Swede’s life as musician has beginnings in Palmer

PALMER — Tom Levin, who’s playing a concert Sunday at Vagabond Blues, may live in Stockholm, but he says a piece of himself — a pretty big piece — resides in Palmer.

“I see Palmer as my second home,” he said.

As a foreign exchange student, he lived with a host family here in 1986 and 1987, attending Palmer High School for his senior year. He still wears his PHS class ring, too.

It turned out to be a pretty monumental trip. It’s the year he discovered he was musical.

“My host family’s sister heard me singing the shower,” he said.

The family encouraged him to sing in the Palmer High choir. He eventually started singing solos. He loved it.

But music didn’t seem like a career path. He took up guitar and started writing songs while living in Australia on a university scholarship. But instead of music, he studied economics and went into business marketing.

In 1994 or 1995, he started a band in Sweden called Tennis. The group signed to a major label there and scored a top 10 hit. But still he resisted music’s pull.

“It was still a hobby because I was pursuing my career,” he said.

But after a couple of albums he relented.

“The urge of music started pulling so strong that I couldn’t hold it back any more,” he said.

So he struck out on his own, going solo and became a musician. And, so far, it’s turned out really well. His albums have charted high — even No. 1 — on independent music charts. And they’ve gotten good reviews.

In 2006, he won New Music Weekly’s AC Male Artist of the Year award. He said he never expected to win; competition was tough. James Blunt and John Mayer were in the running.

“I just really didn’t understand why I was nominated,” he said.

But he figured it’d be fun to head out to the awards show in Los Angeles. He brought some friends.

“Then, suddenly it’s, ‘the winner is …’ and I won the prize,” he said.

He said the accolades have been gratifying to his ego, but that’s not why he writes music.

“I try not to think too much about what other people think about it,” he said.

He describes his music as influenced by American roots music. People have added other genres to that. Some have compared him to artists he said he’s never heard before.

He sings in English. Swedes actually study English starting in elementary school.

“I think since I discovered music here it’s very natural to me to write music in English,” he said.

And while 2011’s “Tooth and Claw,” his most recent record, is his fourth as a solo artist, he’s still not making a whole lot of money at it. He doesn’t tour a lot — he’s got a son now and would much rather be home with him. And nobody’s really selling many CDs anymore.

Indeed, he tends to make money from things like an e-commerce platform he and his brother work on, graphic design, commercial songwriting and even voice-over work.

He said all those different worlds tend to inform one another. The cross pollination is interesting.

“It makes life more fun to have that variety,” he said.

Levin said his time in Palmer, aside from being when he discovered music, was a major period of growth for him. It wasn’t his first time abroad, but it was his first time traveling on his own like that.

“It changed me as a person, definitely,” he said.

He said he was kind of a slacker in Sweden, floating by. But in Palmer he learned to study and, by extension, how to work hard.

“I’m really grateful for the time I had at Palmer High,” he said.

Contact reporter Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.