Interview

Per Gessle interview in Västra Nyland

by

Before Gyllene Tider perform in Ekenäs, Finland, Kjell Ekholm from Västra Nyland did an interview with Per Gessle. Kjell met Per in his Stockholm office on Strandvägen.

As Kjell says, Per is a music addict. He has lived and breathed music since he was a child. In addition, he is the only artist who has managed to keep three different careers going at the same time and succeeded in all of them.

Together with Marie Fredriksson, Roxette became bigger than ABBA themselves in the US. The duo managed to get a total of four songs to the No. 1 position on Billboard Hot 100 and over the years, as a solo artist, he has given us many immortal pop classics in Swedish. Now Per Gessle is coming to Finland and Ekenäs for the first time with Gyllene Tider.

According to Kjell, it’s always fun interviewing Per, because he is still so enthusiastic when talking about pop music. Already as a child, Per was able to experience various forms of creation via his mother. She wrote a fairy tale about Ferdinand the ant for him and made her own illustrations for it. As an 11-year-old, he started writing his own songs, but without music.

I have always liked to express myself and when I started school, I also liked to write essays. I created pop music first through lyrics, because I could not yet play an instrument.

He tried to translate songs by David Bowie and Leonard Cohen. He admits that the result would hardly stand the light of day today. But the fact is that Gyllene Tider got their first record deal largely thanks to Gessle’s lyrics.

Per Gessle has always been obsessed with pop music. He says himself that it has meant everything to him since childhood. He and his older brother bought a lot of records, by the time he was ten, he had 100 LPs, while his friends owned five at best.

He earned money for the records by handing out newspapers. Sometimes he managed to get the records a little cheaper when he bought them from his brother’s friends, who needed money for cigarettes. That’s how he came across Lovin’ Spoonful’s album and Los Bravo’s single Black Is Black. But he didn’t just invest in records.

When I was ten, I started buying the English music magazines Melody Maker and later, when punk came along, also New Musical Express. I actually still have those magazines.

20 years ago, Per Gessle coined the expression that a new song must be better than the previous one. Kjell is curious if he still thinks that way today.

Oh no, that no longer applies. I was talking to my wife the other day and stated that if I were to stop making music now, I could probably feel quite satisfied with the songs I’ve written.

I am in the same situation as, for example, Bryan Adams and Tears for Fears. I’m simply not what you could call mainstream anymore. Pop music must always reflect its own time. When I was a child in the ‘60s, the entire youth culture was dominant. It influenced visual arts, film, theatre and clothing. Everything belonged together.

In today’s digital era everything is controlled from our phones and laptops and you notice that in music too. All the music on the charts today sounds the same. There is no place for madmen like Brian Wilson, David Bowie and Frank Zappa. Other artists, who are the same age as me, like Belinda Carlisle and The Bangles, have fallen into the classic “vintage guys and girls” category. We represent a different era.

When Per was 16, he received a Spanish guitar as a gift from his mother and when he learned the basics, things quickly progressed. After school, he was unemployed like so many other young people in Sweden. Quite surprisingly, he and a friend got employed as troubadours at the county council in Halmstad. They went around to nursing homes and hospitals and played and sang. Gessle says it was a great school for him to play at four locations a day and entertain the patients and the elderly.

It was a success and their contract was extended to six months. The repertoire was a blissful mix of Drömmen om Elin, Svarte Rudolf and Streets Of London, but they could also throw in the occasional CCR classic.

He laughs when he suddenly remembers a special event in the long-term care ward at the hospital in Halmstad. They had never played there before and when they arrived, there was no one to receive them. They went in, took out their guitars and started playing. They thought it was a little strange, because in the great hall there were only two beds, and the people in them did not take much notice of the young troubadours.

We settled down and played “Proud Mary” by Creedence Clearwater Revival. At the same time, a nurse arrives and asks what we are doing there. At the same moment, one of the patients sits up in bed and looks at us. The nurse is completely shocked. It turned out that we had come to the wrong place and in this room there were two patients who had been in a coma for a long time.

The nurse lost her temper, the troubadours quickly scurried out of the room and a whole medical team came in to confirm that a small miracle had happened to that patient.

It was fate that wanted us to be there and this is a proof of the strength there is in music.

When Gyllene Tider started their career, the whole band went to London to buy guitars. In a guitar shop far outside the city, Per bought a burgundy Gibson Les Paul Custom. It was a similar one that Ray Davies had in The Kinks.

They also bought amplifiers, which they had shipped to Sweden, but they wanted to take the guitars home as hand luggage. When they arrived in Sweden, they had no money left and tried to smuggle the guitars in without paying customs.

Of course we were caught for it and customs seized all our new instruments. We were completely devastated. When I got home, I wrote an emotional letter to customs and explained that we had no money left and that we were still young and ignorant. They were human and we got the guitars back, but I was fined 2000 SEK, which was a lot of money at the time.

Today, the financial situation for Per Gessle looks different. He is a partner in eleven companies and has built up a fortune and millions of assets. His music business is divided between three companies, of which he is also chairman of the board. Together, they have assets of over 30 million euros.

In addition, he is a partner in Tylösands Havsbad and Tylösands Kompaniet Aktiebolag, which are estimated to be worth over 50 million euros.

He has a passion for cars and owns 15 exclusive cars from brands such as Ferrari, Rolls-Royce and McLaren. His favourite car is a Ferrari Dino from 1972. His interest in cars had been awakened when he saw the pictures of John Lennon’s psychedelic painted Rolls-Royce as a child. Then he had to settle for collecting Corgi Toys toy cars and building car tracks with his older brother.

The guys discuss the beginnings of Gyllene Tider and the early songwriting. Kjell claims that the style he had then was a combination of The Beatles’ melodic loops and the energy of new wave music. Per agrees, adding that he always liked bands that could combine good melodies with energy, like the Ramones and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. The latter became the house gods of the entire band.

