommer från Umeå. Såklart. Tre av medlemmarna har dessutom rötter i originaluppsättningen av Refused! Med en stadig men varierad bakgrund i kreativiteten hos Refused, TEXT, INVSN, Fire! Orchestra, The International Noise Conspiracy, The End, Serpent, The Thing, Final Exit och andra klassiska jazzkonstellationer påbörjas en ny resa: fyra lok som kolliderar och skapar en ny form av skönhet och energi!!! Special guests för kvällen blir inga mindre än Kriget och Isotope Soap! SNÄLLA NI, det här vill ni inte missa! Biljetter ute nu på kollektivetlivet.se

Experimental, avantgarde, new music, free form, modern classical, whatever you want to call it, sank it's teeth in my cerebellum sometime in late 1990. Coming from the metal/punk underground it was fascinating to discover that gifted and classically schooled musicians also had a flair for the grotesque, violent, ugly, furious, dissonant and absurd. I had had the good fortune to discover both Captain Beefheart and John Zorn in my mid-teens and before my teens were over everything from The No New York-compilation, Einsturzende Neubauten, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Ikue Mori, Swans, Glenn Branca, The Residents, Anton Webern, Can, Ornette Coleman, Diamanda Galás, Alfred Schnittke, The Kronos Quartet, John Cage, Pere Ubu and The Butthole Surfers had been revealed to me. What had prepared me to embrace these strange and novel sounds was the attitude with which I had approached playing music to begin with. The very first time I was in a rehearsal space, me and my friend @lapis_niger_productions just improvised for an hour, and it wasn't until several weeks later that we were capable of reproducing anything resembling an organized song. So the wild, the free, the unexpected was where we came from and however organized our respective musics became in different periods, both of us have always kept one foot in the fantastical. Metal was my first love, specifically the metal known as death, and when I discovered non-metal musicians exploring the same timbres and sounds as the maniacs in Morbid Angel, Carcass and Entombed, I was thunderstruck. Very different breeds of musicians were drawn to this crossroads: punk and alternative musicians taking the abrasive and provocative aspects of their respective subgenre further than previously attempted; jazz people playing scholarly chaotic metal/punk from sheet music; cool, downtown NY rockers experimenting with anti-rock sentiments and, famously: members of the esperanto-speaking, brutally suppressed japanese oomoto religion making "music" that was barely visible from the fringes of the western avant-garde. A very fertile intersection in any case, that brought us Naked City, Last Exit, Ruins, Boredoms ...

BACKENGRILLEN’s death-jazz debut album out today via Svart Records ⚫️ ”Music and art without definite labels is a necessity for a better living - create your own individual genres and open up for more death-jazz-core-noise-metal-poetry to enter your world of destroying the local and global stupidities around us” -Mats Gustafsson ”We really hope this slab of stupid, violent death rock will ruin someone’s day. Haha.” -David Sandström Backengrillen is a new ensemble with their roots in HC, punk, noise and free Jazz. All members from Umeå, with roots in the original version of Refused – and one with starting points in the jazz-rock ensemble Nirvana (1980). With a solid and yet varied background in the creativities of Refused, TEXT, INVSN, Fire Orchestra, The International Noise Conspiracy, The End, Serpent, The Thing, Final Exit and other classic jazz combos we will now start our journey of 4 colliding locomotives, creating a new form of beauty and energy. Anti-fascist, anti-racists, free form Death Jazz – in the memory of Lars Lystedt – Backengrillen arrives with new perspectives on jazz. And punk. In-your-face HC jazz inspired by The Cramps, Little Richard, Albert Ayler, Polly Bradfield, Entombed, John Zorn, Misfits, Stooges, Lars Gullin, Can and much more. Backengrillen’s self-titled debut album is today, January 23rd, 2026 on vinyl, CD, and digitally on Bandcamp via Svart Records. Backengrillen is: Dennis Lyxzén – vocal and effects Mats Gustafsson – saxophones, flutes and live electronics Magnus Flagge – bass David Sandström – drums and electronics

