While attending
Göteborgs Högre Samskola in Gothenburg, Henrik Berggren was looking for a way to express himself, and decided that the easiest way would be to form a pop band. The first six years of the band's existence consisted of a number of name changes until the band finally settled on the name Broder Daniel - translating to
Brother Daniel. A couple of new members joined and they slowly started to find their sound. Swedish music press soon caught on to the hype of the now notorious band featuring charismatic singer Henrik who in a short time had gained a cult following of maladjusted youth, looking for a leader. Journalists, however, tended to mostly focus on the violent shows and Henrik's make-up and out of tune voice. Music label Jimmy Fun Music, owned by
Roxette member
Per Gessle, picked the band up and promoted them until they signed to
EMI Music Sweden. In 1995 the band released their debut album
Saturday Night Engine which was characterized by its simple songs with relatively low respect for musical correctness. They soon gained a relatively large following of fans throughout Sweden. After releasing their second album, self-titled
Broder Daniel, the band resigned from EMI in 1997 and found themselves without a record deal - something few people in the music industry could understand. While they did not sell many records, the band was indeed a popular act in clubs and on music festivals. One year later they signed to record label
Dolores Recordings and released their most critically acclaimed album so far:
Broder Daniel Forever. The new record was dark, with a focus on topics of love and death. Its sound was inspired by
Psychocandy, the debut album of indie rockers
The Jesus and Mary Chain. The popularity of
Forever soon took off, and the band reached a larger audience than ever before in their career, much thanks to the inclusion of three Broder Daniel songs on the soundtrack for the movie
Show Me Love which was one of the most popular films in Sweden in the 1990s. Following the release of
Forever, the band embarked on a controversial tour across Sweden, which the band later ended prematurely. A few shows were played in England as an attempt to sign a record deal for international release of their albums. That, however, didn't succeed. After the tour, the members parted ways to recover and did not maintain any contact with each other in the year that followed. In 2001, bass player
Håkan Hellström released a solo record which hit big and soon after that he left the band, since the other members didn't think his reputation as a spreader of joy would reflect well on the band. Guitar player Theodor Jensen also released a celebrated record with his band
The Plan. Five years after the release of
Forever, the band once again got together to record their new album
Cruel Town which was released in 2003. This time around they had a clear focus on the lyrics which were now more complex and less repetitive than before. This album showed a matured Broder Daniel, with themes based around society and nostalgia. Berggren was now singing about the cold society which had made him the person he is today, while looking back at his childhood. Since the
Cruel Town tour, the band has performed only a few times together. Singer Henrik Berggren has performed several acoustic solo sets playing Broder Daniel-songs. On 30 March 2008, guitarist
Anders Göthberg committed
suicide in
Stockholm by jumping off the
Västerbron bridge. The band played together for the last time at
Way Out West Festival in
Gothenburg in honour of the late Anders Göthberg. During the concert they played their newly written song "Hold On to Your Dreams", dedicated to Göthberg. In August 2014, a
memorial to the band was raised at the site of their last concert in
Slottsskogen. ==Members==