Formation Eskobar has its roots in the early 1990s when Daniel Bellqvist left his band to join Frederik Zäll’s band called
FOF (an acronym for "Fish Or Fantasy?") in 1994. The two musicians had previously met in their high school band class. In their incarnation as
FOF, Daniel played bass while Frederik played guitar, and since
Grunge was the popular musical style of the time, the band settled on this genre as their signature style. During this time the band also changed its name to
Cripplefish. In less than a year, ''Cripplefish's
sound began to evolve from Grunge into Pop, prompting the lead singer, Staffan Atling, to leave the band. This shift in genre style led to a significant reformulation of the band. Cripplefish
was renamed, this time taking the name The Bugs,'' but without a lead singer, Daniel was forced to pick up the slack on vocals while playing bass. Another reshuffling of the band's lineup brought in Robert Birming as drummer and Jojjo, the band’s only female member, was brought on as ''The Bugs' '' acoustic guitarist and backup vocalist. By 1996, the newly revised 4-piece band had continued to make inroads with their upbeat pop style, but another shakeup was looming on the horizon. As they booked their first Stockholm gig, Jojjo decided to leave
The Bugs, citing the stresses associated with daily rehearsals as her main motivation for leaving the band. The three remaining band members decided to stay on and continue making music, however, and used Jojjo’s departure and their ever-evolving style to change the band’s name yet again. ''The Bugs'
shift from mainstream pop to Brit-Pop came about as they changed their name to Browneyed Susan''.
Members Source: Daniel Bellqvist – Vocals, Percussion Frederik Zäll – Guitars, Pianos, Harmonica etc. Jocke Brunnberg – Drums Jocke, a childhood friend of the band's members, began playing with Eskobar in 2015 and joined as a full member in 2018. He has been active as a drummer across numerous bands and projects.
Getting signed After a year floundering with Swedish record label MNW, the band recorded a three track demo in 1998 that was shuffled from
EMI to
Sony Publishing, where Sony eventually agreed to finance a ten-song
demo. This critical step would become a watershed moment for them, as one of the ten songs – "Tumbling Down" (not to be confused with the
country/western song
Tumbling Tumbleweeds) – was set apart, in sonic feel, from the others, in demonstrating a capability for originality, breaking from the uniform style of the band's entire previous
corpus, for the first time in its history. They discarded other nine songs In favor of a new, more free-flowing set of numbers; this demo led to them signing with
V2 Music, where they used the name
Small Change. Under its new label, the band found greater exposure,
opening for such well-known Swedish bands as
The Wannadies. Eventually, their popularity brought them to a prime position for releasing their own album, but for on its title. Shuffling through a series of names had seemed fine for an unsigned band, but they committed to settling on a single name, not in use by other bands. After substantial and frustrating thought, and nearly giving up on the task, a friend of the band who met an American
manager who (being asked for help), suggested the surname of the notorious
drug czar Pablo Escobar; the band liked the sound of it (but made a slight spelling change from the letter 'c' to 'k', for the sake of a distinctive spelling.
Fame "
Someone New", a duet with
Heather Nova released in 2002, was an international hit and has since taken on a life of its own. Although both artists are still primarily known in Europe, the popularity of "Someone New" saw Eskobar and Heather Nova's fan base reach America through
MTV. The band has been nominated for the Grammy award, Song Of The Year with their Heather Nova-duette ”Someone New”, won ”Best Nordic Act” on MTV Awards and a number of other nominations and awards in Sweden but predominantly in Europe. ==Melodifestivalen 2008==