I’ve always had lousy self-confidence when it comes to my music and especially my voice. I’ve always hated my singing voice. What punk and new wave music did for me was that I realized that you didn’t have to be very good. I felt safer when I heard that everyone else also had faults and shortcomings.

If you have a band that is not super competent, there is often more energy and adrenaline in the playing than technical quality. I still like that today. For example, I never liked Mariah Carey’s singing style. That’s the expression I want in the singing and playing.

Kjell is curious what the secret is behind Gyllene Tider’s success.

There is something strange that happens when we play together. I know I sing differently when I play with these guys. There is some DNA molecule in all of us that is activated when we play together. It’s impossible to explain, but it feels absolutely magical. Age and experience certainly play a role as well. We now have a film in the works and then we have gone through old memories and it is a wonderful journey we have made together.

Kjell says the guys will probably never say it again that they are quitting.

No, I didn’t like it either when we said in 2019 that now we are saying goodbye. It was our drummer, Micke “Syd” Andersson who thought we should finish with the flag at the top as long as everyone was alive and well.

Over the years, I have learned that it’s not good to paint yourself into a corner. I remember an American lawyer I hired once upon a time used to say, “my preliminary opinion is”. Then you can always change your mind. Then came the corona pandemic and nothing was the same anymore. In addition, we made a new record and therefore it felt good to go on tour again.

Per Gessle’s parallel universe in Hallandsposten

by

As it always happens before a tour starts, Jan-Owe Wikström from Hallandsposten did an interview with Per Gessle this time again.

There was a sneak premiere of the Gyllene Tider tour at Leif’s Lounge in Hotel Tylösand last Thursday, release of the new record “Hux Flux” the following day and tour premiere of Gyllene Tider at Brottet in Halmstad on Friday. It is the present.

New solo record already completed for release next year, premiere of the Gyllene Tider movie in 2024 and then also premiere of the musical in Malmö, based on Jane Fallon’s novel “Got You Back” with Roxette’s songs as a basis. It is the future.

Come along into Per Gessle’s parallel universes.

This is how the industry works today. Everything must be planned a year in advance. Least. It’s studios, venues, hotels, staff and everything around that needs to be booked, so it’s important to always be one step ahead.

Per and Jan-Owe are sitting in Per’s house in Sandhamn which, surreally enough, turns 30 this year.

The summer of 2023 lies ahead of Gessle and Gyllene Tider. A new tour awaits. Even though everything was really over that evening on the pontoon outside the Opera House in Oslo on 18th August 2019. Until a red, rectangular Bo Diddley model Gretsch guitar in the fall of 2021 changed everything again. And Hux Flux was Gyllene Tider back.

For some reason, I usually come up with something new when I’ve got a new guitar and these songs screamed for “Gyllene”.

But if he hadn’t suffered from tonsillitis and new covid regulations hadn’t been introduced, there might still not have been a comeback.

That’s how it was. In November, at the end of my 2021 acoustic concert tour, I got tonsillitis and had to cancel the last concerts in December. And when they were to be implemented in January instead, new pandemic restrictions came and everything was moved until April.

That gave me a lot of time to spare, so between December 2021 and April 2022, this album was created. I recorded demos together with MP, where we worked in a completely new way. Since we had so much time this time, compared to the recording of the last record “Samma skrot och korn” in France, we devoted a lot of time to the guitars. We went back, tested, redid and tested again.

Then, when everything was basically ready, we sent the material out to the band. Some songs were just finished in form, but not arranged, then everyone got to make their mark and that’s where Anders came into the picture, who modernized the sound on some.

The rest was recorded at Staffan Karlsson’s Sweetspot Studio outside Harplinge. And the result: an energetic pop album full of string guitars and of course – Farfisa organ.

I was doing the acoustic tour at the time and in parallel also finished PG Roxette, which was an ’80s-90s synth-based pop record. So this became an outlet to play that kind of totally dying guitar pop that I’ve always loved. Old fashioned, a bit punk and edgy where the song “Gammal kärlek rostar aldrig” almost sounds like Plastic Bertrand and Sigue Sigue Sputnik.

It’s difficult to balance between silly and fun, but I try to get on the right side of the line because Gyllene should be a little more fun, a little more kick-ass, which isn’t always easy when you’re 64.

I noticed in retrospect that on the previous Gyllene album from 2019 I had too many songs that were better suited for me as a solo artist. A little more sophisticated and more serious. Gyllene sounds best when it becomes a little more classic power pop, a little more 3-chord fireworks!

And actually, this time I haven’t written a single song that didn’t make it.

Just like the previous record, “Hux Flux” is also available as a vinyl LP in several colors. But the song order on the vinyl version differs from the CD and streaming.

Yes, on an LP there are two opening tracks and therefore you always want a strong, exciting ending on side A to get curious about side B. Otherwise, with the CD and not least streaming, it has easily become that you featured too much music. The LP format is perfect.

The fact that Per still buys vinyl records is due to one reason in particular:

It’s for the album covers. Then I usually play the records on Spotify anyway because it’s easier.

At the same time, he misses the romance of the physical records.

I come from a generation that has a romantic view of the record itself and therefore it is so difficult to accept that it hardly means anything anymore. Without the album covers, the music becomes much more obscure and is consumed in a different way. Most young people probably listen to even more music than my generation did, but they don’t always know WHO they are listening to. Or what the songs are called. Or who wrote and produced. Everything has become one big anonymous stream of music since streaming took off.

In the past you went on tour to promote the records because it was on the records that you made money. Now it’s the other way around. Major tours are very lucrative. Few people care when old artists release new material because it’s the old hits that the masses want to hear. I can only look to myself and have no idea, for example, about the last decade’s Elton John, Bob Dylan or Paul McCartney records.

