An unofficial box of news about the singer / songwriter Helena Josefsson, her work with Sandy Mouche and Per Gessle's Solo Band ... and other related projects
(Between 1997 and 2010) - by a fan.
If you need further information, go to the official websites
Showing posts with label 1 - PER GESSLE's SOLO BAND (PGSB). Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1 - PER GESSLE's SOLO BAND (PGSB). Show all posts
In May I gave up posting here. Nobody seems to keep on writing about Helena and "les mouches", so today I have decided to write a new article. There are some things to write about from May.
"Welcome to helenajosefsson.com. Helena´s second solo album is on its way. The site is being updated. Moohhoohaaahaaa ..."
So things are going to happen very soon.
Picture by Sandy Mouche, September 2010
Sandy Mouche's boys (and girl) have been recording a new album this summer 2010 in Per Blomgren's home studio. They even wrote a blog about it: http://sandymouche.tumblr.com/. According to the band, they are "in the proccess of recording new songs" and getting ready for a new gig.
Sandy Mouche guys and girl added: "We're currently recording new material and intend to put up some samples here. Stay put for updates!"
Meanwhile, other "friends", Per Gessle, Clarence Öfwerman and Christoffer Lundquist, have been touring and recording with Marie Fredriksson as Roxette. This time, with Pelle Alsing (drums) and Malin Ekstrand (backup vocals). Maybe you remember Malin because she took part in Helena Josefsson's Dynamo solo tour some years ago.
Helena said goodbye to P, C and C last 18th June 2010 at Princess Victoria and Daniel's wedding in Stockholm. Roxette played "The look" with Marie Fredriksson on the stage.
Sadly, Helena Josefsson didn’t have a microphone in the beginning of the song so it was a sad goodbye to the "plumbers".
Finally, Helena takes part in the last single of Arash, "Broken angel".
According to Arash’s facebook, the song was recorded in May 2010 and will be the new single for his upcoming album in 2011.
So good things are going to happen very very soon. And "Le Journal des Mouches" wants to be there, don't you? Keep up with Helena and "les mouches".
PS: I am not sure if this article means the come-back of LJdM. I said goodbye six months ago. I don't promise to update this blog usually. Help is still needed. I am sure you can do it better than myself. Does anyone want to write articles or publish his/her opinion in this blog? Thank you in advance.
Updated January 2011: The second album of Helena Josefsson will be released in February 2011. You can find more news in the official websites and in Roxetteblog - HJ.
Yes, this could be the last article of this blog, unless a new editor or new writers want it to be alive. Does anyone offer himself/herself as a volunteer? Le Journal des Mouches' editor and creator transfers the blog.
Picture by Alberto Fuente
Some days ago, I was in Sandy, Bedfordshire, UK. Well, at least my train and my camera were there, I just continued to London King Cross Station. It's not much for an article indeed, but I didn't want to give up this blog forever without any "goodbye post".
Obviously, this station made me think about Sandy Mouche and Helena Josefsson. As Adela Toplean told me in her blog "Sandy Mouche are – almost – back and Helena herself has made quite a good and danceable album which is (almost) out." Almost back, almost out, ... It explains why this blog has been "almost" a Journal. ;D
Three hundred people (well almost 300, lol) seem to have watched Sandy Mouche's last gig online and we have just got a few comments from the band on Facebook.
"Är i studion och spelar in en av de nya låtarna." - 11.03.2010
"Ännu en torsdagkväll i studion med inspelning - härligt!" - 18.03.2010
"Har varit i studion. En låt färdiginspelad nu..." - 25.03.2010
I am improving my English not far from Sandy, Bedfordshire, so my Swedish is not very good yet, but Google translator is marvelous and let us imagine that the band has been spending March Thursday's evenings at Per Blomgren home studio, recording new songs.
Meanwhile, Helena Josefsson celebrated her 32th birthday last month and received some congratulation message in her guestbook. She briefly answered: "I just want to say thank you for all the birthday-greetings :o)!! I wish you all a happy Easter!".
Easter was over and we (we?: the few readers of this blog and its editor) have been waiting for something new from "Sandy Mouche Camp". Aren't we? I hope the wind could give us more new songs and no more Eyjafjallajökull's ashes.
By the way, in London, I walked by On The Beat, 22 Hanway Street, near Tottenham Court Road Tube Station. It is the record shop that appeared in "Son of a Plumber" album. I could not help thinking about the new plans of Gessle, Lundquist and Öfwerman with Roxette. The new Rox album will be released in 2011, but Roxette will play live this summer. I am happy Marie is back but I miss the sound of "Per Gessle Solo Band", with Chris, Clarence and Helena. I didn't like the last songs of Roxette. IMHO, One wish and Reveal were poor quality and lacked the breath of fresh air that meant "Mazarin" or "Son of a Plumber".
I hope Gessle would decide to record again a personal album without the pressure of what Roxette fans are waiting for. Maybe in 2012, after the Rox fever, P, C & C could join again to record an album in Swedish together. And Helena should be there, of course.
I also miss Brainpool, the band of Christoffer Lundquist, David Birde and Jens Jansson. They recorded new songs in January for their rock opera, Junk, that could be premiered in Stockholm and London very soon. Last 22th April, David and Jens were the DJ's in Kick-Start, in Malmö.
I have decided to stop . The idea of a blog began with the Helena Josefsson's Official Forum. in June 2007, just some months after other of my favourite sites closed (Junk Musik website). I loved Helena Josefsson's forum but I needed more space to write about Helena and "The Mouches". I have tried to do a compilation of news of the story of Helena, Sandy Mouche and Per Gessle's solo band between 1997 and 2010. More or less, this compilation looks like I wanted it to look like 3 years ago. But there is no need to continue with a blog when there is not much to write about. I want to thank you for being patient with an unexperienced blogger that had made so many mistakes (I have always tried to solve them. Sorry anyway).
Maybe I will write again in this blog, maybe not. The only thing I know is that I have more important things to do right now and that writing here without readers is not funny anymore. If you have read this blog and find it useful to understand Helena Josefsson's music, just write a comment, please, anonymous if you prefer. If someone wants to tell me something or somebody wants to become the new LJdM's editor, write me an e-mail: lantartida(at)yahoo(dot)es. It's free! :D
Photo by Cornelia Haslinger - Roxetteblog.com - Germany, 12.2009- NOTP
Christoffer Lundquist will be 40 y.o. this week (btw, just one day before LJdM's editor 's 30th birthday).
Born January 16th, 1970, the producer from Lund was interviewed in December by Judith Seuma and Kirsten Ohlwein, from roxetteblog.com. We want to take some of his words of this great interview about his life and career. Since January 2nd, Brainpool is working together again with Shakina Nayfack in the new arrangements and songs for Junk Opera, that will be premiered in New York soon. Works will finish January 23rd. You can watch the first recordings here: "Writing more JUNK - Part 1" of JUNK: A Rock Opera. Brainpool and Shakina work together to expand the show with 4 news songs and 9 sung scenes.
It's our first post of the year, so we wanted to know more about P, C & C's plans. Today it is Per Gessle's birthday. Per was interviewed in Radio Halland in December (TDR tranlated the interview) and in Expressen today (translated by tomos85, from rb). Clarence Öfwerman also spoke to roxetteblog.com before Christmas about 2010. These interviews are a good source to follow P, C & C team.
Lundquist will work with Brainpool until January 23rd and will begin the new Roxette's recordings with Gessle an Öfwerman the last week of January. Busy birthday, dear Chris, but for LJdM readers it is not a surprise. The mix of snow, cats and musicians is becoming a common situation during AGM Studios' winters.
So far Helena Josefsson is not involved in P, C & C's 2010 projects and fans are still waiting for her second solo album.
