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Spotlight

Caesars

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What? Complaining about Sweden’s seemingly omnipresent musical output would be easy if the country’s sonic exports weren’t so damn catchy. Case and point: Caesars, whose latest lo-fi power-pop opus, Strawberry Weed, is prepped to storm American shores Aug. 19 courtesy of Astralwerks. Weed finds the stunning Swedes deviating from the twitchy keyboards of minor hit (and former iPod Shuffle commercial theme) “Jerk It Out,” instead choosing to get high on their own supply of Guided by Voices, Matthew Sweet, and the Who influences; you can check out the endearingly low-rent psychedelics of the video for single “Boo Boo Goo Goo” below.

Who? Despite the fact that Caesars were founded in 1993 by guitarist/lead vocalist Cesar Vidal and guitarist/vocalist Joakim Ahlund, it was five years before the crunchy tunesmiths released 1998’s Youth is Wasted on the Young.After two successive full-lengths — 2000’s Cherry Kicks and 2002’s Love For the Streets — Astralwerks released a compilation of tracks from those albums under the name 39 Minutes of Bliss in 2003.”Jerk It Out” was featured in advertisements for the iPod Shuffle in 2005, and was featured on that year’s breakout set Paper Tigers.In between Tigers and Strawberry Weed, Ahlund also found success as one of the founding members of electro-pop act Teddybears. Currently, Caesars is comprised of Ahlund, Vidal, David Lindqvist (bass), and Nino Keller (drums).

Fun Fact: The band was initially known as Caesars Palace in their native Sweden, but chose to shorten their name for the U.S. as to avoid copyright troubles with the Vegas casino of the same name.

Now Watch This: “Boo Boo Goo Goo”
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