Tom Aspaul: Red cabin fever

By Karl Batterbee | Photos: Kasia Clark

He is the British popstar who was so inspired by his first Midsommar trip, he took the creative decision to build a whole album around the experience. Now, as he prepares to kick off the Cabin Fever tour with his first headline shows in Scandinavia this August, Tom Aspaul speaks to Scan Magazine.

An album inspired by Midsommar but not a single track about little frogs or sleeping bears? It is true! He has written for Kylie Minogue, worked with MNEK and helped pen one of the biggest dance tunes of last year (Indestructible by Andy C & Becky Hill), but when the time came for British artist Tom Aspaul to take some rest after touring his second album, little did he suspect how fervently the Swedish summer backdrop would put his creative juices to work.

There was something in the air that night, the stars were bright…

“It was never my intention to base a whole album off the experience. But it became pretty overwhelming, and so much happened, that it just made sense in the end,” the singer begins. The idyllic Stockholm archipelago has long served as the inspiration behind some top-tier pop. Many of ABBA’s biggest hits, such as Dancing Queen and Fernando, were composed in a cottage owned by Björn and Agnetha on the island of Viggso. And that knowledge probably will not have escaped Tom, who is a major ABBA fan. “Me and my friend Matthew, we love ABBA, we love Sweden and we love travelling together. Ever since ABBA released their final album, Voyage, we thought; wouldn’t it be amazing to go and listen to that album where ABBA had their studio?”

“I went there to be inspired,” Tom continues. “But I don’t think I realised how that experience would become so fruitful; something that informed the aesthetics, the visuals, the places I go to on tour, the music videos. It really did become a whole thing. And I love concepts. If we’re going to go for a concept, we’re gonna go full steam ahead.”

After an appearance at Gothenburg’s West Pride earlier in the summer, Tom plays his first headline shows in Sweden and Iceland this August.

Life is easy, gin martini, on a boat lounging

One short-lived experience went on to shape an entire song. On That Girl, Tom manages to turn a 30-minute encounter from afar into an astute character study, penning a whole backstory for his new muse. If you have attended any Midsommar party, however, you will have seen ‘that girl’, too. Tom sets the scene for us: “It was Midsommar. Saturday. Everyone was around their families. We were in this Airbnb that was surrounded by other houses, but they were all far apart, so you couldn’t really see anyone’s face. This boat pulled into a bit of water that all of the islands surround. And I don’t know why they did it; I guess so people could watch them, because everyone could see that boat. It was playing the loudest, most obnoxious music. Everyone was really hot, super tanned. And yeah, she was blonde, holding a cocktail… Like, who makes a cocktail on a boat?! It’s beer or wine. You could just tell all the guys on there were basically obsessed.”

All it took was for Tom’s friend to marvel at how she was living her best life, and he had the idea for the song; rooted in celebration for the girl, but with a little bit of lament for what they never got to experience in their own youth. “They stayed there for half an hour. Once they’d gone, it left such an impression on both of us. We were talking about what it was like when we were younger. About how different it was and about how lovely it would be to have that level of confidence at such a young age. And to know who you are. It was great to see. We love women owning it, basically.”

Tom’s first Midsommar trip inspired a whole album, Cabin Fever.

‘Swede Nothings’

Tom’s enthusiasm for female empowerment is evident elsewhere on the album; a song called 70s Angels. On it, he lists the singers from that decade (Stevie Nicks, Barbra Streisand, Lynsey De Paul, Carole King, it goes on) who soundtracked his Midsommar trip, via his Spotify playlist titled… 70s Angels! But which Swedish singers would make the cut on a ‘Sverige’-themed playlist of his? “I actually have a Swedish version of that playlist, called Swede Nothings! I love The Cardigans. I had a really big resurgent phase with them at the start of this year, so I’ve got back in touch with their first album First Band On The Moon, which I really love. I do love Ace of Base, too. Especially Life Is A Flower, that’s one of my favourites. Agnes is amazing. Tove Lo, her Blue Lips album. I’m a big fan of Robyn, too. I think that’s a cliché for a gay man who’s nearly 40, but I do love Robyn. I actually really love her early Max Martin stuff; Show Me Love, Do You Know What It Takes, that kind of stuff.”

Tom’s Robyn declaration may well be a cliché, but it comes with something most other gay men who are nearly 40 don’t bring to the discussion… An accompanying anecdote! “I went to see her actually, in Stockholm, on the last show of her tour. It was insane. I met her grandmother, she was fab. They had an after party for the family and it was really genteel. There was loads of fish and sandwiches and people drinking tea! It was lovely,” he recalls.

The Cabin Fever album was released in May, but Tom’s newfound love affair with the Scandinavian summer hasn’t come to a halt just yet. The Cabin Fever tour starts in August and where better to kick it off than with two dates in the Nordics? “It was a conscious decision, 100 per cent,” Tom explains, and he will play Reykjavik on 23 August and Stockholm the following week on 29 August; his first headline shows in the Nordics. “I’m so excited. I love Iceland and haven’t been for a very long time. And I have such a real connection to Sweden. I’ve always come to do writing camps in Sweden, for 10 or 15 years since I’ve been a musician. So I’ve built up a really nice group of friends and connections there. And every time I go, I come back and think: I love it!”

You can also catch Tom when the Cabin Fever tour comes to Toronto, Dublin, Utrecht, Berlin, London, Manchester and Mexico City, throughout the rest of the year. And we will likely be hearing more Midsommar-inspired music soon, according to the singer. “I definitely want to continue with Cabin Fever for at least another year; do a remix EP, a deluxe edition. There are plenty more songs about the trip to come!”