Picture by Shakina Nayfack - AGM St. - January 2010
MUSICAL INFLUENCES
To begin with, when I was a kid it was a lot of Beatles and a lot of ABBA. I loved ABBA, I still do, I listen to them a lot, I think it’s great music. I was also into all this prog rock stuff, so that was also part of my music information, I listen to that still. But now I listen to pretty much everything. I am not that much into dance music, I don’t get that, I need chords and melody. I sort of discover new music all the time, Per Gessle is such a music maniac, so he is constantly playing new music to us when we are working together, I discovered a lot of new stuff thanks to that. It’s difficult to cover anything. If you really love an artist you can’t take the cover versions. I don’t want to hear Beatles covers. It’s horrible.
I collected albums when I was a teen. I bought a lot of records. But now – it’s not so much fun anymore. I do as everyone else – I have the computer and iPod and sort of stuff. But I bring out the vinyl sometimes. Then I play the music I loved when I was a kid. I prefer CD than digital songs. It’s more fun, but it’s disappearing. I mean, our kids they don’t care anymore. They want the good songs and skip the bad songs. Things change..
I used to go to concerts. Not so much anymore, mainly because I work so much, there’s never time. And when I don’t work I want to be with my family. And then I live kind of off. The place where I live, where the studio is, is in the middle of nowhere. No other people ever. And I have gotten so used to it, I like that so much and when I am home I sort of never leave the little farm. I find it difficult in big cities now. I don’t like it. I feel sad. Everything is ugly and it smells bad. When you don’t know the city you only get to see the bad parts, because you don’t know where to go. So you only see the horrible, tall buildings.. I have a house even more in the countryside, on Gotland. We have a 400 year old storage building there, with just cold water and no shower and we’re there for six weeks every summer. Not checking emails, if possible. I have become more and more like that over the years.
I am not into buying stuff and all the consumer blablabla. I think it’s a sad development. People should have more time and spend more time with their family and less time with making money to buy unimportant things that are made by kids in China. That’s my agenda. We behave very badly. I’m ashamed every day, actually, honestly. It’s really sad. A couple of years ago me and wife counted the objects our kids owned when they were 6 or 3. And I can’t remember the figure, but it made us feel “uuuh, we are bad people, what are we doing to ourselves and the planet”. So we are trying hard to change. But it’s difficult.. All the people who disagree with that must try to do something against it, or nothing will ever change. With cell phones, and getting a new model every year. I have my personal little cell phone fight. Mine is five years old and I am fighting hard not to buy a new one. It’s our whole civilization, I think, that is going into that direction. And I believe that money is the root of it all, that money has become too important, too influental, too much a deciding factor. It doesn’t mean I am a communist, but maybe we should try to listen to our emotions a bit more. And less towards economial-wise.
Picture by Shakina Nayfack - AGM St. - January 2010
AEROSOL GREY MACHINE STUDIO
Becoming producer was a gradual thing which evolved out of itself, and, of course, a lot of luck. For me writing, playing and recording is sort of the same thing to me, the record is the music in my world, so I was really interested in all this stuff, when I listened to music when I was really small I paid a lot of attention to sound, arrangements, all this, so I was always the guy who recorded in Brainpool, and I just slowly started to get requests from small local bands to help them record a demo, and then it just evolved. I have worked with lot of bands. Producing, arranging and recording. I’ve done more than a hundred albums by now, that’s what I do all the time.
I bought the house in 1997, thinking I was going to have a summer house in the country side and a demo studio, but then it GREW. I didn’t have a plan to have a professional studio and be a producer, it just happened. AGM Studio is quite unique, it’s a bit old style in the way that it’s set. Modern music making is people sitting in a small room in front of the computer and doing music on the computer screen. It used to be a lot of people together in a big room, with lots of instruments, inspiration, great acoustics, and that’s what I like and been trying to create, an old style studio with a modern approach. I’ve also got a lot of different instruments, that’s also what makes it special and is rare. Nowadays everything comes out of the computer, and everybody uses the same samples, same drum sounds, leading to a more streamlined, boring, less personality music. I’ve got lots of bookings and I work very hard, since I started. A bit too hard I think. I am trying to have somebody else use the studio without me being there, so I can have a bit of time off. A lot of French artists have been in my studio, a couple of American, Canadian, Norway. But mainly Swedish. I have never thought about working with an artist. When I start working with someone I sort of get into it and realize what it’s about. I haven’t really dreamt about it. I think it would be scary to work with your own idols or something like that. I would probably be afraid.
Photo by Kirsten Ohlwein - Roxetteblog.com - 12.2009
FUTURE PLANS
I finished my first solo album before I went on this tour, I don’t know how I am going to release it, but I will try. I released an EP that I am sort of semi happy with it, it didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to. I enjoy making music so much, but when the music is finished the rest is not so much fun. I am not into working with record companies and all that, so I will force myself to get it released, I really want people to listen to it. I’ve also got a singer singing backing vocals this time, just because I get bored of hearing my voice the whole time.
Picture by Shakina Nayfack - AGM St. - January 2010
Brainpool started with “some kind of punk” and ended up with rock operas! Haha! That’s a huge change, I agree. It was mainly, the three of us who are still in the band. The three of us are like brothers. We continue, it’s still fun, even though it’s more a hobby band now. We try sometimes to meet and play, let’s make a new album, but we need time and money and we are busy with many other things, to support ourselves. But we will again, one day, I’m sure. The Junk rock opera is very much alive. Shakina Nayfack, the American director who did the show in LA with it, two years ago, is coming to my place in January, we’ll write some new songs for it and develop it. They’ve done like 30-40 shows and now he knows what he feels is missing in the plot, so he’s going to tell us “we need to change this here,” or “this character is not clear enough”, so we are going to record some new music in January. I am really looking forward to it. After that we’ll start working on new Roxette music.
Picture by Shakina Nayfack - AGM St. - January 2010
Brainpool in January and then I hope to release my own stuff in the Spring. As soon as possible. I am not sure if I am trying to find a record company. Record companies are no much use anymore. They just want money and don’t release the records. I should try and do it myself, maybe. Yes, you can upload in iTunes yourself. And you can put it on Spotify and everything. But I am an old-style person. I like the records, I want to look at the record and the lyrics and watch pictures and so on. I really want to do that. I always read the booklet, too. And I sort of remember it like “Oh, that guy wrote this one but not that one”. That’s fun. I think you should always write that on records. As much detail as possible. The designers of the covers – they don’t want that. They want it to be clean and beautiful and I always fight them.
Picture by Shakina Nayfack - AGM St. - January 2010
We love the AGM studio. In the beginning we used to stay there for like 11 days, now it’s usually three days, we go down on Monday morning and leave on Thursday. So we work three long days, till three in the morning. It’s very intense. It’s impossible to work like that in Stockholm, since you then go home in the evening, or people come in the studio, from the record company, or for interviews. Nobody goes to Christoffer Lundquist’s, it’s too far away from everything. So we usually go down 10-12 times, about 3-4 days each, and then mix the stuff somewhere else, Stockholm most of the times. I used to have my own studio, but I don’t anymore. Now I only have my keyboards and computer to write the movie music I do, then I take it somewhere else to record it, with the orchestra. I write with “fake” orchestras in the computer.
Releasing my own music someday would actually be nice. You know, all these tracks I did for movies and TV. Maybe I could make an album with it, but I have to check if it’s enough, because it’s normally short pieces, and then some of them go together with the pictures, video. But I thought about it, maybe an EP for download. So here’s the exclusive, my movie music will be released in … the near future. And I’ll post on Facebook, and force everyone to follow the link and buy it. Joking aside, I think Facebook is a great tool to communicate. I now got my computer, and every night, I sit and chat with different people. People waking up in Chile or Argentina, they all say hi and ask when we will tour over there. I think the first one on Facebook was Jonas, then I came along. Christoffer joined I think 6 months after me, and Per just joined now. I guess since they heard us talk about it, they found it interesting. But Per always talks about Twitter, I have no clue how that works. I anyway think it’s great to have contact with people. I confirm everyone, in the beginning I was kind of scared, but I realized everyone is kind of normal. Or do you know anybody I should be careful with? I heard about what happened on the chat side on Dailyroxette.
