Eric Sjolin aka Rikk Roxx grew up living in a trailer house next to his dad's bar, the Yodelin Swedes, located across the street from the famous world's largest Paul Bunyan statue in Akeley, Minnesota.

Adopting the moniker Rikk Roxx for his written poetry during high school and registering the alias on his FCC Radio Operator's License while studying Mass Communications at Bemidji State University, his short experience working lights for a theater production at the college later helped him to get hired to work lights for the St. Cloud based regional rock band Riff Raff.

Travelling with Riff Raff would prove to have a huge impact in his musical interest, as Sjolin credits Riff Raff lead vocalist and guitarist Randy Engebritson with showing him some basic chords and strumming techniques during off time between gigs. Though his tenure with the band was short, he did manage to get his name in credits for Riff Raff's original album release "Let's BBQ!".

After leaving the band, it would be a few years spent practicing guitar by himself before Sjolin found himself with fellow Akeley friends Don Moore, Jason Dunham and Cliff Johnson jamming in Moore's garage and eventually working up a set list of cover tunes that would entertain a crowd, but would need to be repeated to fill a complete night. The four called the band FourPlay, and played private parties and also at the Yodelin Swedes, with a tip hat passed around to help cover the band's bar bill for the evening. Later versions of the band saw Dunham move to playing guitar while Brian Hitchcock took the drums.

While FourPlay was an enjoyable and rewarding experience, eventually the band fizzled out and there was a few more years of time spent practicing guitar alone before Sjolin would sing karaoke for the first time and recognize his vocal potential. While he could now play his original music and sing it, he still couldn't do both at the same time.

Meeting up with high school friend Tim Gack who had a makeshift recording studio set up in the attic of a main street location in Walker, MN which was closed on Sundays, the pair set to record 12 original songs Sjolin had come up with:

Akeley, MN
Alone
Audubon
Better Days
Carita
Destiny's Power
Dirty Bird Romeo
Fade Away
Jammin at Moondance
Northwoods Nights
Share Everything
Sharing Smiles

Sjolin later added a rough tape recording song he had made during the solo practicing time when his daughter was very young and can be heard playfully enjoying their time together. Sjolin titled that track "Playtime".

With the 13 songs together, Sjolin set out to press 300 copies and met with local retailers to assist in making the CDs available for purchase with $1 from each CD sale going to a playground project planned at the time at the Akeley city beach. In the end $200 was raised and given to the city of Akeley to assist with the playground equipment costs.

PIC OF PLAYGROUND AT BEACH -

Connecting with long time friend and accomplished local musician Jerry Snow, Sjolin joined Snow's band Point One Oh, and later was a founding member of the band Aisle 5, playing guitar and singing at bars, weddings and festivals as far away as International Falls. It was during this time that Sjolin found a method of disposing of the remaining Northwoods Nights CDs he had, giving them away for free to random patrons he'd encounter.

After a few years of these gigs, Sjolin parted from live performance other than occasional karaoke nights. He still picks up the guitar or pen and paper when he gets an idea and records some to potentially work with later, but has no definitive plans to do more.

"I see myself more as a studio musician without a studio," Sjolin laughs. "Even assuming the Rikk Roxx alias was, besides being easier to spell or pronounce, a way of remaining somewhat anonymous. My highest hope is for a real band with amazing talent to someday record my music, that would be a great honor".

His attention more recently has been in appreciation and support of the talents of his son in law, Josh Nichols aka Casual Pharaoh, who is a rap artist based in Pueblo, Colorado. Following the many digital releases Nichols has produced gave Sjolin the idea to publish his own original work digitally as well.

Using DistroKid, Sjolin published all 13 songs under the album title Northwoods Nights. Sjolin then set out to register himself and the works with ASCAP, the MLC (Mechanical Licensing Collective) and SoundExchange to maximize any potential revenues from the songs. Sjolin then used a program called Neural Frames to create videos for each of the songs and loaded them to Youtube, sharing the links on Facebook to friends.

It was only after this had been done he heard discussion of a potential new playground to be set up somewhere near the Paul Bunyan statue across the street from where he had grown up. To Sjolin it was kismet or fate.

Sjolin approached the city council and offered 50% of all digital revenues from his song "Akeley, MN" for the next 5 years to go directly toward new playground equipment near the famous statue. To help generate clicks and purchases of the song, Sjolin also gifted the city a plaque to be installed near the statue with a QR code allowing visitors to hear the song and help raise the funds.

The council accepted the gift by unanimous vote, and working with the Akeley Chamber of Commerce and with assistance from friend Dave Moore (brother to Don Moore from FourPlay days), Sjolin now has the plaque in place. All visitors to the Paul Bunyan statue can now scan the song and purchase or play it, helping to raise funds to build the future playground.

An AI imagined recreation of the time spent in the studio was used to tease the digital release of the music.

(Click image to view that video).

A more recent image of Sjolin posing with a couple of his pet ferrets Stitch and Nico.

Rikk Roxx with Aisle 5

In 2026 after releasing his music digitally, a fan sent him this image of a signed promo poster used by his former band Aisle 5. Shown on the poster are (left to right): Mike Zimmerman (sound), Rikk Roxx (guitar, vocals), Jerry Snow (Frontman Vocals, Bass), Brian Hitchcock (Drums, Vocals) and Chuck Domrese (Lead Guitar).

Cover of Pearl Jam's Last Kiss by FourPlay with Rikk Roxx on vocals

Cover of Van Halen's Eruption / intro to You Really Got Me by FourPlay with Rikk Roxx on guitar.

Cover of James Blunt's You're Beautiful by Aisle 5 with Rikk Roxx on vocals

Cover of INXS's Pretty Vegas by Aisle 5 with Rikk Roxx on vocals

Akeley Playground Project

Northwoods Nights

Click images above to learn more about the playground project or the original music.