The Ark (Swedish band)

The Ark was a Swedish glam rock band formed in 1991 by Mikael Jepson (better known as "Jepson") and Lasse ("Leari") Ljungberg, Ola Salo and Leari being only fourteen years old at the time. In 1996 The Ark released an EP featuring four songs, of those "Racing With The Rabbits" being the most known. The EP gained very little success in both critical and commercial sense. Martin Axén officially joined the band in 1997, and Sylvester Schlegel in 1999. In late 2005, Jens Andersson joined The Ark as an official member. He had at that point played live with the band for several years.

Ola salo was the main songwriter of the group and his lyrics have sometimes been seen controversial. For example, the 2002 single "Father of a Son" is about homosexuals’ right to adopt. In October 2006, the band was criticized by members of the U.S. public for some controversial comments referring to the September 11, 2001 attacks that were apparently part of the joking banter between songs as the band performed at the opening festivities for the new Swedish embassy in Washington, D.C.

The Ark also performed in the Melodifestivalen 2007 with the song "The Worrying Kind". The song won the contest after capturing both the popular vote and the jury's vote. The song was Sweden's Eurovision Song Contest 2007 entry, and is also included in The Ark's fourth album Prayer for the Weekend, released in April 2007. Despite being a bookmaker favorite, it finished in 18th place (out of 24)

In 2006 The Ark toured the UK acting as the warm-up band for The Darkness. "One of Us is Gonna Die Young" was used in the 2007 snowboarding video, "Picture This" from Mack Dawg Productions for Seth Huot and Andreas Wiig's video part, also was it used for the Sam Blenkinsop and Philip Polc Section of the FOX Racing Shox 2007 sequel. "Let Your Body Decide" was used in the 2010 film 'Super' starring Rainn Wilson and Ellen Page. Their all-time hit remains being the 2000s manifesto for one's freedom in life, "It Takes A Fool To Remain Sane". It gained massive radio play especially in Sweden and Italy.

On December 8, 2010 the band announced that they would be breaking up after the release of their greatest hits compilation, Arkeology, and the following spring and summer tours. Arkeology contained two new songs, "Breaking Up With God" and "The Apocalypse Is Over". The Ark won numerous awards during their 20 years together and were lauded as the most successful Swedish band since ABBA, even being recognized by MTV as the most influential northern group of the last 10 years. Ola Salo and Jepson appeared once in Expressen, a Swedish newspaper, where they were referred to as two of the 10 most important personalities in Scandinavia.

They made their last concert at the amusement park, Gröna Lund, in Stockholm 16 September 2011. The crowd was counted up to around 15,000 people.

On the 13th of February 2020, The Ark announced they're doing a reunion tour for the summer 2020, starting in Stockholm the 28th of June.

Members

 * Ola Salo: vocals, piano, percussion and songwriting (1991–2011, 2020)
 * Jepson: lead guitar and vocals (1991–2011, 2020)
 * Lars Ljungberg: bass, backing vocals (1991–2011, 2020)
 * Martin Axén: rhythm guitar, backing vocals (1997–2011, 2020)
 * Sylvester Schlegel: drums and backing vocals (1999–2011, 2020)
 * Jens Andersson: keyboards and sound engineering (2006–2011, 2020)

Touring members

 * Jens Andersson: keyboards and sound engineering (2000–2006)

Extended plays

 * The Ark (The debut EP is sometimes referred to as Racing with the Rabbits) - 1996

Singles
Notes
 * P^ "Deliver Us from Free Will" was only released as a promo single for International use.[13]
 * D^ "Gimme Love To Give" wasn't released as a single as such but charted on the Swedish Singles Chart due to the large amount of digital sales of the album track.

Music videos
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