I heard some of Beatles remastered albums, but I still have mixed feelings. I don’t think it’s better when you start to hear things which weren’t there. Christoffer Lundquist played them in the dressing room, and we both reacted on the same things like “that piano shouldn’t be that loud”, we both found the same spots which didn’t sound right to us. I will stick to the remasters from this Japanese guy, he remastered the songs directly from the vinyl, which is as close to the originals as it can get. And those are fantastic. I haven’t listened to the mono box yet. People say that those are better. But I listen to a lot of mp3s currently, the quality isn’t that good as on vinyl, but as long as the music is good, it’s fine. I like to have all songs in one place, which I can take with me. Suddenly you were out of batteries very soon. And if you want to move to a song you have to press the fast forward, and wait. But we actually recorded a lot on tape for “Son of a plumber”, basically drums, which tends to sound better when you record on tape and then you transfer to the computer, it gets a little bit of warmth from the tape, a bit of tape distortion. But we record vocals and other instruments directly to the computer, that’s easier. You can also save a lot of recordings and then pick up what you think is best, and mix it.
The tech guy? Definetely not me. Christoffer Lundquist is mostly taking care of it, he just sits and finds out how things work. I only do it home, I sit with the instructions and see what happens. You always find a solution, but I hate it, especially when you want to work and you sit there, not able to work due to a technical issue. I don’t have a big collection of keyboards, since I don’t have the studio anymore, the keyboards are in the garage. I have two of these red ones, they are Swedish. These are the ones I take on tour, too.
What do I do besides music? I like football. Zlatan Ibrahimovic is great but he doesn’t want to play in the Swedish team anymore. But maybe that’s better, because he’s such a big star and everybody’s looking what he is doing all the time. Not good for the team. He is too big for a team.
And raising kids! Haha! I have three of them, the youngest is three years old. The others are 10 and 12, three girls. They’ve been here sometimes and seen some shows. They go to a music school, where they have lots of singing. It’s a normal school but they have extra hours dedicated to singing. Swedish people aren’t that musical. There are no clubs like the ones we played at in Spring, so it’s very difficult for small bands to go and tour. When I grew up we used to play in schools, during the school hours. We also used to play in youth centers, so you could book a whole tour through schools, and maybe a rock club on Saturdays, but you can’t do that anymore, nobody plays in schools or youth centers anymore. Germany has a big tradition for rock clubs, people can tour in Germany for ever in front of 500-1000 people. I don’t know many German bands, I produced an album with a German band, Throw that beat. They are from Nurnberg. They didn’t sell many records, didn’t hit the charts. Some indy underground stuff. I heard about Tokio Hotel, I never listened to them, only heard about them. I hate Idol artists. I can’t watch them. My kids used to like it. It was the final yesterday – in Sweden. But I haven’t followed it this year but my kids tend to lose interest in it now. I think it’s very strange when they try to make them sound like people who already exist, imitate people and also force them so sing different styles, because nobody can. Like that – Per would never have made it to “Idol”, because he can’t sing in a Michael Jackson-style. I think it’s on for seven or eight years in Sweden. And nothing happens to the people who win. The next year they are forgotten. I remember Modern Talking, I hated it. I think they were in the charts at the same time as Roxette, in the same year. Per writes kind of the same songs all the time, too.. in different arrangements, but the chords are basically the same. Sometimes there are new chords, but he has his own style. And I like that style, so that’s cool. When he presents a new song, it’s like, usually I know the next chord before he takes it. You mostly stick to your harmonies. But Per doesn’t copy other stuff, he copies himself sometimes. Sometimes I have to say to him “You already wrote that one” and he says “No” and I say “Well, yes, you did”. Sometimes he rewrites if I can convince him. That’s a good feature with him, that he doesn’t notice he copies. He just writes and writes and writes. When he presents the songs to us he usually has everything, so I don’t know. We don’t change the text. No, Christoffer and I don’t do anything with the lyrics, that’s up to him, maybe only when it sounds wrong, like the wrong English or something. But he’s better in English than we are. But the meanings of the lyrics stay his.
We are aiming to begin – slowly but undoubtedly recordings of new material now in the spring. It will be bloody amazing. We are working with Clarence Öfwerman and Christoffer Lundquist in Scania as usual and everyone is eager to start the work. We're in the studio until midsummer for starters. Then possibly rehearsals if we're to do concerts. 2010 there will be nothing but Roxette. I put everything else I am musically busy with on the ice for now and the nearest future. There is no direct timetable. We just record and see what happens. There is no hurry. We're thinking '80s, that immediate in-your-face production. We're looking at 'Look Sharp!' production wise. The songs are short and effective. Clarence calls it "fool proof production" meaning not so many instruments and they all are very clear to hear. I'm trying to think that way when I write [for this album]. It's hard to explain. Maybe in December 2010, the album's out. Half of the songs are written for me, half for Marie. Marie hasn't written anything for the album. I guess we will, as always, base on Marie’s voice and my songs. I'd like Marie to sing it all, but I guess that's not possible so I have to fill in here and there. The most important thing is that we sound like Roxette. We have our own sound and that is the basis for everything else. It feels as if the material is very strong so far but I’m slightly biased… We all think it is great to work with Marie again. She is still terribly good. It is enough for me.
"Night of the Proms" was absolutely huge. Marie got standing ovations every night and we will especially never forget the German gigs. We did 42 concerts and played for over 600,000 people so it was a pretty big deal. We sang our four US number ones each after another and it felt a bit cocky, actually… It would be fun of course to do more concerts but it is up to what Marie wants and copes with. I do see Roxette performing again, that's what we want. Why not in Sweden? If not, we'll have to make room for Sweden. This is not written in stone though, but if you had asked me 6 months ago I would have said no. I might take more space on stage, since I've been touring a lot solo lately I now feel more comfortable to be on stage. US will never happen again. We're too old and vintage. But there may well be a cover of a Rox song that will climb the charts. The songs still have power, not sure that Per & Marie have it anymore… It’s actually quite amazing that it works, as you know it is completely macabre industry that eats people on the right and on the left. And it’s so natural in pop and rock business that people get forgotten. So I pinch myself in the arm every now and then…
Music? I like pretty much everything. I’ve heard Eels, Regina Spektor, Josh Ritter and The Killers today while I was driving as well as The Who’s “Tommy” which I like to listen to from time to time. My birthday party is not so big… I have a small dinner with my loved ones. There will certainly be 70s disco in the early hours.
2009 has been a good year in many ways. We got a new album by P, C & C ("Party Crasher"), with Helena Josefsson, the spring tour with Martinique and Helena's new single in Swedish. However we are still waiting for Helena's new album.
Le Journal des Mouches will be back in January 2010. We just want to wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Enjoy these days with your family and friends!
Toodiloo all Roxers! 2009 turned out to be a killer year after all! My small but heartwarming Party Crasher Tour around Europe in the spring was followed by the huge and glorious Rox comeback at the Night of the Proms. Thanks everyone for your support (appreciated!) and for those loud voices in the front row (interesting!).
Also, we started recording a new Rox-album on the road. So far so good but there are, of course, lots more to be done. And for next year we have even more mighty plans. Will let you know what’s goin’ on in Roxville before long. But for now we wish y’all a great xmas och a extraordinarily swell new year. See ya around the corner. Cheers.
Night of the Proms finished yesterday night in Dortmund. It is time to review the tour and who better than the musicians that took part in it.