Jan-Owe is curious how Per has managed to “survive” despite the fact that the music industry has completely changed, both in terms of listening, consuming and the way of writing.

I don’t know. I’ve tried both to try to develop myself and my creation in the digital world while at the same time “going backwards” sometimes and staying with the acoustic and organic in my music. I’m interested in both ways because they bring out different sides of me and my creativity. I absolutely believe that as long as you have fun and work consistently, a certain amount of success will come naturally. But of course, if you want to reach the top of the charts around the world, all the stars must be aligned. It is completely out of my control.

Jan-Owe asks Per how he knows if a new song fits his solo project, PG Roxette or Gyllene Tider.

I actually try to write as little as possible. But I always have the antennas out. Sometimes an idea pops up when I’m strumming the guitar in front of the TV and I save the idea on my iPhone. When I’m working on a project, I go through everything I’ve collected and use some for what I’m working on at the moment. This is a pretty typical scenario how I write songs. I do puzzles.

I almost never sit down and write lyrics or complete songs if I don’t have a project going on. That way, I almost always know from the start what I’m looking for.

For the audience, Hux Flux, the album is brand new. But for Per, MP, Anders, Göran and Micke Syd, it is already fifteen months old when Per reveals which minute is the most important at a concert:

It is the last 30 seconds before the concert starts and the first 30 after it has started. Then the expectations are maximized and that is why the first impression is so extremely important.

There are more songs that can be played live this time compared to the last record. But at the same time, over the years, we have built up a treasure trove of songs that means we can’t skip “Leva livet”, “Tylö Sun” or “Sommartider”. People expect them as they have such strong nostalgia value and many have lots of memories and connections to those songs.

Then the old songs are on so many playlists. It’s the same with Roxette, we’re constantly increasing on Spotify. If we release a new single, it gets 30-40,000 streams in the first few days, while “It Must Have Been Love” gets 400,000 streams on any given day. Then you think: Why can’t people listen to the new song instead? But it doesn’t work that way.

That Gessle, when “Hux Flux” was finished a year ago, would take it easy and wait for it was not on the map either. Instead, he has spent the winter and spring completing his new solo record, which he just finished with a planned release sometime in 2024.

I wanted to finish this record before I enter the Gyllene bubble that lasts until September.

Per gives a hint of how it sounds:

It has a bit of a summery Mazarin feel. I play many instruments myself but have the help of many new acquaintances. It’s a super exciting project.

The start of filming for the new Gyllene Tider film is in the pipeline with the band bringing the cast to the stage at the sneak premiere at Leif’s Lounge last week.

It starts filming in August with a premiere next year and if the film is as good as the script, it will be awesome. The film is not a documentary depicting Gyllene’s enormously long career, but is about the early years, from when I meet MP and we form Gyllene Tider until 1982 when “Sommartider” is released. A lot of anecdotes and craziness run past, it really was a special time that I hope can be portrayed in an equally special way.

In autumn 2024, there will also be a premiere at Malmö Opera for the musical with Roxette’s song catalogue based on the novel “Got You Back” by the English author Jane Fallon and reworked for a musical script by Klas Abrahamsson.

I have met her a few times and she is fantastic. To my great surprise, I have discovered that my music works perfectly in a musical context. I’ve never been particularly interested in musicals because the style itself can be very pompous and slightly annoying. It’s never been my thing. But songs like “Spending My Time”, “Crash! Boom! Bang!”, “It Must Have Been Love” and not least “Listen To Your Heart” work superbly with a large orchestra and grandiose arrangements. They are big melodies with strong and intense emotions.

So I’m grateful that it happened. Back in 2015, we got the first offer, but it always turned out that the script wasn’t good enough. Up until now. Because this is a wonderful way to nurture Roxette’s music and the ambition is also for it to go abroad.

However, whether there will be a solo tour in the summer of 2024 before then remains to be seen. Per cryptically smiles and says he can’t say anything about it. But in Per Gessle’s parallel universe and future calendar, it may already be inscribed, Jan-Owe says.

Per Gessle interview in Dagens industri

by

Dagens industri magazine met Per Gessle at Hotel Tylösand and while Lars Jansson was taking some fabulous photos of Per, Göran Jonsson interviewed him about his career, successes, collections (vinyl, guitars and cars), as well as business.

Göran thinks that selling a few hundred thousand concert tickets for another Gyllene Tider reunion tour is a measure of success. Displaying your collection of Ferrari cars at your own Hotel Tylösand is another. The real success is based on the hit songs written by Per Gessle, a song catalogue that is not for sale.

Göran starts the article with some information about and description of Hotel Tylösand. Per bought it together with former TV4 manager Björn Nordstrand in 1995. Göran saw Marie’s portrait photo next to the reception. It was taken by photographer Mattias Edwall and it’s part of the Per & Åsa Gessle Collection.

Per invites Göran into The Look suite at the hotel. There they start talking. Per points out that the cover photo for his first solo album 40 years ago was taken at Tylösand beach, which they can see from the panoramic window of the suite. PG explains that his first two solo records were considered a flop and he didn’t get a new record contract. Gyllene Tider had ended by then and he felt a little lost. It took 18 years before he again released an album under his own name with Swedish lyrics, Mazarin (2003).

Per says:

I got a lot of requests to write songs for other artists, especially lyrics, including „Kärleken är evig” for Lena Philipsson. From that I learned that it suits me very badly. I have a hard time adapting when someone says ‘change that line’. Then I realized that it wasn’t my thing to write songs on order for others.

