They told him to pick something safer. He picked this.
A guitar in his hands at fourteen and a decision he has never taken back. Deals that collapsed, bands that broke, stages on two continents - and every single time, another song. This is the whole road, named one project at a time.
A boy, a guitar, and a garage that would not stay quiet
There was a boy on the Scandinavian countryside who didn't know he was building a life in music.
He was fourteen. His father handed him an electric guitar like it was nothing, just wood and strings. But the moment his fingers found the frets, something ancient woke up inside him. The garage became a forge. The neighbours became his first crew. And the noise they made, blasting rock covers until the walls rattled, that noise was the first brick in a fortress that would take twenty years to build.
Their band was raw, messy and loud. It was everything a first band should be. But the boy watched childhood friends who had graduated from music school and formed a virtuosic melodic rock band, and he knew he wasn't there yet. He wasn't the shredder. He wasn't the prodigy. So he did what every artist does before they find their voice: he served. He learned bass. He showed up. He recorded his first song in a real studio with real musicians, and he felt the weight of what it meant to be part of something bigger than himself.
Soundtrack to this chapter
Här och Nu - Axel Brundin - from the album Va fan é en Jantelag?!
The call that changed everything - and the silence that followed
A friend from music school asked him to audition for a pop-rock band in Copenhagen. This wasn't a garage anymore. This was the real machine, produced by industry heavyweights, signed to a real label, with a lead singer who could silence a room with one note. The boy held down the bass with everything he had. They generated millions of views online. They shot music videos. They played to a crowd that screamed their names. A world tour was booked. An album was ready.
And then nothing. Poor management. Dissolved dreams. The album never dropped. The tour never happened. He stood in the wreckage of the biggest opportunity of his young life and felt the silence where the music should have been.
Most people would have quit. Most people would have gone home, put the guitar in the closet, and told themselves it was never meant to be. He was not most people.
Soundtrack to this chapter
Worlds Apart - Axel Brundin featuring Jonathan Bernhardsson
He stopped standing in the back
He went home and joined another band: a lead guitarist who could make the strings weep, a vocalist with soul beyond her years, and a rhythm section that locked in like a heartbeat. It lasted a year. Then it became something new, and this time the boy didn't stand in the back. He stepped to the front. Lead vocals. Rhythm guitar. They recorded an EP that proved he could lead, could write, could be the voice.
When that band dissolved too, he didn't wait for another invitation. He wrote his first solo song, a question that became the war cry of his life: why wait?
He became a troubadour, playing pubs and weddings across the countryside, just a man and his guitar and the stories he needed to tell. Then a childhood friend joined him, and they became an acoustic soul and blues duo that played every corner of southern Sweden for two years. But the rock fire still burned. He reunited with old friends to form a new rock band and released an EP that roared with everything he couldn't say in words. Two bands. Two lives. One man refusing to choose between them.
Soundtrack to this chapter
Why Wait - Axel Brundin
A plane ticket, a Broadway stage, and a voice he didn't know he had
A study abroad program. A chance to study music production and acting at a college by the ocean. He threw the biggest going-away party of his life, walked away from every band, every gig, every familiar stage, and flew into the unknown. Under professors who became mentors, and through a single unforgettable lecture from a legend of rock, he discovered that his voice could carry him further than his fingers ever could.
Through a friend he met in the theatre - a force of nature who sang, played guitar and acted with the kind of passion that makes you believe in destiny - he auditioned for a Broadway musical at a historic theatre. He got the part. Standing ovations in California. He auditioned for a producer's showcase and closed the night with his own song.
And then the alchemy: a singer from the north, a drummer from the south, his theatre friend beside him. They became a new band, writing songs and touring the coast, proving that borders are just lines on a map when the music is real.
Soundtrack to this chapter
I Wonder - Axel Brundin featuring Morten Opedal
Told no on national television. He recorded anyway.
He returned home with California's sun in his pocket and fire in his lungs. In 2014 he stood in line for the biggest talent show on Swedish television, the one that turns unknown singers into household names overnight. He gave it everything. The lights, the cameras, the hope hanging thick in the air. And they told him no. Another door slammed shut. Another silence where there should have been music.
He went home, picked up his guitar, and started recording anyway. Solo singles with different producers, both cut in the hometown that had watched him grow. He reunited with his acoustic partner for more shows. He formed a new rock band - a bassist, a drummer, a lead guitarist, a producer who doubled on second lead - and released an EP with anthems that bled honesty. They destroyed stages at legendary venues in two of Sweden's biggest cities. They helped found a festival in the countryside - one of the founders who built it from the ground up: their own world, their own rules.