Christoffer Lundquist and Clarence Öfwerman were interviewed by Judith Seuma and Kirsten Ohlwein, from roxette.blog, last week. In their great interviews, they spoke about NOTP and Roxette's plans for 2010. We also add the words of Per Gessle to The Daily Roxette.
If I had to choose between the studio or the stage, I’d stay in the studio. But I enjoy playing on stage inmensely, it’s so much fun. And I think it’s the best education for a musician, I think if you want to be good, you have to play for an audience, it teaches you a lot. Music is about communication after all, and only on stage you have this direct connection, you do something and you feel if you get something back or not immediately. Of course, this doesn’t happen with records. So…, I want to have it all!
So far I have it all. But of course, there’s the other side of touring, the travelling, being away from your family. To start with, it’s great, because we have lots of fun, we like being together. Short tours are great, like last Spring, that was great all the way through. This one is maybe a bit too long, we are away from our families for nine weeks, towards the end it feels a bit sad. But of course, it’s great playing live and spending time with the other guys in the band.
In this tour there is less room than ever, mostly because of the orchestra. But for example, we planned last Spring’s tour in a way so that we could have more room for this. We consciously tried to do that, let lose a bit, take a bit more chances than normal and hope for the best. What happens is, when you succeed on that, you become stronger and want to do that more often. The communication with the audience then reaches a peak, everybody is in the same moment. Of course, that’s a risk, and sometimes it’s not that great, but I think it’s good to take those chances, that risk. No risk, no fun.
Of course, you can’t do that during this tour. Well, we added the “Hey Jude” part during this NOTP tour to “The Look”. Marie just came up with it. She just started singing “Hey Jude” so we were all “what?”. It came out of nowhere, and it actually sounds great, so we kept it. She is actually like that, she’s always done such things, she has so much music in her, it’s so natural for her to improvise. I think she always did that live on stage, changing melodies. Of course, if you are that secure with that way of singing, you can get away with mistakes and such. We are all “Wow! What happened?”. Marie Fredriksson is wonderful. She is my idol, I think she is such a hero. After all she’s been through, she still can do this in front of so many people, and she is SO strong, she’s got so much inner strength. I bow my head to her. It’s so much fun when she is happy on stage, we all feel that so much. It was bad when she got the throat thing, that was hard. But still, she simply went for it, other artists would have cancelled the show, I mean, she couldn’t speak at all, had no voice. But she was like “no no, up on stage, let’s do it”. I think she has a new sort of dimension in her voice, maybe because of what she has gone through, what comes out is your collected experiences as human being, and she has had more experiences than most of us, so when I hear her singing now, I think it’s even better than before. There is something new there. Some days ago, I don’t remember which concert, I think I heard the best version of “It must have been love” ever, it was like a new song almost, so fragile, so full of feeling. It meant so much in a way. And when she sings the new songs Per wrote, we are all like “wow!”, it’s so fun to hear the two voices singing new songs together, it’s wonderful.
Cologne was a special night in Party Crasher Tour. But unfortunately the recording from the gig in Hamburg went wrong. So we couldn’t have “Hello Stuttgart” on the record. I would have loved that . The “finally Stuttgart” sign is in the tour bus now. It must be weird for fans from Stuttgart who don’t know it and ask “why is Stuttgart so funny?”. But Per recovered great. He said “it’s great to be here in Stuttgart..and Hamburg, and Cologne.” So he really saved himself in the last minute. But he will hear that for the rest of his life.
Our adventures on YouTube are getting worse and worse I think! Haha! When you tour, a certain silliness enters your brain because there is really nothing else to do. So your mind goes a bit empty, that’s what happens.
The break between the first song and our second part is very long, so we sit there for hours. I think Per counted the hours and realized we are going to sit backstage a total of five full days. It’s so difficult to do anything, you try to read books, but you can’t, you can listen to music, that’s the only thing. It’s the same in hotel rooms, you can’t do anything there, it’s so difficult to concentrate and get going. It’s like… BLANK. And then silliness takes over.
The silly videos are actually only boring, those don’t make it. But that’s Per’s decision, he does that on his own. He also goes around with the camera all the time, so always when he comes in the room it’s like “Hellooooo!” holding the camera, he never stops. He’s got this energy, I don’t know where he gets it from, it’s like an infinite source of positive energy, he’s amazing in that way. I’ve never met anybody who is like that actually. He never gets tired.
NOTP is different from my taste of music and style of performing, but getting to know it all and being part of it made me realize how incredibly well everything is organized and how difficult it is to do something like this. And they have done this for such a long time, and people keep coming. They are very nice and really good at what they do. So I appreciate it a lot.
The audience in Antwerp was great, everybody was dancing, ages ranged between 5 and 80, everybody was totally into it, like a huge family party every night. The audience is very different in Germany, it’s a bit older, but at the same time Roxette has more support here, so for us that’s great.
The artists slowly get to know each other. Our dressing rooms are next to each other, and we also eat together. They are all very nice. But maybe the choice of artists was a bit better in Belgium and Holland. Toots was great, I liked him a lot.
In the German part I am sort of getting into the Alan Parsons project part a bit more. I haven’t listened to it before. The second song is really nice (sings a part of Silence and I). The instrumental section in the middle is nice. Maybe that would be my favorite. And before it was Toots Thielemans. Yes, maybe you shouldn’t listen to him too many times. I think it was a bit long maybe. The film music medley was going on and going on. The Bluesette was great. Jazz is not my thing. I don’t know much about Jazz, but he is a melodic jazz player. He is 87 and plays something new every night. He has had a couple of strokes as well and he comes on stage, improvising, in front of 10.000 people. And he has some Swedish connection. In the 60’s he was working a lot with classic Swedish jazz singer Monica Zetterlund, who is fantastic, and also a pair of Swedish comedians, who everybody loves and knows, Hasse och Tage. He wrote music for their films and they made lyrics in Swedish for them. His jazz tunes are very well known in Sweden. He speaks Swedish. He comed and says “hej, hur mår du?” (laughs). And he was in the bar and was singing the theme from Swedish children’s movies that he made the music for. He was fantastic.
Clarence Öfwerman and I wrote the arrangements this summer. And they have an arranger and he added some things here and there. But we wrote the main part. And also they added things for “The Look” and “Joyride”, we wrote less for these and they said that we have to keep people in the orchestra happy, they have to play something, so we added a bit of stuff that maybe we wouldn’t have written to keep people play. But it’s still stuff that we like. That was fun. We actually wrote arrangements for the songs we were supposed to play in 2002, too. They were never used in the end. So there were arrangements for “Crash!Boom!Bang!” and “Anyone”. They were put together to one song for the huge orchestra. I hope we can use that some day. It’s a great song. It’s one of the best songs on “Have a nice day.”
We performed “Junk” with Brainpool and a symphony orchestra once. That was like the concert of my life. I never had so much fun. When we started the project I thought like “oh, this is going to be scary, it’s not going to work” and I remember maybe two or three songs into it it just felt like “yes, this is right, this is how it should be”. But that’s because it is a rock opera. But touring with Roxette or maybe a whole Per Gessle concert with an orchestra doesn’t really make sense. In this context it’s good, but otherwise not. The whole idea “Classic meets Pop” is very rarely successful, I think. A lot of bands have done it, Metallica (S&M, 1999) etc etc. And it feels like something bands do when they get bored. “We have to develop. Let’s get an orchestra”. For me, it’s not my style, but it’s very well done. They use it in a good way, I think, but I prefer Metallica without the orchestra.
I really don’t know how are we going to record the new album of Roxette. We are talking about it all the time, it might be a mixture. This time we might have a bit more or real playing, more than in Party Crasher where we used programmed drums. That was fun to do, we hadn’t done that before, but we’ll see.