I was able to develop as a songwriter thanks to having Marie. Songs like „Listen To Your Heart” and „Queen Of Rain”, they were all written for her. When I think back, it feels like „Look Sharp!”, the „Joyride” era and „Tourism”… There are some songs on „Tourism”, „Queen Of Rain” for example, that I still think are very good. In this way, I was a bit of a ‘late bloomer’ compared to many others, who peak when they are around 25 years old. When Roxette broke through, I turned 30 and Marie was 31. And since then it’s been rolling.

Göran is curious if it is slower to write songs now and if it is harder to find inspiration.

No, not really. I have just finished a brand new Swedish solo record that will be released next year.

Göran is surprised, because he knows that a new Gyllene Tider album has just been released. Mr. G explains it was recorded last summer. When they reunite, he has to write a new record so they can hang out a bit, because they never meet otherwise. Then they get to hang out a bit, feel each other’s pulse, play together and be creative. It’s the best there is, he says to Dagens industri. It’s wonderful when they meet.

Göran wants to know if Per knows how many records he has sold during his career. He has no idea. He knows that Roxette has sold appr. 80 million albums, but there are a lot of streamings. He has no clue about how many albums GT sold, but he remembers that Mazarin sold 400,000-450,000 albums.

How much money he has earned, PG doesn’t know. His greatest asset is his extensive song catalogue. He has 862 works registered with the copyright organization Stim. For a long time, a single song was teasingly missing for the catalogue to be complete. Per wrote the music and Ingela “Pling” Forsman wrote the text for Skepp utan roder, which was submitted as a contribution to Melodifestivalen in 1986, but was not accepted. It was the only one Per Gessle wrote that he did not own the rights to. Later, Per became friends with a manager at Universal Music, which owned Skepp utan roder. PEr told him his story, that there was a single song that he didn’t own the rights to. Then all of a sudden one day, when Per celebrated his birthday, Universal’s Swedish manager came and rang the doorbell with a vinyl single that they had pressed with this particular song. Then PG got the rights back.

The real gems are of course all the hit songs he wrote for Roxette and for which there is an international market. Many great artists sold rights to their music for billions in recent years, e.g. Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Tina Turner, Paul Simon, Sting. Per Gessle’s songs are owned by his own music publisher Jimmy Fun, which in recent years has had a steady turnover of between SEK 16 and 19 million and has reported a profit after net financials of SEK 12-13 million annually. Per has no plans to “cash in” and sell his song catalogue.

I can understand that you do it if you are Springsteen, he is 73 years old, and Dylan who is over 80. I’m a little too young for that. It’s like selling your babies and I’m not ready for that. I’m not quite done yet. But there are a lot of people who want to buy the rights. There are props almost every week, or at least every other week, from different places. But I don’t want that now. Maybe one day.

Göran from Dagens industri says that those who invest in song catalogues speculate on the longevity of the songs, that they will get back what they invested and more through ongoing copyright payments. The question is how long the lifespan of Per Gessle’s songs is.

I don’t have a crystal ball, but the big hit songs will certainly work for a few more generations.

PG says that music is made in a different way these days. You hear a lot of old music in commercials, in HBO films, Netflix series and so on, because no such music is written anymore.

I understand that rights are worth their weight in gold, because suddenly a song appears in a TV series and then it rattles.

Göran writes about Pretty Woman and It Must Have Been Love, the song from 1987 that got a second life and became number one in the US in 1990.

Göran Jonsson shares some financial details about Hotel Tylösand too. It turned out to be a successful investment, he thinks. The turnover increased in 2021 to SEK 199 million with a result after net financial items of SEK 46 million. Per owns 50 percent of the shares in the hotel through his company Elevator Entertainment, which last year received SEK 20 million in share dividends.

It has gone very well for the hotel. Björn and I were, at least during the first ten years, not particularly dependent on the hotel’s income, so we reinvested the profits.

To Göran’s question regarding how involved he is in management, Per replies that he sits on the board and in the past ten years he has taken up more space than in the beginning, when he was very much the ‘silent partner’.

Göran Jonsson says that the hotel walls are covered in art, mostly photographs. Some are for sale through the gallery Tres Hombres Art, of which Per Gessle is a co-owner, but many belong to the Per & Åsa Gessle Collection. Not even Per can tell exactly which works of art are the family’s and which are the gallery’s.

During the interview, the guys are sitting in front of the photo that is on the cover of David Bowie’s album Pin Ups (1973). Per has a few prints of it, even a huge one at home in Halmstad. David Bowie is undoubtedly one of his favourites. To Göran’s question regarding which was the best concert he had been to, Gessle replies it’s impossible to answer, but he remembers being completely enchanted by the Station to Station tour with David Bowie at Scandinavium in Gothenburg in 1976. It was absolutely magical to see him. Everyone in the audience came in platform shoes, but he himself suddenly looked like Frank Sinatra.

The Beatles are at least as strong and it was photos of John Lennon’s psychedelic painted Rolls-Royce that sparked Per’s interest in cars. It was the 1960s and in his room in Halmstad there were toy cars from Corgi Toys and a car track from Scalextrix.

Now Per has collected his cars in The Joyride Car Collection: twelve Ferraris, a McLaren and two Harley-Davidson motorcycles. Most are on display at Hotel Tylösand. The exhibition hall with glass walls in all directions is located on the ground floor of a newly built hotel part with 39 rooms and a conference room that was inaugurated in May.

It was my and my wife Åsa’s idea to build a garage there. It was actually only intended for six to seven cars, but there was room for eleven and now there are ten there, nine of which are Ferraris.

The idea is that I will rotate them. They must be serviced once a year and must therefore come in and out here. Then maybe I’ll take one home and put another one here.

Göran is curious what the car collection is worth. Per says he doesn’t know, Göran should google it. Göran has done that. It said SEK 100 million on some site. PG thinks it’s probably a very low estimation. There are some real gems here. The Ferrari LaFerrari Aperta is one that cannot be bought, there are none for sale. One was sold at some charity auction and it went for SEK 80 million. So such a car is worth maybe SEK 40-50 million.

