The Hives, quite possibly the greatest band to come from Sweden (besides Europe, err…I mean the Refused) recently began their assault on Canada by challenging the three Swedish members of the Vancouver Canucks to a game of hockey.Amazingly, the band put up five goals against the highly-trained professionals. It wasn’t quite enough, however, as the Canucks managed to score six despite being outnumbered.

The band is on their way to finishing their North American tour and are working their way back east now, so if you missed them in San Francisco (like I did…sigh…) you’re shit out of luck. Sorrrrrry.

We recently interviewd Dr. Matt Destruction, the mustachioed bassist of The Hives. Their latest album, the Black And White Album, is my favorite from them yet, probably owing to its musical diversity (within the spectrum of garage rock, anyway). Dr. Matt was cool, and even through a series of bad connections and a mild language barrier (I had to explain what a pinky toe is, for example) we managed to get the goods out of him.

Check it out on our main site here.

Like most songs by The Hives, I have absolutely no idea what “Tick Tick Boom” is all about. Love Pelle Almqvist’s voice, but definitely think his lyrics need a bit of work. But whatever, I guess not everyone needs to be a Leonard Cohen. Actions speak louder than words anyway, and in their video for “tick Tick Boom” they are giants, they fuck the shit out of art and make big explosions and funny faces. Their new album, The Black and White Album, hits US shores Tuesday November 13th.