You probably did not see the sign.
Ulf Ekberg, a founding member of 1990s hit-makers Ace of Base, apparently got his start in a neo-Nazi punk band.
Best known for sunny pop numbers like 'The Sign' and 'Beautiful Life,' Ekberg got his musical start in a much darker place.
According to Vice's Benjamin Shapiro, who publicized the singer's spotty past in an article Wednesday, Ekberg created the group Commit Suicide, a group that performed songs with explicitly racist and xenophobic lyrics. The group was active from 1983 until 1986
Shapiro translated a selection of the band's offensive lyrics from an unnamed number:
"Men in white hoods march down the road, we enjoy ourselves when we're sawing off n----rs' heads/ Immigrant, we hate you! Out, out, out, out! Nordic people, wake up now! Shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot!"
Swedish label Flashback Records collected Ekberg's Commit Suicide output into 1998 compilation "Uffe Was a Nazi," which features titles like "Don't Touch Our Country" and "White Power, Black Skull Slaughter."
Shapiro reports that Ekberg was also a member of the Sweden Democrats, a group whose ranks "still maintain connections with contemporary hate groups."
Ander Klarstrom, former head of the Sweden Democrats and one of Ekberg's Commit Suicide band mates, was convicted in 1986 for harassing anti-racists, including Jewish theater director Hagge Geigert.
In 1997 documentary "Our Story," Ekberg disowned his neo-Nazi past.
"I told everyone I really regret what I did. I've closed that book. I don't want to even talk about it, that time does not exist to me anymore," Ekberg said. "I closed it and threw the book away in 1987. I took the experience from it, I learned from it. But that life is not me. It's somebody else."
Ekberg has since transitioned from music to business interests, founding strategic marketing company Result, whose clients include McDonald's, Linkedin, Google, and IBM.
