Sweden's EUROPE Honored With Special Monument In Band's Original Hometown: Video, Photos

The Swedish municipality Upplands Väsby, where several members of EUROPE grew up, unveiled a monument in the band's honor earlier today (Saturday, June 4) at Blå Parken (Blue Park). All five members of EUROPE attended the ceremony, which is part of Upplands Väsby's 70th-anniversary celebrations.

After the event, EUROPE issued a statement saying: "We were so honoured and humbled today as our hometown Upplands Väsby unveiled a monument in our honour as part of its 70 years celebration. We are so incredibly lucky to get recognised in this way. THANK YOU VÄSBY!"

Nearly four years ago, Upplands Väsby honored the members of EUROPE for their efforts in spreading word about Väsby through national and international media in their four-decade career. A piece of artwork designed by Concretum Arte was presented to the band before their concert at Gröna Lund in Stockholm in August 2018. At the time, Maria Röstberg, minister for culture and recreation, said in a press release: "There is a pride in Väsby about the rock culture that EUROPE and other artists from the city have contributed to."

Two years ago, EUROPE singer Joey Tempest said that a documentary about the band could be on the horizon. He spoke about EUROPE's tentative plan to make a film during an interview with Tom Cridland of Greatest Music Of All Time.

"We get asked a lot about a film or documentary," he said. "So that's one thing in the future that's there for us to do. I mean, there's the early years of Upplands Väsby and Stockholm and how hard rock really started happening around the world as well. So there's a lot to be told there… [We still have the] original members. We've done six new albums now. We did five the first period. We won a Grammy [Grammis award] in Sweden the other year; we never won anything like that. It's amazing."

EUROPE has released six albums since reuniting 19 years ago — "Start From The Dark" (2004), "Secret Society" (2006),  "Last Look At Eden" (2009), "Bag Of Bones" (2012), "War Of Kings" (2015) and "Walk The Earth" (2017) — and, according to Joey, there are no plans for the band to slow down.

"The last two or three albums just felt really, really good," he said. "And we're in a good place, so we're just gonna keep going, touring. We work quite hard. 'Walk The Earth' feels like you wanna walk the earth; it feels like you wanna go to all the places. What we have left is South America; we've got America left. We just came from Japan. We did Australia, U.K., Europe, Scandinavia. So we're working on walking the earth at the moment. And recording the follow-up [album], hopefully with [producer] Dave [Cobb] again. And learn more about music and move on."

"Walk The Earth" was released in October 2017 via Hell & Back Recordings (Silver Lining Music). It was recorded at famed Abbey Road Studios in London with the aforementioned Grammy Award-winning producer Dave Cobb (RIVAL SONS, Shooter Jennings, Jason Isbell, Chris Stapleton).