When that band dissolved, as all bands eventually do, he didn't mourn. He built again. A pop-folk project with a longtime collaborator gave him a single and a six-track album that felt like home. For ten years it was his musical sanctuary. For ten years he grew into something he didn't have a name for yet. And when that project ended, the cocoon finally cracked open.
Soundtrack to this chapter
Day and Night - Trip Sixteen
Twenty years don't make a musician. They forge something else.
He stepped into the studio with a new production team and emerged as Axel V King. Singles that didn't just sound like songs - they sounded like declarations. He joined a salsa band led by a passionate bandleader in a vibrant city and discovered his voice could carry Latin fire as easily as Swedish soul. And across the ocean, his old friend from those California days - now an artist, writer, actor, model and producer in Barcelona - came calling with a proposal: a Swedish pop album, a concert tour, a global stage.
The boy from the Scandinavian countryside, who wasn't good enough to play lead guitar in his friends' band, who watched his first real shot crumble, who stood on Broadway stages and pub stages and California club stages, who was told he wasn't enough for the biggest stage in his own country - that boy became a man who understood something profound.
The name isn't given to the best guitarist. It isn't given to the loudest voice. It isn't given to the one who never fails. The name is earned by the one who keeps going when the bands dissolve. Who keeps writing when no one is listening. Who keeps showing up - in garages, in studios, in Broadway theatres, in salsa clubs, in Barcelona production meetings - because the music is bigger than the moment, and the journey is bigger than any single stage.
Soundtrack to this chapter
Leading My Way - Axel V King
Axel Brundin didn't become Axel V King because he was the most talented kid in town. He became Axel V King because he was the one who never stopped.
Born in the south of Sweden. Forged on every stage. Ready for the world.
The road, one project at a time
Traxx
2002–2007 · Guitar · Välinge, Sweden
A garage, three teenagers and a wall of Status Quo riffs.
Axel Brundin was fourteen when his father handed him an electric guitar. Within a week the neighbour's garage in Välinge had been turned into a rehearsal room.
Traxx was Axel and his neighbours Jojje and Putte, built on the songs of Jojje's father Bosse and his 70s band Trucks. Jojje was the driving force - he taught the others the Status Quo covers, and they played them until the amps complained.
Nothing was recorded and nothing was released. It was simply where the whole thing started.
Melodia
2006–2007 · Bass · Helsingborg, Sweden
He learned a new instrument just to keep up with the virtuosos next door.
Erik and Fabbe, both schooled at Mega Musik in Helsingborg, led Melodia - a band raised on Europe and Yngwie Malmsteen. They were a large part of why Axel picked up an instrument at all.
He wasn't good enough on guitar for their brand of 80s melodic rock, so the band taught him bass instead, purely so he could play with them. Erik was on keys, Fabbe a virtuoso on guitar and piano, both serious songwriters.
Together they recorded “Endless Hero”, written by Erik - his first real studio session, and the moment the meaning of craft landed.
Lucy in the Sky
2008 · Bass · Copenhagen, Denmark
1.6 million views, a record deal, and a dream that ended too early.
Through Erik came an introduction to Patrik, another Mega Musik talent, and an audition for a pop-rock band in Copenhagen. Axel took the bass spot.
Lucy in the Sky was produced by Nicola and Rasmus Seebach and signed to Mermaid Records. The promo hit 1.6 million views on YouTube, a full studio album was in the works and a world tour was on the table.
Poor management of the funds ended it before the album could be released. The band shot music videos and played a show in Landskrona, and Axel got a full year of what the big version of this life feels like.
Dusty Diamonds
2008–2009 · Bass · Åstorp, Sweden
Home from Copenhagen, and straight back into a rehearsal room.
Back in Skåne he kept the bass on and joined Dusty Diamonds in Åstorp - a year of rehearsals and local shows.
A year of rehearsals and local shows in Åstorp before the lineup shifted into something else entirely.
Anovia
2009 · Lead vocals & rhythm guitar · Åstorp, Sweden
The band where he stopped standing at the back.
When Dusty Diamonds dissolved it became Anovia - and Axel stepped up to the microphone for the first time, on lead vocals and rhythm guitar.
