BWO

Formed in 2003 as the brainchild of Alexander Bard, the onetime frontman of Army of Lovers, the Swedish pop outfit Bodies Without Organs—commonly abbreviated as BwO—emerged after Martin Rolinski, a tennis player who had reached the final of Popstars, reached out to Bard via producer Anders Hansson. Bard responded by aligning himself with Rolinski and bringing aboard Marina Schiptjenko, who had previously worked with Bard in Vacuum. The trio adopted its name from the writings of French philosopher Gilles Deleuze, a thinker Bard himself had examined as a philosophy lecturer in his 2000 book Netocracy.

With the release of their 2004 debut album Prototype, the group quickly attained substantial popularity across Scandinavia and Eastern Europe, placing seven singles inside the Top 40 and earning platinum certification in Sweden. Their follow-up, Halcyon Days, arrived in 2006 and achieved gold status soon after its launch; the album’s opening track, “Temple of Love,” climbed to number two on the Swedish singles chart. BwO appeared at Melodifestivalen in both 2005 and 2006, advancing to the semifinals on their first attempt before being eliminated by Martin Stenmarck. Early in 2007 they issued a cover of Alcazar’s “Save My Pride,” while their next studio album, Fabricator, was scheduled for release in Sweden later that same year.