I sort of play with my guitar what sounds natural to me. I haven’t listened to so much heavy metal music. No, that’s not my thing. But I like riffs. I like all the riffs Jonas Isascsson plays and that he came up with . I always rememberThe Look intro. That’s brilliant stuff I think. For me that sounds like it comes from The Beatles. It doesn’t sound like it comes from heavy metal. It’s a bit of both actually, but for me it sounds more like a Beatles riff. Jonas is such a great musician, he’s so technical and he can play so many styles. I am not like that at all. He’s just a hundred times better than I am. Jonas does that great. Yeah, Jonas is the best guitarist Alan Parsons ever had. I hope, Alan Parsons realizes it. You can see that he likes it. He’s into it, improvising and having fun. Playing with Jonas is great. He’s so musical, he has such a good ear and listens and adapts and always comes up with great stuff and this is wonderful.
The first couple of nights I got the stomach flu and I was bluaaaaah all over the place and I couldn’t be in the same dressing room like the others, so I wasn’t actually there in the first four nights. I sat in my own little isolation cell, no contact with anyone, no idea what was going on… Yeah, I am getting old. The guy I met in the reception was the back fixer. I haven’t been able to sleep because my arm hurts. It’s hard being a rock musician. I think it’s a combination of playing the bass and stress, maybe. You are tensed and then the muscles and nerves get squeezed..
Second and third concerts in Frankfurt were excellent. he first wasn’t that good. Stuttgart was the best so far, and the second in Munich. Dortmund next Sunday is the last one. It’s kind of sad, we’d like to go on forever. At least we had the family come down to us a couple of times in between, so I think it’s ok. All in all it’s great, when you get into it it’s wonderful to be on tour. Soon I will be home with my family, Santa Claus and Kalle Anka.
“The Proms” guys always make jokes. In Frankfurt, during Heaven 17 there is a lot of smoke on the stage, one of the violin guys from the orchestra, had a gas mask on stage, just for the fun. He’s crazy. One day he played with the violin on his back. Patrick is also fun, he’s been doing this from the beginning, he has done about 700 concerts. He is also good getting the audience to participate.
I just put the notes together. I have never studied anything about classic music. In some of my early works as a producer I just tried it out, and I learnt a lot from that. I still don’t know how to do that properly, but it works. Now Christoffer Lundquist and I do it together, none of us is really educated in this direction, so we only trust our ears.
I added the original “Wish I Could Fly” arrangements to the song for NOTP. Then we added some trumpets and stuff. Well, there are some things in “Listen to your heart” which were added by NOTP guys. We did about 90-95% of the arrangements. The Proms guys added the rest, which are mostly wind instruments.
It’s nice to get the response of the audience. It’s wonderful with Marie, she’s stronger and stronger. I think from the 4th or 5th concert it’s just going up. Marie surprised us all being this good, it’s fantastic.
Marie also added “Hey Jude”. It’s actually an old thing, Marie used to add this sometimes in some concerts too. It’s fun she does this again. She fell into it again. One line in “Place your love” is also a bit similar to “Hey Jude”, a small homage. Improvising is what great artists do. It’s difficult to do something every night, but sometimes it just works. It’s also not good to try every night to do something new, because it doesn’t always work. You just have to wait for and feel the moment.
I thought NOTP would be worse with all this waiting, and also the concept, which isn’t much Roxette. And I wasn’t sure about the audience. But I think it’s great. We do our thing, and then we have some time for ourselves. We listened to the other artists a couple of times, but not every night. I would love to do this again, with different songs.
We actually wrote arrangements for “Crash! Boom! Bang” together with “Anyone”, and back to “Crash!Boom!Bang”. It was similar to the “Room Service” tour, but with these arrangements we went back to “C!B!B” again in the end. So it was a bit different. We also did “Dressed for Success”. But I think lots of songs would fit this concept. “Queen of rain”, with Per and Marie singing the chorus together.
We will record new songs again in Bremen and in Cologne. We are just trying out things, keys, who shall sing what part and this kind of stuff. We have some songs with Marie’s vocals, guide vocals, something we can work with, and then we’ll have Marie come to the studio to sing the final vocals. We have no demos for the new Roxette songs. We only have the guitar and vocals. The idea of the songs, but it’s very basic. But I understand that fans like demos so much, I would also like to listen to the Beatles demos, for example.
NOTP is bizarre. Very much so. It’s impossible to understand, unless you see it for yourself. You have to really be a part of it to understand it. It’s really hard to describe to friends at home what we are actually doing - it’s fun, it’s great! It’s also a great step. I think it’s a very clever move of Marie, instead of doing a full tour or a full concert. She’s not ready to do those things. With Night of the Proms you share the responsibility with other artists, and you're just doing your four or five songs. And we're doing lots of shows, so she's getting back into the concert mode
Yes, it's amazing to be on tour again. There's absolutely nothing negative about this. Did I believe we'd be together like this again? I never wanted to ask myself that question. It was always up to Marie Fredriksson. And I'm amazed it goes so well. She's missed this, I can tell. She's always been a stage artist, even though she's been great in the studio too lately. Now the fans are crying mostly, a lot of scenes out there. We've recorded 14-15 songs, chosen keys, direction and stuff. Plus we're killing time. The recordings sound great. We're sticking to our Roxette sound, but hopefully updating it so it feels relevant to us and preferably others… It's my songs and Marie's voice, as always. A fifth US #1 wouldn't hurt! NOTP was good, Marie was excellent. Let's say we have a very good time at work. Now there's a huge possibility for a new album, then we'll see. It's a huge step for a real Roxette concert. It's up to Marie. A huge step.
We have started working on a new record, that's the plan. I'm filming a lot of the recordings. But on the other hand, I can't publish them, because I don't want people to hear those songs. So it's like a dead end. But I think it's fun, it's a fun way of communicating and the Internet has made everything so much easier. From a fan's point of view I think it's just fantastic to be able to see what's going on in the studio, backstage or in the tour bus. We only just started the recordings, but I wrote a lot of songs this year after the tour with Roxette in mind. We have started on two songs, but we have like 13. We have a pretty good idea of what we want to do, which is the hardest thing. So far so good. After NOTP we are going to start late January. We're recording in Christopher's studio and then we're doing Marie's vocals in Stockholm.
After Night of the Proms I'm going to work on the Roxette album. And then - I don't know. I'm sure there will be another Gyllene Tider tour, and I'm sure there will be another Per Gessle tour in Europe, as well as another Per Gessle album. You know, I'm just writing. Like this summer: we knew that Night of the Proms was going to happen and then I told Marie "let's try to do an album". Then I started working on songs, that's how I work. After that album, who knows? Maybe if we think the time is right for Gyllene Tider to do something, and then I will start working on Gyllene Tider songs. Maybe a summer tour.
The problem that I have with the Party Crasher project is that I have a non-working record company. EMI is really not working anymore. Nowhere. A little bit in England, but in England I'm with Sony. Sony is much better in England. I’ve walked my head into a wall so many times regarding that album. It was the same with Son of a Plumber when that album came out. The response I was getting from the record company was nothing. So I have to find another way. You know, it's a contract thing as well. I have to sort all these business things out. But, of course, I'm very disappointed that there hasn't been a proper American release for Son of a Plumber or Party Crasher. On the other hand, both albums are quite timeless, so eventually something could happen. Maybe if a song from Party Crasher would be in a commercial, then the whole album could happen I think. I'm not really in charge of that, but you know me - my plan is always to dominate the world. It's a tough one, though. In the music industry you’re in between chairs, so to speak. It's really hard to know what's going on and how you're going to work. There's always an opportunity to do an American tour, like I did in Europe, but that costs so much money. Someone has to pay for it, someone has to pay guys like him (Per points at Oskar, the tour manager and tech guy who laughs out loud). But I'd love to do it. The Over Europe tour, the Party Crasher tour, was one of the most fun tours ever made for me. The same goes for the band. Those were great shows, and I love that album. That's why I released a live album. Normally, when you come back from a tour, you feel like: "Yeah, well, that was the tour." But in this case it actually gave some songs new life and it just is a great testament of my catalogue of songs. I just feel very comfortable.