Göran says that the exhibition catalogue has the info that together the cars on display are driven less than 100 miles per year. He wants to know if the collection is to be considered an investment in the first place. Per finds it difficult to call his interests investments. It doesn’t sound much fun.

I played at Ferrari’s 50th anniversary party in 1997 in Italy and got to know them and their representatives in Sweden. That was before it became a hysterical business of collector cars like this. It is only in the last 5-10 years that it has become so.

First he just liked the cars. But in 2001 he had the opportunity to buy a limited edition car, a 550 Barchetta Pininfarina, of which 448 were produced. It’s a car that Per has home. After that things got tougher.

The Joyride Car Collection

Ferrari 250 GTE 2+2 (1962)
Ferrari Dino 246 GT (1971)
Ferrari 550 Barchetta Pininfarina (2001)
Ferrari 430 Scuderia (2007)
Ferrari 599 GTO (2010)
Ferrari 458 Speciale Aperta (2015)
Ferrari F12 TDF (2016)
Ferrari LaFerrari Aperta (2017)
McLaren Senna (2018)
Ferrari 488 Pista Spider (2020)
Ferrari Monza SP2 (2020)
Ferrari Daytona SP3 (2023)
Ferrari 812 Competizione Aperta (2023)
Harley-Davidson XLH 1200 Sportster (1992)
Harley-Davidson Heritage Softail Nostalgia (1993)

Göran thinks Per must have made a good deal, since he started buying Ferraris before the real boom took off.

Yes, but you don’t make money until you sell.

Göran refers to the stock exchange. Per says shares are greedy and he thinks it’s super boring. He is totally uninterested in that kind of investment. But these cars are fun and really beautiful.

It’s the same with art and photography. I bought a lot of amazing photographs in the 1990s. It cost nothing then compared to now – Terry O’Neill, Ansel Adams, Irving Penn, Robert Mapplethorpe – just because I liked it. I have got to know many photographers. Anton Corbijn is a very good friend of ours in the family. I have worked with him since 1999. When Gabriel, our son, was little, Anton was at our house every year and took family photos of us. We have lots of photos from Gabriel’s upbringing. It’s really fun. I love his work and he is a damn nice guy.

Göran asks Per if he has a record collection.

Yes, of course I have a record collection. Otherwise you are naked. I’ve purged stuff that I got for free from record companies over the years and never listened to, but I still have the records that have followed me through life, about 2,000 LPs.

He also has a guitar collection of a little over 100 guitars. As rarities he has some old Martins, acoustic guitars from the 1930s and ’40s. And Rickenbackers. Per points out that the retro logo for The Joyride Car Collection is a Rickenbacker attached to a gas pump.

So-called memorabilia from his career adorns Leif’s Lounge, one of the restaurants at Hotel Tylösand. There hang, for example, six framed rejection letters, addressed to Hamiltons väg 8 in Halmstad before Per moved away from home. Among those who had a demo cassette with Gyllene Tider’s music sent to them, but who declined and returned it, were Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson at Polar Music. The rejection letter from Electra is signed by Ingela Forsman, with whom Per Gessle later came to write a song together, the one that was missing from his catalogue for a long time.

Göran writes that Per is a big music fan and has encyclopedic knowledge of rock and pop music. He has always loved the aesthetics of music. For him, it was important that Gyllene Tider’s records came out on EMI’s Parlophone label, the same one on which The Beatles’ music was released.

He misses album covers, pictures, magazines and everything else around music itself, which is anonymized when practically all music is streamed.

I’ve got used to it like everyone else, but I think it’s super boring. When I was growing up, there was an absolutely huge pop culture, which was teen-affirming. The role of pop music has completely changed since then, but our whole society has changed, so it’s not so strange.

Per thinks album covers make the music so much clearer. He looks up at David Bowie’s Pin Ups on the wall where they are sitting. That record is the album cover, after all. The Abbey Road record of The Beatles is the crossing point. Dark Side of the Moon, Sticky Fingers and all the others. Per thinks that without those covers and that song order, these albums would have meant something else. He thinks it’s hard to explain if you haven’t been there then.

When I sit and talk to my 25-year-old son about this, he just thinks I’m weird. He doesn’t understand anything. And he is absolutely right about that. And I can’t understand how music can mean so little. If you talk about today’s pop music, I don’t understand the purpose of it. It seems like everyone is trying to make the same songs that everyone else is making. Everything follows the same formula. Everyone works with the same plugins and the same type of sound. Everything sounds very good, but it also sounds very boring.

Göran says there are many indications that we are at the end of the era that began in the mid 1950s with the breakthrough of rock music. The golden age of that music style is definitely over. In an interview in the New York Times last fall, Jann S. Wenner, founder of the influential music magazine Rolling Stone, said this about rock and pop music: “I’m sorry to see it go, it’s not coming back, it’ll end up like jazz.”

Per thinks he is right.

There will soon be no more rock music. Being able to play and sing has lost its value a little because you can do everything with computers. That was knocked off when the EDM music thing happened. Rock music as we know it will only become a small niche. Once upon a time starting a band was fantastic!

The article on Dagnes industri is for subscriers only. It includes some fab photos of Per and a video reportage. The video can be watched without subscription HERE.

Per Gessle and Anders Herrlin about Gyllene Tider on Efter fem – TV4

by

Per Gessle and Anders Herrlin were guests on TV4’s Efter fem on 1st June. You can watch it HERE!