The band played a run of gigs and recorded its first and only EP - just three songs: “Why I Say Goodbye”, “Sweet Little Susie” and “Eyes On You”. Those were the only songs Anovia ever recorded together.
When the band ended a year later he didn't look for a replacement - he started writing instead, and the first song out was “Why Wait”, recorded solo. It was never part of the Anovia project.
Unplugged
2009–2011 · reunited 2013– · Vocals & guitar · Skåne, Sweden
Two voices, two guitars, soul and blues in every room that would have them.
Childhood friend Jens joined him on the solo circuit and the two became Unplugged - an acoustic soul and blues duo working weddings, pubs, restaurants and house parties across Skåne.
It is the project he keeps returning to. The duo reunited after California and later founded the Bara Löv Festival together.
Violet Blitz
2009–2011 · briefly 2013 · Lead guitar · Helsingborg, Sweden
Old friends, loud amps, and an EP that still holds up.
Violet Blitz reunited him with Erik, alongside Kim from Anovia and Patrik L. from Lucy in the Sky. This time he played lead guitar - the instrument he had once been told he wasn't good enough for.
The band released an EP in 2011 before California pulled him away, and reformed briefly on his return.
Hairspray - Lobero Theatre
2011–2012 · Wilbur Turnblad · Garvin Theater, Santa Barbara City College
A Broadway musical on a legendary California stage.
A study abroad programme took him to Santa Barbara City College in 2011 to study singing, songwriting, performance and music production.
Leaving meant ending every band he was in. He threw a huge going-away party and went anyway.
His friend Alex arranged an audition for Hairspray at the legendary Lobero Theatre, and he landed the part of Wilbur Turnblad in the Broadway production.
At SBCC he studied under Dom Camardella, Nathan Kreitzer, John Clarke and Ike Jenkins, and was lectured by David Paige of Toto. He auditioned for Camardella's show “Music Now” and closed the night with his own song “Blue For You”.
Luscious Joe
2011 · Actor - drummer Filip · Los Angeles, California
A Swedish rock band drives to Los Angeles chasing stardom, and the road changes everything.
Luscious Joe was a short film about a Swedish rock band that travelled to Los Angeles to become rockstars - and how their destinies changed along the way. Produced by Gustav, Carl and Amalia, it cast Axel as the drummer Filip, one of the leading figures in the band, surrounded by star actors and musicians from Scandinavia, North America and Asia.
Luscious Joe followed a Swedish rock band on the road to Los Angeles, chasing the dream of becoming rockstars. The film was produced by Gustav, Carl and Amalia, and cast Axel as the drummer Filip - one of the band's leading figures.
Shot in 2011, the production brought together star actors and musicians from Scandinavia, North America and Asia. It was Axel's first screen role, and it placed him inside the very myth he was already living: a young musician crossing an ocean to see if he had what it took.
Brothers of March
2011–2013 · Vocals, guitar & songwriting · Santa Barbara / San Francisco
Four writers, two California cities, and a stack of new songs.
Out of the Hairspray cast and the SBCC studios came Brothers of March - a band that spanned two California cities.
Zephan, a rising singer from San Francisco; Justin on drums from Los Angeles; Alex, a Colombian-Swedish-Spanish singer, guitarist and actor; and Axel.
They wrote constantly and toured Santa Barbara and San Francisco between 2011 and 2013. He and Alex are still working together today, more than a decade later.
Music Now - Dom Camardella
2012 · Vocals & original song · Santa Barbara, California
One original song, the best players in Santa Barbara, and a room that went quiet.
Music Now was the showcase produced by legendary engineer Dom Camardella at Santa Barbara City College - an audition-only night backed by some of the finest musicians in the city.
Dom Camardella's “Music Now” was the showcase every music student at Santa Barbara City College wanted a place in. Axel auditioned with an original rather than a cover, and got it.
Backed by some of the best musicians in Santa Barbara, he closed the night with “Blue For You” - a song he had written in California, played in the city that gave it to him.
Cruise 2012 - Santa Barbara to Miami & Bahamas
2012 · Featured artist & performer · Santa Barbara to Miami · Miami to Bahamas
A cruise across two oceans, a gang of Scandinavians and Americans, and every moment filmed as a music video.
In 2012 Axel joined a crew of friends from Scandinavia and America on a cruise from Santa Barbara to Miami, and then onward from Miami to the Bahamas. The entire trip was captured by filmmaker Øystein Grønvold in music video format - days and nights on the open water turned into a cinematic project.
