Ah, the Soundtrack of Our Lives – what bold explorers to name themselves this, to boast the promise of nostalgia, life, and all the scary bits in between. Let me say this: Ebbot Lundberg gets a tinkle in his eye when he’s on stage. At first it looks like the proud joy a father feels for his offspring, but stare a bit closer and you’ll see that Ebbot is on some psychedelic trip, offering us the words from his mouth, the notes that he can only see.

Deep enough for you? Actually, there’s the typical guitar solo, the banging of a tambourine, the tickling of the ivory keys and the maniacal stare of Ebbot, who was but a few inches from my camera lens. TSOOL is Sweden’s answer to 60s grand stand, arena rock, before the 70s glammed things up. It’s a lot to digest, the live stuff, a Smörgåsbord if you would, it causes all sorts of involuntary reactions, like clearing your throat when someone has something stuck there. Ebbot hassled some Germans in the crowd that night, but it was all in the name of something greater than words, here I am, defeating all that magic by trying to parse it down to this paragraph. “Sister Surround” took out of eyes, but so did Wayne Kramer from MC5 who just happened to shred for a few. Madness ensued.

The Soundtrack of Our Lives performed at the El Rey on 02/26/10.