HISTORY During Christmas time 1978 Massmedia recorded their first EP at Torkhold, a bombshelter under Västermalms High School, which also hosted the first punk concerts in Sundsvall. Mats and Torulf Nilsson (bass and guitar) had been in London a few weeks earlier and bought a mixing desk and together with a friend who had a little more knowledge than themselves regarding the knobs, they spend the Christmas holiday in the bombshelter recording four songs live on a borrowed taperecorder. Massmedia 1979. From left: Torulf Nilsson, Svante Jansson, Mats Nilsson and Anders Brodin. Unfortunately the batteries of the fuzzbox run out, and since in was holiday everything was closed so they could not get new ones, which resulted in a very sizzling guitarsound. But on the whole they were quite satisfied with how it turned out and they sent the master to Dallas, Texas for pressing. From an advert in Melody Maker they have learnt that they could get cheap pressings in the US. In February 1979 they released their first record on their own Massproduktion label, pressed in 492 numbered copies. Being the most ambitious local punk band at the time they developed fast and even before the release of the first EP they recorded the classical single "Das Jazz/Jag vill inget", live in their rehearsalroom with Jan Zachrisson from Diestinct, who did know slightly more about recordings. It is still one of the most furious singles from that period with the VU-meters glued to the red area. The next release was an compilation-EP with Massmedia, Vacum and Förbjudna Ljud. Mats Hammerman was singer in Vacum and had recently become neighbour with the Nilsson brothers and was soon involved in the record business. After the delays that hit Sundsvallspunk EP vol. 1 and the Vacum EP they discovered the advantages of pressing in Sweden and under a few months a lot of local punk band released their debutesingles on Massproduktion. In late 1979 the "label" got distribution though Sam-Distribution (now MNW-distribution) and even more band started to release records on Massproduktion. In those days the band financed their own records and Massproduktion collected the money from the distributor and distributed them among the bands. In 1980 Massproduktion released their first LPs - four of them. At the same time the Nilsson brothers moved to Linköping for studies and left Hammerman to take over business. In 1981 Mats, together with his guitarist Stephan Segermark and bassplayer Anders Olsson registered Massproduktion as a company and slowly Massproduktion became what it is today. During the 80ies the punkwave faded and Massproduktion broaden the musical horizon. The most successful band during the mid 80ies was Vacum, Gina Jacobi's Rummet and Krunch and the in the early 90ies Crompojkarna and Shades of Orange. Massproduktion of today have a rich variety of styles and bands and is not only a local label. The origin as a local label has determined the variety of styles as Massproduktion signed only the best local bands - not a special music-genre. On Massproduktion you can find everything from the screaming electric guitars of My Orchard, the modern folkmusic of Garmarna, the brilliant pop of The Confusions, the childrenrock of Krämen, Giraffer & andra saker, the crushing doom metal of Left Hand Solution and the ultimate cool sound of Emma Holmér and her band Mine. During the last years we have met a large international interest, mostly for Garmarna (released in 23 countries) but also for our other releases. Left Hand Solution latest CD Fevered was released in Europe and North America by Nuclear Blast and the reception was very good. The Confusions are also doing well abroad. Their debut CD Being Young, was released by Edoya record in Japan in September 1995 and was very well received. Their second album Everyone's Invited produced by Peter Svensson of The Cardigans was released in Europe by German Clearspot recordings/EFA and got very good reviews from Record Collector, Melody Maker, Rolling Stone among others and it was followed up with a large European tour in February 1997. Mine was our next success. Cool ambient jazzinfluenced sounds with Emma Holmér wonderful vocals made Swedish press go wild. During the summer of 1998 it was released in Japan and Taiwan and it will be released world-wide by Polygram in 2000. At the moment we are working on a large re-issuing project involving some of our, now historical, punk-releases. Vägra Raggarna Benzin Vol. 1 & 2 have been both a critical and commercial success and we are know planning for a Vol. 3. 1999 saw the release of new albums of my Orchard, Garmarna, Krämen, Giraffer & andra saker and The $1000 Playboys and our 20 years celebration CD - We're only in it for the money. Apart from that we also released the PopStad 99 promoCD. Early 2000 will see the release of Left Hand Solutions new album - Black in Grace and much more exiting stuff !