The program leader, Axel Pileby says 4 years ago Gyllene Tider was out on a farewell tour and said goodbye in packed venues around the country after 40 years. But if you are one of Sweden’s greatest bands, you can make a comeback as many times as you want and now a new tour awaits and also a new Gyllene Tider album. He says it’s great to have Anders and Per on the show and asks them if GT is still as much fun. The guys say it’s a lot of fun. PG adds it’s a wonderful little pop band of the type that isn’t formed anymore.

Axel says they will talk about the GT film later, but he heard on the radio that yesterday Anders was going to meet the guy who will play him. Anders says it felt a little strange, but it was nice. The guy studied him thoroughly and they talked a lot. The guy was staring at him to check Anders’ moves and behaviour and so he felt watched.

The program leader says they will talk about the film and many other things soon, but first comes a little nostalgia and his colleague will tell a bit about magical Gyllene Tider. So here comes a compact history of GT. After the introduction of the band’s career, Axel asks the guys if they sometimes stop and think, wow, what have we done. Anders says when they see such presentations, they do. Seeing the 2004 Ullevi picture there, it’s just fantastic. Axel says he wasn’t there, but just by looking at the picture he gets goosebumps. It must have been extraordinary. Per says the first time they played Ullevi was absolutely incredible. So it has been an awesome trip.

Axel asks the guys how often they think back to GT and such things as Ullevi. PG says he is reminded about Gyllene Tider all the time. You hear GT music all the time, e.g. now when it’s graduation time of secondary schools (studenten), the students still sing Sommartider.

Axel says the band is back again after their 2019 farewell tour and he is curious what happened, why they changed their minds. Anders says the pandemic happened after their decision. Everything became so sad, everything was shut down and it was boring. Then this idea was born that they should fix themselves and bring back some light. Anders remembers when he hit the last note at the last gig in Oslo, he thought, „shit, what have we done? This is really sad, we should continue”. Per says people have a different way of thinking because of the pandemic. You started to appreciate things that you have in a different way. Time passed and so they started talking about why not recording a new album and play a bit more together. All of a sudden it felt obvious in a way, so it wasn’t really planned, but Hux Flux just happened. Axel says they maybe somehow realized it even more how much they miss each other, how much they mean to each other, because they have been a part of each other’s lives for so long. Per says such thoughts popped up during the pandemic in different ways. PG thinks a lot of people can identify with it.

Axel asks if there is any fear related to Hux Flux. He means that they said goodbye in 2019 and there was a big hype around it, a lot of people went to see them. Now they come back again and they are Gyllene Tider, but Axel is curious if they are afraid that the interest will not be as great. PG says you never know. Every time you do a new project, you can’t take anything for granted at all. Per thinks they have such a huge song catalogue that it feels completely right to do this. PG also hopes that there will be more things, so that they won’t go on another farewell tour.

Axel asks the guys how it is touring these days compared to 40 years ago. Anders says it’s a little easier now. Back then they carried their own stuff themselves. Maybe not Per, but the rest of them carried Per’s guitars too. Haha. Now they just go along and stand on the stage playing. Per says the only fun thing about touring is being on stage. Everything else is waiting to be on stage. It is the communication and energy that you get from the audience and that you feel the love. You live for this in a way. The rest is just sleeping pills… waiting for the flight, long bus rides, all that and new hotel beds every night. As he said before, you can never take anything for granted and it’s very cool to be in this band and to play on these stages and meet the audience. Anders says when they went on tour in their little tour bus 40 years ago, it was also cool, this little gang going around. They stuck together and learned a lot during those times.

Axel goes back to 1985 and asks about why the band split up. Anders says they kind of felt like they were not getting anywhere with their music. There was so much happening in music at the time with synths and more electronic stuff, but they were kind of stuck, so then Anders thought it’s better that they take a little break and they did.

Anders moved to Stockholm and started working in a music store and learned a lot about synth music, because he was very much interested in it. Then he started working with Per again for Roxette and added his knowledge to the music they made. And it was good.

Axel asks Per about 1994-1995 when they were on tour with Roxette and Per was writing music in Japanese ice hockey halls for GT again. PG says it was during the Crash! Boom! Bang! tour. They were to take a break with Roxette, because Marie wanted to have another child. So Per wrote songs for GT. Det är över nu he actually wrote in an ice hockey hall in Japan. All these songs, Kung av sand, Juni, juli, augusti, Gå & fiska! were written back then. It was a great time, PG says.

Axel mentions that Per often writes in unexpected places. PG says ideas can come anywhere, as long as you are motivated.

Axel asks the guys to tell a bit about the GT movie that premieres next year. Anders says it won’t be a documentary. It’s more about 5 guys from a small town who succeed against all odds. Per says it’s a film about 5 teenage guys who meet and start a band and suddenly end up in Stockholm in their clogs.

Axel wants to know how much the guys in GT are involved in the film. Anders says they get to read the script and think. Per says they have been there the whole time, because that script is their story, so it’s clear that they have to be there. They have told a lot of anecdotes and so it has become the script in a way. But it’s clear that the story is written in a way that it becomes an interesting and funny movie. It’s a very funny script with lots of laughs and cries, just like it was for real. Per thinks it will be a great movie. PG says most people who are in a film like this have already died, so it will be very strange to see this. Anders has already met mini Anders. Per has also met mini Per and he thinks that guy is amazing.

Axel says the movie will be exciting and he speaks for many people out there when he says it’s much fun that GT is back again. The new album is out soon and the tour starts on 7th July in Halmstad. Axel thanks the guys for coming to the show. Per says it’s their pleasure.

Stills are from the video.

PG40 – RoxBlog interview with Per Gessle – „You have to be kind to your history all the time, because it always makes sense in the end.”

by

It was 40 years ago when Per Gessle released his solo debut album. 40 years! I thought it deserves to be talked about. Fortunately, even if it’s once again a very busy period for Mr. G, he was very kind and agreed to a 40th anniversary interview. You would think it’s all about that album only, but we touched on topics related to Gyllene Tider, Marie, Roxette, PG Roxette, Per’s new solo project, past PG solos, the Roxette musical and more fun stuff as well.