About the demos? Well, I have a plan for the future but it also has a lot to do with the recording contracts. I thought about something like putting my demos on iTunes or whatever. Basically because I think that if you're interested in my music, it's interesting to listen to my demos. And there are so many of them. For up until the Son of a Plumber album, there are demos for basically every song I have written. Of course some of them have been released, I did this Bad Hair Day thing and some Christmas things as well. But there are so many songs, I don't really know what to do with them, so the idea is probably to make some sort of an archive. Like I said, I have to sort out all this with the record company. I do know there's a big interest. I've been doing this for over 30 years now. When you are my age and you have this - I have written more than 1000 songs in my life - I think it's great to be able to have an archive, one that if you're interested you can listen to it. It's the same with the reason why I wanted Sven Lindström to do that book: because it's been a long career. If you wait too long, people are going to forget. Maybe you will even forget it yourself, or the ones you're working with. It's fun to do it when you're still around and you have the motivation to do it.
090909 the Beatles remasters were released today (by EMI), both in stereo and in mono, now EMI is releasing Roxette's entire album catalog remastered, albeit only in stereo… "The Rox Archives." Erik Broheden at Masters of Audio (former Polar Mastering) has remastered the albums. According to TDR, "very nice looking sleeves, quite disappointing booklets and the albums sound terrific in headphones."
Roxette is taking part in the Nokia Night of the Proms 2009 tour along with many other top artists. EMI Germany has released the full list of the NOTP concerts where Roxette will perform. Roxette's band will include Marie Fredriksson, Per Gessle, Clarence Öfwerman, Christoffer Lundquist (P, C & C), Jonas Isaacson and drummer Pelle Alsing.
TDR interviewed Per Gessle before his trip to New York September 23. Read it.
You can also read the final recording blog of Brandur Enni, the Feroe Islands' artist that has been at AGM Studios this year with Christoffer Lundquist.
First of all 'Night of the Proms' is a great opportunity for Marie and myself to get back together again without trying to do a full-scale Roxette concert. At this point we'd like to take everything concerning Roxette step by step. We take everything step by step. Time will tell how much she wants to work the stage. I don't know yet. But I don't consider this to be a problem. Marie's voice and presence are still magical. Enjoy the shows. We certainly will.
It will be thrilling to perform some of our biggest songs (especially "Wish I Could Fly," "It Must Have Been Love" and "Listen to Your Heart") with a big orchestra & choir. Clarence's & Christoffer's arrangements are truly stunning. And the idea of having strings on "The Look" sounds very South Park to me. I love it.
I'm sure there will be DVD:s released with our Prom-performances. Full orchestral album? Not on the agenda at the moment, no. We're actually bringing a serious amount of equipment to Belgium & Holland to make some groundbreaking recordings in the hotel corridors… I'm born, raised and bred on 7"-singles. Every thing I create starts off as a "single" in my head. That's the way I am, that's how I work. But the decision what should/shouldn't become a radio-single or the lead teaser for an album is basically made by the various record companies. You have to trust that they know their own markets. At least, that's what you would expect in the olden days when we were having tea with the Queen.
I'm a writer. I love to write songs. Then I love to record them. So yes, I always find myself halfway into a recording situation and it would be lovely to make some new splendid landmarks with the divine Ms. F. We'll see what happens and check our pulses. But yes, we'd love to make some more recordings as Roxette.
Most of the stuff that Roxette's fans are interested in is owned by jolly EMI and at the moment it's really hard to get any answers or directions out of them. They're in a complicated state of business. We're still trying to grab a decent record deal in US for these two up and coming youngsters, Marie & Per. I guess big things will happen in due time. However, we try to be on the case as we'd love to have everything available just as much as you do. Trust me. We all shoot film all the time. We'll use the best parts down the road, like we've always done. I'd love us to do another great album and a world tour again. I won't promise it will happen though. But it certainly would be great fun. I'm sure that a Gyllene Tider reunion will happen one of these years too. It's a great little band.
I only make acoustic demos these days. No arrangements, no intros, no solos, no double choruses. I leave all that to the real studio sessions. It's more fun like that. Much more creative. I love the input I'm getting from C&C.
My new album ("Sometimes truth needs a lie") was finished Friday night at 10pm - September 11th. It was a crazy feeling... something deep inside me said that this was worth a celebration, but we had worked 24/7 in an almost three-week-race, so Christoffer Lundquist wanted finally to be with his family which I totally understand...so I went down to the little house where I'd stayed, feeling kind of melancholic and proud at the same time - and extremely hungry for some crazy party - the only problem was that I was all by myself in a little house in the middle of a dark forest - not knowing a soul. I drank some bear and put some Swedish "snus" under my lip, what I never do unless something very special's happened...I tried to read a novel, the only one that seemed interesting for the time being, but I got restless and bored. Then I hear somebody's screaming/singing Gasolin songs somewhere in a distance. I go outside and find that my only neighbor is having one hell of party! But I'm too shy to go over and join them...I tell myself that I can't just walk in there if he's having a very personal party. I made pictures of the situation turning creepy with a stranger suddenly turning up. But after walking around my house for half an hour hearing their wild karaoke songs, I felt so alone that I finally built up some courage and grabbed my guitar and went over to introduce myself as the new neighbor! It turned out to be one of the very best parties I've ever joined...the hosts were the warmest people you can imagine...we played and sang all through the night. No club or magical bar could ever compete with that spontaneous garden party!
Roxette’s Per Gessle and noted Swedish music journalist Sven Lindström celebrate the summer season with a countdown of the 50 greatest Scandinavian summer songs of all time on The Spectrum’s Nordic Rox, SIRIUS XM’s Scandinavian music show, July 12. Listeners will hear songs by Peter Bjorn and John, Eagle-Eye Cherry, ABBA, Roxette and more. See the list in the comments of this article.
Roxette performed live at Jurmala, Latvia and the New Wave festival last July 28. It seems Roxette will play the same five songs as on the Night of the Proms; "Wish I Could Fly," "The Look," "Joyride," "It Must Have Been Love" and "Listen to Your Heart." And just to be clear; since this was a TV-show Roxette did not perform live, but lipsync. The band included Marie, Per, Clarence Öfwerman, Jonas Isaacson, Pelle Alsing and Christoffer Lundquist.
According to Per Gessle the seven new Roxette remasters (2009 versions) will be released September 28. All physical albums will have no more than three bonus tracks each, except for "Tourism" which only gets two. Per explains on Roxette's own site - roxette.se - that it was neither EMI's nor Roxette's intentions to put out collector's items, but new versions of older catalogue titles and that demos and such will be taken care of otherwise.
Meanwhile, the band from Stokholm [ingenting] has released the first single, HALLELUJA!, off their third album, "Tomhet, idel tomhet" (to be released on September 9, 2009; Labrador Records). The album was recorded and mixed by Christoffer Lundquist at AGM Studios, Vallarum, and produced by Jari Haapalainen. The members of the band are Niklas Lundell (percussion), Christopher Sander (guitar, vocals), Mattias Bergqvist (drums), Sebastian Ross (bass), Tobias Måård (guitar) and Andreas Jeppsson (keyboards).
This is not the last 2009 CL's project as producer. Between 25th August and 11th September, he will be recording new songs for Brandur Enni's upcoming album.
For Latvia, we are bringing C&C - Christoffer and Clarence on bass and keyboards respectively, Pelle Alsing on drums and Jonas Isacsson on guitar. I recorded 2 new demos while visiting the ‘Aerosol Grey Machine-palace’ in July. Both are played on banjo. And both are primarily for Roxette for sure. Clarence and Christoffer are currently working on the Night Of The Proms strings arrangies. Songs sounds great. I never knew I had written epic symphonic music!!!
