whale

• Cia Berg - vocals
• Henrik Schyffert - guitar
• Heikki Kiviaho - bass
• Jorgen Wall - drums
• Jon Jefferson Klingberg - guitar

Whale was originally started with the intention of recording just one song for fun. Schyffert was the producer of a Swedish pop music show, and invited Cia to host. The two got together with bassist Gordon Cyrus and recorded "Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe". The song spurned a video became a hit on MTV, which spurned an album, and a tour, and finally a full fledged band.

The album, "We Care", is guitar-laden trip-hop album with a few solid songs, including one with guest vocals from Tricky, but on the whole, it's an inconsistent, average album.

Three years later, with three new band members (Cyrus left to start his own record label), the band grew out of its adolescence and instead focused on writing solid material. The result was 1998's All Disco Dance Must End In Broken Bones. Though still a bit uneven, the album is full of infectious grooves, trippy sampling, and clever lyrics.

The band is definitely rooted in trip-hop, although they're a little more into guitars and basses than sampling and synthesizers. The closest comparison I can give is Portishead, although I think Portishead fans would probably be insulted by this comparison. OK, take a trip-hop band with a female lead singer who sounds like a happy, upbeat Beth Gibbons, but isn't as good, and you probably have Whale.

Perhaps the best line about Whale comes from captainspatula, who remarked after listening to a ShoutCast that included Whale, "Whale's weird, I'll be listening and be like hm, this is a cool song, and it's Whale. Then, a little while later, I'll be listening and I'll be like this song is dogshit and, yep, it's Whale." Note that while I don't necessarily agree with this assessment, it speaks to the eclectic sound of the band.

Discography:

Albums:

Pay For Me EP (1993) - Released by Caroline

• Pay For Me
• I Think No
• Darling Nikki
• Buzzbox Babe
• Trying

We Care (1995) - Released by Virgin

• Kickin'
• That's Where It's At
• Pay For Me
• Eurodog
• I'll Do Ya
• Electricity
• Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe
• Tryzasnice
• Happy In You
• I Miss Me
• Young Dumb N' Full Of Cum
• I'm Cold
• Born To Raise Hell

All Disco Dance Must End In Broken Bones (1998) - Released by Virgin

• Crying At Airports
• Deliver The Juice
• Roadkill
• Smoke
• Losing CTRL
• Four Big Speakers
• Go Where You're Feeling Free
• Into The Strobe
• Puma Gym
• No Better
• 2 Chord Song

Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe (UK) (1994)

• Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe
• Lips
• Eye 842

Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe (US) (1994)

• Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe
• Eye 842

Pay For Me (1996)

• Pay For Me
• Now Thing

I'll Do Ya (1996)

• I'll Do Ya (Edit)
• Now Thing
• Sexy M.M.
• I'll Do Ya (Full Version)

Crying At Airports (1998)

• Crying At Airports
• Heavy Stick
• Spitting Indoors

• 14 Rock Street (from the Japanese 'All Disco Dance...' release)
• Anywhere But Here (from the Japanese 'All Disco Dance...' release)

Amongst the whales are players such as the Saudi arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi and the Sultan of Brunei, but the undisputed king of the whales is Australian Kerry Packer, who is allegedly responsible for a 19% drop in the International Hiltons profits in 1996 after a huge winning streak at their casinos. A legend amongst gamblers, Packer once got so incensed with a big-headed Texan oilman at his table bragging about his $100 million fortune that he offered to flip a coin with him for it ......

Whale, n. [OE. whal, AS. hwael; akin to D. wal visch, G. wal, wal fisch, OHG. wal, Icel. hvalr, Dan. & Sw. hval, hval fisk. Cf. Narwhal, Walrus.] Zool.

Any aquatic mammal of the order Cetacea, especially any one of the large species, some of which become nearly one hundred feet long. Whales are hunted chiefly for their oil and baleen, or whalebone.

⇒ The existing whales are divided into two groups: the toothed whales (Odontocete), including those that have teeth, as the cachalot, or sperm whale (see Sperm whale); and the baleen, or whalebone, whales (Mysticete), comprising those that are destitute of teeth, but have plates of baleen hanging from the upper jaw, as the right whales. The most important species of whalebone whales are the bowhead, or Greenland, whale (see Illust. of Right whale), the Biscay whale, the Antarctic whale, the gray whale (see under Gray), the humpback, the finback, and the rorqual.

Whale bird. Zool. (a) Any one of several species of large Antarctic petrels which follow whaling vessels, to feed on the blubber and floating oil; especially, Prion turtur (called also blue petrel), and Pseudoprion desolatus. (b) The turnstone; -- so called because it lives on the carcasses of whales. [Canada] -- Whale fin Com., whalebone. Simmonds. -- Whale fishery, the fishing for, or occupation of taking, whales. -- Whale louse Zool., any one of several species of degraded amphipod crustaceans belonging to the genus Cyamus, especially C. ceti. They are parasitic on various cetaceans. -- Whale's bone, ivory. [Obs.] -- Whale shark. Zool. (a) The basking, or liver, shark. (b) A very large harmless shark (Rhinodon typicus) native of the Indian Ocean. It sometimes becomes sixty feet long. -- Whale shot, the name formerly given to spermaceti. -- Whale's tongue Zool., a balanoglossus.

© Webster 1913.

Whale (?), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Whaled (?); p. pr. & vb. n. Whaling.] [Cf. Wale. ]

To lash with stripes; to wale; to thrash; to drub.

Halliwell. Bartlett.

© Webster 1913.