Swingfly

Ricardo DaSilva II, better known by his stage name Swingfly, is an American–Swedish naturalised

Ricardo DaSilva II was born in New York. He lived in Trinidad and Tobago and Panama before relocating to Stockholm, Sweden in 1991.^[2] In Stockholm, he became involved in the emerging hip hop scene and joined the Timebomb collective, together with producer Christian Falk, rapper ADL, and DJ Sleepy among others. Three singles were released, including Swingfly's "Smoke 'em Swing", a jazzy number produced by Christian Falk.^[3] A series of albums was planned but the record label bailed out.

Under the name "Swing", he teamed up with Dr. Alban in 1995 and recorded the Euro-disco hit "Sweet Dreams", featuring Dr. Alban (a cover of the classic Eurythmics song), which peaked at No. 12 in Sweden.^[4] This took him into the pop charts in a number of European countries, including the Netherlands, where the single peaked at No. 44.^[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 the Fugees European tour in 1996.^[5] 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.^[6]

He achieved his biggest success through a collaboration with the electro/dub/punk trio

Swingfly landed a record deal with the largely rock oriented label

He participated in Melodifestivalen 2011 with the song "Me and My Drum". The song prominently featured the vocals of Christoffer Hiding but without crediting him specifically in the competition credits. Swingfly placed second in the first semi-final, and advanced to the final, where he placed fifth overall.^[13]

Despite failing to win, the song gained great popularity and was released as a single reaching #2 on Sverigetopplistan, the official Swedish Singles Chart.^[14]

Melodifestivalen 2016

Swingfly participated in

In popular culture

• Swingfly has contributed rap vocals on many artists' songs, including
  Ken, Lutricia McNeal and Teddybears
  .
• The track "Singing That Melody" came out in the summer of 2008. One year before its European release, Korean artist
  Tony An
  recorded a Korean language cover of the song. This has led to a confusion as to whose version is the original. "Singing That Melody" was written by Ramstrom/Magnusson/Swingfly/Beal.
• His songs have been featured in episodes of
  NFL; and the video game FIFA Street 2.^[16]
• His songs have been used in ads for
  Cingular Wireless, and in Tic Tac’s East European commercials.^[17][18]
• Swingfly was referenced in the lyrics for the song Robert Johnsson by Swedish indie duo Junior Brielle in the spring of 2023. The groups singer accused the rapper of having borrowed one thousand Swedish Kronor from him in 2015 in exchange for playing the then unsigned duos demos for famous record producers. According to the Junior Brielle song the rapper have not returned calls or the one thousand kronor to this day. As the song was a minor hit on Swedish radio the songs lyrics sparked a bit of debate in Swedish media, mostly propelled by the music journalist Fredrik Strage. ^[19]