The cruise was as much a social experiment as it was a music project. A group of Scandinavians and Americans packed into a ship, sailing from Santa Barbara to Miami, then crossing to the Bahamas, with filmmaker Øystein Grønvold capturing the whole thing in music video format.
Axel performed throughout the journey, turning decks and small rooms into stages while the cameras rolled. The footage was cut to feel like a long-form video - not a documentary, but a piece of cinema where the journey was the song.
Where Is The Love - Peace Project
2013 · Vocals · Santa Barbara, California
A song about peace, cut with friends, meant for anyone still listening.
In 2013 Axel was asked to join a peace project built around the Black Eyed Peas song “Where Is The Love”, recorded for the Santa Barbara City College Music Department.
The Santa Barbara City College Music Department put together a peace project around the Black Eyed Peas song “Where Is The Love”, and Axel was asked to sing on it.
He recorded it alongside Alex Lebron Torrent - his friend from the Hairspray cast and Brothers of March - with James Mooy producing and engineering the session.
I Wonder - 1021 Cliff Drive
2012 · Songwriter, vocals & acoustic guitar · 1021 Cliff Drive, Santa Barbara
Two guitars, one room, one take - a song written and recorded the same evening.
At 1021 Cliff Drive in Santa Barbara, Axel and Morten Opedal wrote “I Wonder” and recorded it then and there, with Axel on vocals and acoustic guitar and Morten on solo guitar. Allan Chan captured the performance in 2012.
“I Wonder” was written and recorded in a single evening at 1021 Cliff Drive in Santa Barbara. Axel and Morten Opedal built the song in the room - Axel singing and playing acoustic guitar, Morten answering on solo guitar.
Allan Chan captured the performance in 2012, turning a quiet living-room session into a record: two guitars, one voice, no overdubs, no safety net.
Solo Troubadour Years
2009–present · Songwriter & performer · Skåne, Sweden
One voice, one guitar, and every room in Skåne.
The troubadour years began the day he wrote “Why Wait”, and they have never really ended.
Pubs, restaurants, weddings and private parties - hundreds of nights spent learning how to hold a room alone.
It is also where the solo releases live: “Stand Alone” with producer Emil at T.i.S Records in Ängelholm, “Worlds Apart” produced at Bernhard Production Studios in Ängelholm, “Why Wait” cut with Joveth Jorquia in Los Angeles, and in 2024 the debut solo album “Vafan é en Jantelag?!” - the troubadour years finally pressed into a full-length record.
Idol 2014 - TV4
2014 · Solo artist · Sweden · TV4
He walked into the biggest audition in the country with a song nobody had heard.
Most contestants pick a safe cover. Axel walked in with his own song, “Down And Up”, and played it for Laila Bagge, Anders Bagge and Alexander Bard.
He didn't get past the first audition. He knew the odds the moment he chose an original over a crowd-pleaser, and he did it anyway - because the point was never to be liked by a panel, it was to be heard on his own terms.
The audition aired on TV4, some fifteen seconds of a young songwriter refusing to play someone else's song. A no from three judges changed nothing about what came next.
T.i.S Records - “Stand Alone”
2014 · Songwriter & vocals · Ängelholm, Sweden
The song he wrote to find peace after loss - and the studio that captured it.
Straight after the Idol audition Axel walked into T.i.S Records in Ängelholm and cut “Stand Alone” with producer Emil - a song about finding peace within and moving on after grief.
“Stand Alone” came out of loss. Written after grief tore through his family, it is a song about finding peace within yourself and choosing to keep moving anyway.
He recorded it at T.i.S Records in Ängelholm with producer Emil - the first time one of his most personal songs was given a proper studio treatment.
Trip Sixteen
2014–2018 · Vocals & guitar · Ängelholm, Sweden
Blood, sweat and tears - and the biggest stages back home.
Trip Sixteen was the hardest-working band of his career so far - an EP recorded with Jonte in Ängelholm and the biggest club stages in Skåne.
The band recorded the EP “Blood Sweat and Tears” with Jonte in Ängelholm, entered competitions and tore up The Tivoli in Helsingborg and Babel in Malmö.
They also built something that outlived the band: the Bara Löv Festival in the countryside outside Ängelholm.
Bara Löv Festival
founded 2015 · Co-founder · Countryside outside Ängelholm
A festival built by musicians, for musicians - and it became a tradition.
A festival in the fields outside Ängelholm, run by musicians for musicians, founded with Jens from Unplugged and the Trip Sixteen crew.
