Stockholm Syndrome

Stockholm Syndrome is the fourth album, using distorted guitar, rough singing and punkish beats to make rock 'n' roll with a dangerous scent. Recording continued in the middle of an incident in October 2002 in which Dregen was assaulted and had his jaw broken, making the front pages of Swedish newspapers. Joe Barresi, who has also worked with Queens of the Stone Age, produced. The songs move roughly, but the choruses have a solid pop feel and stay in memory. Street grit and arena-scale hooks coexist, and the playing has a relaxed delinquency. It runs hard from the opener “Everybody Ready?!”; the signature song “Minus Celsius” later appeared in Guitar Hero III, and “A Song for the Outcast” also became widely known. “Friends” features a lavish cast — Joey Ramone, Michael Monroe, Danko Jones, Nina Persson and more — and became Ramone's final studio recording before his death. Regarded as a return toward a rawer direction than the previous record, it's a definitive Swedish glam-punk album.