Listening to @toneloki best of 25 (he's always a safe bet) and contemplating the years: the coming ones, the ones we just left behind, some older years, good and bad, a few that almost killed me, some where things changed for the better — they were good ones — and love, the joy and the fear of love, the unconditional, the lost and the newfound, and pain of course, the inherited and the diy variety. It's my birthday, I spent it with my wife and daughters, apart from a therapy session where I talked about the band for the first time. Been having stress dreams about Refused. Mostly I'm back in the old days, trying to get the band to where i want it and having tons of shows and no material and the gear breaks down and for some reason i can't fix any of it. I texted Kristofer and he got it right away. He used to have them too. Several years after the band broke up me and him would still wake up in a panic over some imagined catastrophy on stage or in the van somewhere in Europe. Says alot about how we functioned as a band, or didn't function, malfunctioned, dysfunctioned? Either way, it seems fitting I'd get a few flashbacks now that it's all over. I'm very happy. Very tired, but happy. We did it, and we did it the way we wanted to, planned to. From the first night of the US tour in DC to the very last night in Umeå, we managed to cross paths or reconnect with all the most important people in the history of our band, one last time (if i start naming them here I won't get my beauty sleep tonight, and i managed to tell most of you what you meant to us face to face). But it was a year of joy, of insane shows, of community and deep, old friendships, and I'm a better dude for having lived it. It was a good one. Thank you all.

Umeå! It’s been so insanely overwhelming. Our bodies are broken but our spirits is soaring. So much love. So many friends that it’s making our heads spin. So much fun. Played two fantastic shows at Väven and maybe the most important show of the year @hamnmagasinet.umea for the kids. It was such a blast and really felt like things are coming full circle. Thank you to all the bands that showed up to play with us. @constrictorband who opened up at hamnmagasinet. @svart_hal_ume @left_hand_of_darkness @deppaband @top10babies @youthcodeforever @millencolin @mattiasalkberg @firesidetheband Our love and gratitude for you is endless. Tonight is the final night of a truly magickal year. Can’t wait. Final exit is on at 6 already. And for god sake don’t miss @dreamwarriorshc and @nixumea and our old friends in @abhinanda_hc And you can still see everything on the live stream. Let’s do it!! Photos @robinlaananen

Preparation for the penultimate gig tonight. #vävenumeå #väven #refused #dennislyxzén #durasduras

On Sunday @refused is being laid to rest. Well, sort of. Even though there will be no more live shows and no more new music the legacy will live on and there’s plenty of Refused related projects in the works. The documentary @exit_to_end_ is happening. It will follow the entire history of the band through both break ups. We have gotten funding from Swedish television but to be able to push to feature length we need YOUR help. We launched a kickstarter campaign with really cool stuff so please check that out and become a part of the movie. We’ve recorded almost every show this final year so there’s at least one live record in the works. Maybe more. We decided to take control over all up and coming Refused project so we are starting a record label called Happy Trash Records where we will release said albums plus a bunch of other stuff related to us. Re-issues of out of print stuff. Vinyl releases of albums never available on vinyl before plus future creative projects. The music lives on and continues. We’ve already alluded to a new project within refused. It still does not have a name (no David, we are not going to be called Toilet Beauty) but all 4 of us I’ll are excited to get it going once the dust has settled. Also 3 of us are involved in BACKENGRILLEN which have an album out on @svartrecords in January. @fakenamesofficial have an album coming out after the summer on @epitaphrecords and I’m also recording more music with @vannaskasino soon. David is working on a solo record for the first time in…. Years. And much more. Refused is maybe coming to and end but the journey continues and nothing would make me happier than if you all continued along with us. Photo @adamhagglund

For those with tickets to the final Umeå show — this is your chance. Only a few passes left to the last soundcheck ever. Check our Kickstarter for more info, link in bio!

This is It: Refused's Final Show Livestream We're playing our last concert EVER on December 21 in Umeå, Sweden, and you can watch the entire night from anywhere in the world! Not only will you see our final set, but we've got an incredible lineup celebrating Umeå hardcore, including the legendary Final Exit playing their first show in 18 years! Plus sets from local heroes @abhinanda_hc @nixumea and @dreamwarriorshc . Get your tickets here: watch.officialrefused.com The entire concert will be available to re-watch for 48 hours following the live broadcast.