The Hives was formed in 1993 by brothers Per “Pelle” Almqvist (Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist) and Niklas Almqvist (Nicholaus Arson) in Fagersta . Friends of the brothers, Mikael Karlsson (Vigilante Carlstroem), Mattias Bernvall (Dr. Matt Destruction) and Christian Grahn (Chris Dangerous), soon joined the band and took stage names like the brothers. Drummer Dangerous suggested the name “Hives” for the band as he had read the word for the skin disease in a dictionary. The other members misunderstood the condition based on his description of it, as Howlin’ Pelle later explained, “we thought it was a way more lethal disease, for one, and we thought it was way more contagious. So, we figured that we’d spread like a deadly disease across the land”. The band went by the name Hives for some time before they realized that “all good band names are plurals”, and added a ‘the’ to their name.
Formed in 1993
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