This is my Twitter-Radio of June and July:
July 14: Ruby, don’t take your love to town. Kenny Rogers. Great beard.
July 13:Evil hearted Ada. The Flamin’ Groovies. Used to play this a lot with the GT-lads late 70’s.
July 12: Fleet Foxes are quite good. Sunday treat: Found my old Paperback writer/Rain 7″-single!!! (Info to all you young people: It’s by The Beatles!). My God, it sounds good!
July 11:Cars. Gary Numan.
July 10:It Never Rains in Southern California – Albert Hammond
July 9: Outstanding song of the day: Urge for going. Joni Mitchell. Telstar. The Tornados.
July 7:Forever young. Dylan. Live at David Letterman 1993. It’s on YouTube. http://bit.ly/rq4CX
July 6:Red balloon. Tim Hardin.
July 5: Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood. Did you ever.
July 4: Have you seen her. The Chi-Lites. Magnificent.
July 3: Can’t make up my mind between L’important c’est la rose/Gilbert Becaud & Making plans for Nigel/XTC. Can you?
July 2: Waiting on a friend. The Rolling Stones. Made for the shade.
July 1:Somebody to love. Brad Newman. There’s a Swedish version as well. Någon att hålla i hand. Sven-Ingvars. Almost as good.
June 30: Sweet Tuesday song of the day: Steve Miller Band: Fly like an eagle. Sounds old. And young.
June 29:I don’t like Mondays. Boomtown Rats. Never liked that one. Manic Monday. Bangles. There you go.
June 28: Sunday Ditty of the Day: Sally Simpson by the Who. It’s on Tommy.
June 27:Duncan. Paul Simon. A masterpiece, never liked the flutes, though….
June 26:Billie Jean. MJ. Outstanding. Unbelievably good.
June 25:Hard to handle. Patti Drew. They don’t do ‘em like this anymore!
June 24:Invisible to her. Brainpool. -”And all the boys are goin’ aaaah!”. Brilliant!
June 23:A man without love. Engelbert Humperdinck. You need music like this once in a while.
June 22: Donovan. Hey Gyp (Dig the Slowness). AC/DC last nite. Excellent popcorn!
June 21:Fresh strawberries and Bend me, Shape me (American Breed). Flavours of the day.
June 20: Anything by Erik Satie…
June 19:Neanderthal man. Hotlegs. Cheers.
June 18:She’s so high. Tal Bachman. Hated it on the radio a couple of years ago. Love it now. Is there a lesson to be learned from this?
June 17: Watched quite terrible David Bowie-DVD “Plastic soul review” last nite. However, song of the day must be his Young Americans. Superb!
June 16:Rebel yell. Billy Idol. Purrfect. Followed by All the way to Reno. REM. When they’re good they’re outstanding.
I never listened to The Beatles in mono. When I was kid I was listened to it in stereo. So I don’t care about the mono, even for the albums that are supposed to be mono. I like the band there (points at the right ear) and the voice there (points at the left ear), because that’s what I heard when I was 10 years old, that’s right for me. I am actually so nerdy that…there’s a Japanese guy who got old Beatles records and transferred them to digital without touching them, straight into the computer and sold that as a bootleg. I got those, so I can listen to them .. He turned them into MP3, but good quality MP3, but it sounds more like you’re used to. I prefer that. I bought a couple of the Beatles stereo records and being a total nerd I have listened to them. Clarence Öfwerman and I listened to them in the dressing room and we both reacted the same way: “It’s changed! It’s not the same”. I am really big on that. You should never change a record, you shouldn’t try to improve them. You can’t improve something that is already done. When it’s done it’s done. It’s like you add a new color to Mona Lisa. They haven’t remixed the songs or anything like that. I think they want back generations in the masters, which changes the sound a lot and you sort of hear details that you never heard before. And the levels changed like the piano isn’t that loud.. Roxette remasters are most subtly done I think. Less change… Yes, there is a difference, but it’s not that big. But it’s bad when artists remix their old records or improve them or update them. Don’t change them. They should be as they always were. No new Beatles remastering for me.
All these stuff they put on records for copy protection, that’s bullshit of course, you can’t do that to people. And it’s the same when you buy stuff on the internet. Before you could have a file only on a couple of computers and so on. I mean, come on – you buy it and it’s yours. Like they do with movies – all the region stuff is idiotic, that’s bad and that’s how they are ruining their own life, because people download it illegally then. I think it’s just off the track. There must be a connection between the people who get it and the people who made it, who should get something for it. That’s the only important thing. And downloading is fine, when it’s not 90%. But Spotify is sort of difficult, too. It’s a great great concept and so much fun, but you get something played 4 million times and then you get 1000 Euro for it. I mean, no one can survive. And about the whole downloading discussion. You mentioned people first download and then buy when they like it, that’s true, but the people who suffer the most aren’t the big ones. That people always say: “Oh, we steal from Madonna, who cares , Michael Jackson, Roxette, they have so much money”. But smaller artists just disappear. They earned just enough to be able to make a new record and now they don’t anymore. So you get no new music. That’s really sad. It’s more about the small ones for me.
The first session in Aerosol Grey Machine Studios was for one week in March. The producer Christoffer Lundquist had to go on a tour with Per Gessle, so we waited 6 months and I returned to his legendary studio on a warm summer day - August 25th. In July - Jana & Tony recorded a video for Sometimes Truth Needs a Lie, in a deserted mental hospital in Sundvall. The place was very creepy...but it was perfect for the video. you can watch it here:
During the summer I had a few concerts in Stockholm and one in the Faroe Islands as well as being opening-act for some big outdoor concerts in Stockholm, Gränna, Borås, Liseberg - Göteborg , for Sanna Nilssen, Shirly Clamp, Sonja Aldén and Charlotte Perrelli. In August before returning to the studio. I went on an Inter-rail trip together with three friends of mine, down through France, Germany, Schweitz and Italy. I had to keep my voice fit beacuse I was going to the studio directly after the trip. My friend Jonas Molinder and I played on the streets in pretty much every town we visited...we met so many wonderful people out there. When we played in Venice a french beat boxer came to join us, and he was fantastic...everybody gathered around us and we went on for a great while... The pleasure in seeing people stop just to listen felt amazing, 'cause they don't know who you are, they don't even care - they just listen to what they hear and stop if they really like it....no pressure - just some honest music-lovers ;)
According to Sydsvenskan’s article and web report, Christoffer Lundqvist, the man behind Per Gessle’s latest albums, is currently working on a new CD with Östra Torns Montessoriförskola kindergarten’s children’s choir from Lund in Scania, Sweden. All lyrics were written by children themselves and the album will be released just before Christmas. All profits will be transferred to help “Sponsor a child” organisation in Peru. By the way, the Swedish rapper Timbuktu was born and raised in Östra Torn, the eastern district in the town of Lund.
Per Gessle's latest solo album "Party Crasher" finally sees the light of day in the UK today. The UK edition will be the standard 12 track album. However, it would appear that the album is not being sold in shops. As far as The Daily Roxette has heard you can only order from online sites.
Per Gessle has revealed on Twitter that his forthcoming live album will be titled "Gessle Over Europe," resembling Paul McCartney's tour name from 1972, "Wings Over America." There are "no further comparisons," says Per in his tweet. Per's live album will be released as a double-LP as well as a CD included with the DVD. Per seems to be very excited about it. "I received the album masters the other day and they sound terrific" Per says.
Per has also written on Twitter that the live recordings included on the album are from Cologne, London, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Stockholm (day 2), Warsaw, Halmstad and Munich concerts. The LP will contain three, possibly four, bonus tracks, while the DVD will contain the full Stockholm #1 concert. EMI is working full time to get the material done before the vacations start and Per mentions the albums preliminary will be released early September.
