Biography
Kjetil Rønningen was born in Holmestrand, Norway in 1983. He started writing songs on an acoustic guitar he got for Christmas when he was 13 years old. The year after he got his first electric guitar. He continued to write songs, and recorded them on a MiniDisc recorder. When he was 15 years old he took the name “Kelly Superstar”, and in the year 2000 he created a website called “Kelly Superstar’s way to rock’n roll”, inviting “fans” to follow him from the start on his way to becoming a true musician. The website contained news and recordings of some of his songs. Kelly made some home made CDs of an album containing 11 songs, a five track EP and a six track acoustic recording. He also performed live in his home town. Øystein Granheim Hammer saw this performance, and later came knocking on Kelly’s door, asking for everything he had recorded up until now. Øystein was a guitarist, and Kelly had seen him play in different settings from a very young age, always impressed by his talent. At the time, Øystein was playing in the local band Televisionary. In 2002, Kelly and Øystein performed three songs together, written by Kelly, on the local music festival ‘Trestockfestivalen’. When Kelly turned 20 he held a party at his house, where Øystein told him that he had an idea for a song. The two went down to the basement where they finished writing the song together, and recorded it on Kelly’s computer. Listening to the song the next day, ‘Tonight’ sounded like a hit single. Kelly and Øystein decided to record the song in a professional studio, with help from Rune Thoen as producer and bass player. The song would later earn them a recommendation on the national TV and Radio station NRK P3’s ‘Urørt’, and was played on the radio.
Photo by Eivind Stensnes.
Kelly and Øystein would continue writing songs together by exchanging a four track tape recorder. One of these songs – ‘Stay Together’, was the beginning of their first band together – Mars University, formed in 2003. The band got together for the first time in the same studio where Kelly and Øystein had recorded ‘Tonight’, and recorded ‘Stay Together’. The band stayed together for a couple of years, releasing six additional tracks on an EP in addition to some nice live performances in Holmestrand and Oslo. One of their songs – ‘Get Over’ received yet another recommendation on NRKS’s Urørt. The band continued writing new songs, but unfortunately 2005 saw the end of the band, and these songs never made it to a recording studio.
Mars University at the Gang Bang Culture Festival in Holmestrand in 2004. From left to right: Tor Christian Eliassen, Kelly, Øystein Granheim Hammer.
After the band split, Kelly continued writing and made eight solo recordings public on the NRK Urørt website. In 2008 Kelly and Øystein got together again and made a demo of a new song they had written together called ‘When The Fire’s Gone’. This became the start of a new collaboration, meant to be a reunion of Mars University of sorts, but with only Kelly and Øystein as original members. Kelly’s psychology class mate Mads Friberg was the drummer, and Alexander Aarvik (also a friend from psychology) joined them on bass guitar. As they stopped playing the old songs and had a bunch of new ones, the band was not considered a reunion of Mars University anymore, but a brand new band that was to become Bravo Papa. For a detailed biography of this band, click here.
Bravo Papa – from left to right: Mads Friberg, Øystein Thomassen, Alexander Aarvik, Kjetil Rønningen. Photo by Stian S. Evensen.
In 2023, after five studio albums with Bravo Papa, Kelly immediately found inspiration to write and record something new. As the last Bravo Papa album had taken more than four years to make, Kelly wanted to make something faster, and making a solo album felt like a natural thing to do. Songwriting in Bravo Papa has always been a collaboration with Kelly adding melodies and lyrics to music that is born out of jams. This time Kelly wrote a bunch of songs on an acoustic guitar like he did in his youth. This was the second reason why this album should be a solo album. In addition to that, Kelly had ideas for electronic drum and synthesizers. He had learned a lot in mixing the last Bravo Papa album, so mixing and mastering this felt easier than ever. The whole process went so fast that he had a whole album ready, both written, recorded and mixed about seven months after the release of the last Bravo Papa album.
In January 2024, Kelly took the name IN (International Name) Kelly, and released his first solo single ever, called Sleepwalker. Together with Kristine Halland, they made a music video for the song, showing the “Sleepwalker” walking around in a snowy landscape with his magic guitar case, containing guitars and synth pads.