I could actually listen to Per talking about his career, his songs, songwriting and music in general 24/7. His enthusiasm, memories and wise thoughts are fascinating. You know I like novels, so I made a transcript of what we had been talking about. It became long, but I hope you will find it interesting to read. Enjoy!

I met Per via Zoom on Saturday, 25th March. He was in Halmstad, sitting in his office and just got back from a long walk.

Per Gessle: – I’ve been out walking, listening to some new recordings I’ve done and changed everything, of course. Sent emails to lots of people to…

Patrícia Peres: – … change everything?

PG: – Back to square one! No, not. But it’s always like that. Work in progress.

PP: – Were you walking along Prins Bertils stig?

PG: – Actually, yes. I’ve been walking around all over the place. For some reason, there weren’t that many people. Normally, on weekends it’s very crowded, but for some reason people are staying at home. I don’t know why.

PP: – It’s not spring enough.

PG: – Not spring enough, yeah. It’s 8 degrees. Well, all the birds are singing very loudly, so they get something in the air. Come on… Shhh… [Per’s mobile is constantly ringing, so he puts it away.] We are going to talk about Gyllene Tider, right?

PP: – No, not at all. Haha.

PG: – No? Hahaha.

PP: – No, it’s about your solo debut album.

PG: – Yeaaah, the old one! Shit! I forgot about that. I can’t even remember the songs. “På väg”, “Hjärtats trakt”…

PP: – You can even remember the order of the songs! Haha.

PG: – Somewhere, hm… let me see… [He stands up and opens the cupboard behind himself.] I have a little CD archive here. No, I don’t have that one. Or… Maybe it’s on this. [He picks out the 5 CD Original Album Serien compilation.] I don’t have the original one here.

PP: – Never mind! How does it feel that it’s already 40 years old?

PG: – It’s scary. Haha. [He is checking the tracklist.] Ah, it’s not bad. It’s a cool album.

PP: – It’s not bad. You don’t have a bad album.

PG: – Actually, it’s got some really good songs. The takes are not that good, I think. When I made this album I wanted to get rid of this sort of high-pitched Gyllene Tider voice, so I took down all the keys. So the keys to the songs became much lower and when you do that, you have to know what you are doing because otherwise you lose your, whatever…, you lose it. Haha. And I think I lost it. I think both “Scener” and the first album have got some songs that are in the wrong key. I should have done it with another producer as well, I think.

PP: – Yeah, I will ask you about that too.

PG: – OK, let’s go ahead! You ask and I answer.

PP: – First of all, I just wanted to ask you about January 1983, when all the other guys in Gyllene Tider started the obligatory military service. Wouldn’t it have been fun to do that together, the 5 of you?

PG: – Nooo…

PP: – Not that I can imagine you there, but…

PG: – Haha. I just felt like that was such a waste of time, a waste of a year. Especially when you have this career going, it just felt so weird. So I did everything I could to get rid of it. We have something called „mönstring” in Swedish [muster], which is when you go to this military office and you do the physical tests and everything, you talk to psychologists and they make the decision if you are capable of doing your military service. I did that and I had three, what’s it called… „intyg”… „intyg” [he is looking at me searching for the English word for it]. A paper from the doctors. You know what I’m saying? It’s called something… whatever. I got those from different psychologists that I went to and I told them that I can’t do this, because I’m gonna die and bla bla bla.

PP: – Oh my God! Haha.

PG: – It’s been independent doctors telling me that was fine. „You shouldn’t do it.” In those days, you know, this is like in the ’70s, there was one side that was very pro military service and the other side was very anti. And I went to all the people that were against it, of course. So they signed all these papers for me. So I went up to this military thing and showed them my paper, they let me go and I was off. It was in Gothenburg and I took the train into town and I bought a Bryan Ferry album instead.

PP: – Haha. Much better!

PG: – This obviously happened before Gyllene Tider had a breakthrough. So at the end of the day, when this military service was supposed to be done for the other guys, it was in the middle of the whole craziness. I don’t know if anyone actually did the service full time. Maybe.

PP: – No, they didn’t. It was just four months. Haha. But maybe it was because of your postcard what’s in the 1996 GT book. There is a postcard from you to the guys with one word on it: „Hjälp!”. Haha.

PG: – Oh, yeah, yeah. Haha!

PP: – It’s not known about all the songs when they were written, but you probably wrote at least some of them during the GT era. Did you write them all with a solo album in mind? I mean, were you sure that you would release a solo album or did you write the songs for Gyllene Tider?

PG: – [Hesitating…] You should ask all these questions to Sven Lindström. He knows the answers much better than I do. I forgot all about it. When I look back on the “Puls” album, there are certain tracks like “Vandrar i ett sommarregn”, “Som regn på en akvarell”, “Honung och guld”. Those songs were not typical Gyllene Tider songs. They were on the way to something else. So when I had the chance to do my first solo album, I guess the idea was to sort of start from square one, the singer-songwriter side of me, not like the pop thing. It started out doing acoustic songs and I wrote a lot of songs in that way, but I always did that. Even if you go back to my demos in the ’70s, they are all acoustic anyway. So I mean, it’s just another side of what I’m doing. But then there is no song on that album that would have sounded great with Gyllene Tider, except for “Den öde stranden”, which is not my song. It’s John Holm’s.

PP: – Those who liked GT, their musical taste was rather pop, then you came up with a solo album in a more sensitive singer-songwriter style. Who did you expect to be your audience?

