New Skid Row’s singer, Erik Grönwall, recently appeared on Swedish TV channel TV4’s “Nyhetsmorgon”, where he discussed how he went from auditioning for the competition show “Swedish Idol” back in 2009 by singing a cover of Skid Row’s classic song “18 And Life” to now fronting the band.
He said:
“I grew up listening to Skid Row, and I was working as a karaoke host before I wanted to become an artist. So I was working as a karaoke host, I did everything I could just to work with music. And I was singing ”18 And Life” and ”Youth Gone Wild” during these karaoke nights. And [former Skid Row singer] Sebastian‘s [Bach] voice was one of the reasons why I even started singing. And then I managed to get on ”Idol”, the ”Idol” show in Sweden, and on my audition, I sang ”18 And Life”.
”And it kind of, like… It’s so full circle here. So, that song became the song that gave me a career. And since then, I managed to become the frontman of H.E.A.T. I’ve been in that band for 12 years. And I’ve been working with John Legend and Alice Cooper; in New York, we did ”Jesus Chris Superstar” live in concert, which was aired on NBC. And that was in 2018. And then last year, I was diagnosed with leukemia.
”And this is why I started a YouTube channel. Because I was kind of moving away from being an artist; I wanted to try other things. And I started the YouTube channel because I promised myself when I was at the hospital, I got full perspective, and I was, like, ”If I make it out of here alive, I’m gonna sing for the rest of my life”. And I started the YouTube channel as a healing process, I just had to sing, I had to get music out there.’ And then [in] January [of 2022], I think, [Skid Row bassist] Rachel [Bolan] contacted me [about joining the band]. And it’s been happening so fast. It’s so surreal, everything. I’m still trying to process the whole timeline. [Laughs] It’s like a Hollywood script.”