Swingfly

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Swingfly
Origin	Stockholm, Sweden (New York)
Genre(s)	Hip hop, Alternative rock,Rapping, electronic music
Occupation(s)	Rapper
Years active	1991 – Present
Label(s)	EMI Sweden Dolores Recordings
Associated acts	Teddybears, Blacknuss

Swingfly is an American - Swedish rapper and singer. He is best known lending his vocal talents to other artists records. He is currently working on his solo career and a rock & electronica influenced album is to be released this summer. He was born Ricardo DaSilva II in New York (He is sometimes known as Swing-fly, Richie Pasta or Swing). Swingfly has also lived in Trinidad & Tobago and Panama before relocating to Stockholm, Sweden in 1991 ^[1] ^[2]

1 Early Career
2 Biggest Success
3 Going Solo
4 Collaborations
5 Notes
6 Videos and Music

[edit] Early Career

In Stockholm he became involved the emerging hip hop scene and joined the Time Bomb collective together with producer Christian Falk, rapper ADL (artist), DJ Sleepy among others. Three singles were released and one of them was Swing Fly's "Smoke em Swing", a jazzy number produced by Christian Falk. ^[3]A series of albums was planned when the record label bailed out.

Under the name “Swing” he teamed up with Dr. Alban in 1995 and recorded Euro-disco hit “"Sweet Dreams” (a cover of the classic Eurythmics song). This took him into the pop-charts in many European countries and charted as high as No3 in the Dutch chart ^[4] In 1996 Swingfly appeared on several tracks of ADL’s Absent Minded project. Due to a small hit via a Hugo Boss commercial Absent Minded hit the road supporting Fugees European tour in 1996. ^[5] ^[6] Swingfly was featured on several tracks on all three albums with soul-jazz collective Blacknuss All-Stars (later known as Blacknuss) as well as being a frequent contributor to their live shows around Europe and the UK.^[7].^[8]

[edit] Biggest Success

He achieved his biggest success collaborating with electro/dub/punk trio Teddybears on their 2004 single “Hey Boy”.^[9]This song became one of the most played tracks on Swedish radio that summer. The song "Hey Boy" has been listed for 21 weeks on the Sweden Singles Top 60 and peaked at number 13.^[10] Swingfly has since then toured Sweden, Europe and the United States with Teddybears and their spin-off project Teddybears STHLM Soundsystem.^[11]

[edit] Going Solo

This lead to him landing a record deal with largely rock oriented label Dolores Recordings. This label has been responsible for launching several Swedish based artists international career such as Caesars, The Soundtrack of Our Lives and I'm From Barcelona. Through Dolores he released a few singles and an album was planned for 2006 but was stalled for unknown reasons. The singles he released did spend a total of 26 weeks on the Scandinavian charts. ^[12]

A reworked version of the album is planned to be released in 2008. It features production from Klas Åhlund of Teddybears fame, Kleerup (both of them has produced Robyn), Rampac and Thomas Rusiak. The album features a handful of guests such as Ebbot from The Soundtrack of Our Lives, Awa Manneh and possibly Robyn. Swingfly has said that a few tracks will be straight up hip hop, yet most songs will have a rock and punk flavour plus some electronica influences. He lists The Strokes and The Soundtrack of Our Lives as two of his favorite bands and influences. He says it was Teddybears who got him interested in guitar bands.^[13] ^[14]

He has a deal with Bonnier Music Publishing. His song “Something’s Got Me Started” has been featured in an episode of Private Practice, video game FIFA Street 2^[15] and ads for T.G.I. Friday's and Captain Morgan ^[16] ^[17] ^[18]

[edit] Collaborations

Swingfly has contributed rap vocals on many artists songs. A few of them are Dr. Alban, Taro, Blacknuss, Robyn, Freddie Cruger ^[19] ^[20] ^[21], Absent Minded, Looptroop, Ken (artist), Lutricia McNeal, The Compilation album Sidewalk Headliners and Teddybears.