UIT Magazine, a local Dutch lifestyle and entertainment magazine publishes an exclusive interview with Roxette in their June issue. The full page article deals with Roxette’s comeback and performance as headliner at the Night of the Proms concert later this year. Marie mentions that during the Christmas tour in Sweden she discovered she felt great again on stage. She loved being on stage again and decided it was time to continue with Roxette. Clarence Öfwerman and Christoffer Lundquist will play again with the band. It seems Helena Josefsson won't be with them this time.
Per and Marie are reuniting and will perform again as Roxette in Latva this summer. The duo is set to perform for the opening of New Wave 2009 on July 28 in Jurmala. Sirius XM has put up two videos with Per Gessle being interviewed on Nordic Rox on YouTube. One where he talks about the Roxette reunion and one where he talks about the concert with Marie Fredriksson in Amsterdam.
When Marie indicated she was completely ready, we could start talking about a reunion. A lot has happened in seven years; we both have changed. Roxette used to be a part of the music industry, trying to be successful. That’s not our goal anymore, we now focus on the things that satisfy us. We will enter the studio this summer. We will not record an entire album, but we will release something new. I hope we can release this to the public before the end of the year. Btw, I have been in NYC in May. Found some great 80's shoes!! And bought a donut and a hat! And "In search of the lost chord" on vinyl. Moody Blues, anyone?
June 15: I love the nu Jonas Akerlund-video. Lady Gaga’s Paparazzi. www.raf.se is where it’s at. Don’t know what’s happening but I like the song too. And “Goin’ back”, by The Byrds.
June 14:Sunshine on the westcoast! BBQ and old Jethro Tull. The Sounds new album sounds very good.
June 13:Saturday in the park. Chicago. Ha ha ha ha ……
June 12: Playing “Hold me” from Russell Smith’s first solo album (on vinyl!!!). Produced by Barry Beckett & Co. Brilliant! Barry Beckett dies. Such a shame. Extraordinary musician. Muscle Shoals. Check out, f i, Paul Simon’s There goes rhymin’ Simon. A treat. The Friday Take-Off: Believe I’ve found/Soundtrack Of Our Lives. Beautiful. Beautiful. Beautiful. Reading a most fab book: “Bob Dylan – The songs he didn’t write”. About the covers he’s recorded & performed. A thrill.
June 11: Can’thelpbutthinkin that Basse Wickman’s Son of Cathy’s Clown is the best Swedish single ever! Such a great voice (nevermindtheKnopflergtr) Anders F. Rönnblom “Jag kysste henne våldsamt”. Pump up the volume!!!!
June 10: “Walking out on love” Paul Collins’ Beat + “Supersonic” Oasis. It’s one of those mornings…
June 9: Just like a woman. Bob Dylan. Live 1966 Royal Albert Hall. Some of the most beautiful music ever made.
June 8: Song of the afternoon: Harley-Davidson, sung with love & affection by Brigitte B. Cry baby cry from The White Album. I never quite got over the fact that the Beatles broke up.
June 7:Never gonna give you up – Rick Astley. The 80’s are underrated!
June 6:BOHEMIAN LIKE YOU The Dandy Warhols. Should be played every Saturday morning!
June 5: “Dizzy” Tommy Roe. Makes you wanna dance with the cornflakes.
June 4: Just came back from Sthlm Stadion. Bruce sounded terrific, he even played Who’ll stop the rain but Gabriel & me were freezing our asses off! “Feel like makin’ love”. Roberta Flack. Awesome.
June 3: Someone is playing “Broken down angel” by Nazareth. Haven’t heard that one for years. Must be this crazy neighbourhood…. Ain’t it strange/Patti Smith Group. Fantastic. Can you believe Gyllene Tider played this -78? I made a Swedish translation. And we played John Cale’s “Helen of Troy”. “Flicka av guld” was the Swedish title if I remember it right… Got it on cassette somewhere..
June 2: “Snow angel” by Ron Sexsmith. Just what we need for summer!
June 1: Peter Bruntnell’s version of “Waterloo sunset”. Just dandy!
May 31: Additonal suggestion: Whatever happened to my rock’n roll. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. Makes you wake up. Mothers’ Day. Song of the day: Take your mama for a ride. Lulu. 1976. Swell.
May 30: “Dreams are ten a penny” by Kincade. Great production, great song!
May 29: I just listened to Washington County by Arlo Guthrie. i loved that album as a kid, it still sounds like I remember it. Great sleeve too! Almost song of the day: Dick Mixon’s wonderful remix of “Silly really”. He’s so talented, folks, you wouldn’t believe it! “Everybody’s got to learn sometime” by the Korgis. Beautiful.
May 28: Bo Diddley on the iPod. Oh yea. Forgot about how overwhelming and ass-kicking Bowies’ Ziggy Stardust is! Oh man, play it again, please!
May 27: More Steve M! Check this out & get blown away: http://bit.ly/10KsPJ OUTSTANDING!!!!
May 26: No, haven’t seen Madonna since Paris 200?. However, got tcts to the Gbg show! She was at our gig at the Beacon, NYC 1992!
May 25: Checking out Small Faces on youtube. “Tin soldier” is on my Top 10 best-song- ever-list. There will never be another Steve Marriott!! Mama said by Nick Lowe is from “E.P.” Pretty hard to find these days. Good luck with it. B-fast in the sun, Josh Rouse & Little Richard on the iPod, great Indy race last nite. Awopbopaloo.
May 22: Meetings are up. Headin’ for New Jersey and Springsteen’s hometown-show. Sean Penn in the hotel lobby. We all love him. Brooze in New Jersey last nite was a mesmerizing experience. I like Radio Nowhere for some reason. The crowd was the best I’ve seen. I like Brooze when he’s showing off his pop side. Cover me, Hungry heart, Wauting on a sunny day, I don’t like Rosalita & Jungleland. Sorry.
May 17: Someone next door is playing Dr Hook’s version of “Only sixteen”. What a great idea!!! Xllent choice of music, Gabriel! Kim Fowley’s behind B. Bumble & Co! Kool kat indeed! Keith Urban on the iPod? I met him in the gym at the Bev Hills Hotel a couple of weeks ago. Nice guy, b-ful wife!
About the Roxette recordings, I don´t know but I do not believe I will participate there. But it was a great moment to sing with Marie Fredriksson in the live situation during the Party Crasher Tour. Actually, the most stunning thing was to witness the love from the audience, amazing. I took my earplugs out when she entered stage so I could hear it well! It was kind of scary to enter the stage after her performance to sing "Hey Mr Dj", and the band was hesitating backstage, just before, wondering if we should do it. But I just felt like, it is a wonderful song so why not? And I think it went well even though it could be a great down fall to enter after a living miracle like she is, Marie getting well from such a serious condition, being able to sing again.
Martin says hi to you and we wish you a lovely summer!!!
'Le Journal des Mouches' is an unofficial compilation of news made by fans for fans.
.........................................
Editor and Publisher: Alberto Fuente, aka Lantartida (from Madrid, Spain - now living in London, UK).
The blog includes articles and opinions of musicians (Helena Josefsson, Martinique, Gessle ...) and interesting words by some fans (thank you all) written in other websites and forums.
.........................................
Editor's note: I didn't use others words to win anything. I just wanted to compilate information about my favourite artists. If you find any information or photos that shouldn't be here, don't hesitate to tell me.
............................................
If you wanna be the new LJdM's editor, join or write an article here with your signature, just knock on the door: lantartida (at) yahoo(dot)es. Without help, this blog will be empty.
Picture by Sandy Mouche, September 2010
![2009 - [ingenting] - Tomhet, idel tomhet](http://s196.photobucket.com/albums/aa95/Lantartida/5D%20Other%20related%20artists/?action=view¤t=3878631330.jpg)