Stages built by hand, bands they believed in, and a countryside full of people who came back every year.
Worlds Apart
2016 · Songwriter & vocals · Ängelholm, Sweden
A solo single about distance, written and cut in Ängelholm.
In 2016 Axel recorded the single “Worlds Apart” at Bernhard Production Studios in Ängelholm - a song about the distance that opens up between people, and the one that opens up inside you.
In 2016 Axel walked into Bernhard Production Studios in Ängelholm and cut the single “Worlds Apart” - a song about the distance that grows between people, and the quieter distance that grows inside one.
It was a solo release in the truest sense: one voice, one song, one room, and a studio willing to let it breathe.
Wilja
2018–2023 · Vocals & songwriting · Ängelholm, Sweden
Pop-folk, patiently made - and a full album to show for it.
When Trip Sixteen dissolved, Axel and Jonte kept going as Wilja, a pop-folk project that produced a single and a full album.
The project released the single “Embrace” and the six-track album “Take Me Away”, produced by Jonte in Ängelholm and mastered by Niklas of Tungsten.
Wilja closed in 2023 - and closing it is what opened the current chapter.
Why Wait
2019 · Artist & songwriter · Los Angeles, California
The first song he ever wrote, finally given a proper studio - in Los Angeles.
“Why Wait” was the first song Axel ever wrote, back in 2009. A decade later he flew to Los Angeles and cut a proper studio version with producer Joveth Jorquia, with cover art by Morten Opedal.
“Why Wait” was the first song Axel ever wrote, back in 2009, the day Anovia ended and he stopped waiting for a band to give him permission. For ten years it lived only on acoustic guitar, played in pubs and at house parties across Skåne.
In 2019 he flew to Los Angeles and gave it a proper studio treatment with producer Joveth Jorquia - the same song, a decade older, finally tracked the way it always deserved. The cover art is by Morten Opedal.
Vafan é en Jantelag?! - debut solo album
2024 · Artist, songwriter & performer · Skåne, Sweden
A debut album aimed straight at the law that tells you to stay small.
In 2024 Axel released his debut solo album, “Vafan é en Jantelag?!” - a full-length answer to every voice that ever told him not to think he was anything special.
Jantelagen is the unwritten Scandinavian rule that says you should never think you are anything special. In 2024 Axel answered it with a question, a hat and an entire album: “Vafan é en Jantelag?!”
It is his debut solo album and the sound of every troubadour night, every band, every ocean crossing arriving in one place - written in Swedish, played with a guitar in hand, and delivered with the bluntness the title promises.
The cover says it plainly: a man in folk dress standing against a police line-up wall, guilty of nothing but refusing to stay small.
The Barcelona Album
upcoming · Artist & co-writer · Barcelona / Sweden
A Swedish pop album, produced by a friend from Santa Barbara.
Alex from Brothers of March is now based in Barcelona - and the two are making a Swedish pop album together.
A full album production and a concert tour are in motion. Thirteen years after Santa Barbara, the same two people are still writing songs together. Guest List members hear it first.
Axel V King × PGZ Sound
2023–present · Artist & songwriter · Ängelholm, Sweden
The alter ego, the kingdom within, and the loudest version of him yet.
Axel V King is where two decades of work arrive at once. Recorded with producer PGZ Sound in Ängelholm, it is rock at heart, modern in production, and entirely unapologetic.
Two singles are out so far, “Save The Day” and “Leading My Way”, with more on the way.
JL Son de Armonía
2024–present · Vocals · Malmö, Sweden
Latin fire on Swedish stages - twelve musicians, one clave.
Singing with JonnyLuis's salsa band in Malmö has rewired the way he hears rhythm. Most recently the twelve-piece took the stage at Malmöfestivalen 2026.
JL Son de Armonía is a twelve-piece salsa and son orchestra based in Malmö, founded by vocalist and bandleader JonnyLuis, born in Havana and raised on stages around the world. The sound is authentic Cuban son and salsa, played loud, played live, and shaped by the wildly different backgrounds of the twelve musicians who carry it.
Horns, congas and a dance floor that doesn't let anyone coast - the best schooling a rock singer can get. Standing in a Cuban horn section rewired the way Axel hears rhythm: the pocket, the clave, the discipline of singing on top of twelve people who are all listening harder than you are.
It is the one room where he is not the frontman, and that is exactly the point. Every night with the orchestra goes straight back into his own records.
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