PG: – I didn’t think like that at all. I never thought about that. Lots of people are doing that. Especially business people, managers and record labels. They always have these target groups and say you should do this and this format. Even with Roxette. We hated all that. You should have a mix for the adult AC radio or a mix for dance radio, whatever. You do your thing and then you just leave all those things to other people. So I never really thought about that. I never really felt comfortable with my voice that much, even though I felt that my voice had something unique. I was never very secure about my voice. So I think when I did the first solo album, that was also one of the reasons why I wanted to bring in Marie. Even when we did television for that, we did “Om du har lust”, “Tända en sticka till”, “Rädd”. She was there, because I wanted a proper singer for my music. That sounded cool. We started with that earlier. “Vandrar i ett sommarregn” on the “Puls” album was recorded with Eva Dahlgren and Marie did it with us on TV.

PP: – As far as I know, the working title was “Hjärtats trakt”, but in the end, your name became the title. Or… I’m not sure it has a title. Because we are referring to it as a self-titled album, but does it have a title?

PG: – I thought the album was going to be called “Hjärtats trakt”, but there was Ulf Lundell who was also on EMI. He had a book out called “Hjärtats ljus”. So I felt that it was a little too close to his title and he came out before me. So I basically just used my name, yeah.

PP: – So that is a title. Not an album without a title.

PG: – No. It was just my name. It was the title.

PP: – Can you tell the significance of the dot? I mean there is a dot after Per Gessle and a dot after each song title. Does it have any special meaning?

PG: – Haha. Are there dots?

PP: – Yeah. [I hold up the vinyl sleeve and show him the dot.] It’s not usual to put dots everywhere. It’s like „Per Gessle, period!” Haha.

PG: – Haha. Are there dots after the titles as well?

PP: – Yes. [I turn the vinyl sleeve around to show the back side.]

PG: – I don’t know who made that. Kjell Andersson did the sleeve.

PP: – So maybe it’s just a design thing. How do you remember the excitement of a solo debut album?

PG: – I was probably scared, because it was different and it didn’t really sell. I mean, I can’t remember. Maybe it was a gold record. I think I have a gold record somewhere.

PP: – It sold 55,000 copies.

PG: – It was sort of scary times in a way, because I was without the guys from Gyllene. But on the other hand, I had another band with lots of different session players, playing with me when I did TV and stuff. I wasn’t really comfortable with that. I think I wasn’t really ready to do solo stuff. I mean it’s always scary to do that. On the other hand, it was really hard to go back and do “The Heartland Café”. The reason why we did that was because there was an American guy, Don Grierson was his name. He worked at Capitol Records and he liked us a lot. So he promised us to get a release in the States if we did it, which we eventually got, as you know. That sort of convinced the EMI office in Sweden to pay for it and I think at the end of the day it was just something that we wanted to do. We wanted to do something else, but that was a tough one to do as well. That tour was terrible.

PP: – What’s the greatest debut album of all time, you think?

PG: – Greatest debut album from anyone?

PP: – From anyone.

PG: – Shit, I don’t know.

PP: – Maybe from your inspirations.

PG: – Well, the first Tom Petty album, of course, is very good. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. The first Eagles album is amazing.

PP: – And if you think about a solo artist?

PG: – Paul Simon’s first album. But he was established when he did that. I have to think about that. Hard to pick.

PP: – Who were your inspirations for this album?

PG: – Little bit of this, little bit of that. “Tända en sticka till” is very much Neil Young. “På väg” I wrote with Niklas Strömstedt and he was really into Jackson Browne at the time. So it’s that sort of LA style. I don’t know, I can’t remember. It’s a long time ago. When I look back on even Roxette stuff, if people talk about inspirations and I check what was in the charts, it was lots of synthesizer bands and Trevor Horn produced stuff. Of course, that was a big inspiration. But you can’t really hear it in our music. But it was an inspiration. It was like when we referred to how much bass there was going to be in the production. We listened to Trevor Horn productions or we listened to Michael Jackson or whatever. I was never really a Michael Jackson fan, but his record sounded amazing. Obviously, you used everything around you to compare yourself all the time.

PP: – When your album peaked at No. 5 on the Swedish chart, there was David Bowie being No. 1 with “Let’s Dance”.

PG: – Yeah. Shit, I hated that. Haha.

PP: – Do you remember how it felt?

PG: – I remember going on a signing tour, which was always scary, because you are in the middle of all these people. And David Bowie had just released the “Let’s Dance” album and he was also on EMI. So everyone at EMI was so excited about “Let’s Dance” and I was like forgotten about.

PP: – Was it before or after you met Bowie in person? It was the same year.

PG: – It was before, because that was the tour. The tour was called “Serious Moonlight” and I met him in Lyon, I think, in France. He had this sort of turquoise suit and blonde hair. And I was very scared.

PP: – Haha. You always mentioned that you were not that interested in David Bowie after “Let’s Dance”, because his music changed with that.

PG: – Lots of Bowie fans don’t like the “Let’s Dance” album, because they think it’s too commercial. But I always felt it was one of his best albums. The production is so intelligent, because it’s so sparse and you can basically hear every instrument in there. It’s just brilliantly done by Nile Rodgers. And good songs.

PP: – At the time, did you see yourself as a solo artist who would still release solo records after 40 years? Or was it more like let’s see what happens?

PG: – In ’83?

PP: – Yes, when you released your first album.

PG: – No, it was more like surviving to the next month, basically. Haha. Especially when “The Heartland Café” album came out, because then it didn’t really work for us.

PP: – But “The Heartland Café” album came out only after this.

PG: – Yeah, yeah. But it was like the same thing. The band broke up and then “Scener” came out and “Scener” was like a mishmash of solo stuff and Gyllene Tider stuff. “Galning” is played by Gyllene Tider, for instance. In a terrible key, by the way. And suddenly, I didn’t have a recording deal anymore. So it didn’t go that well. I mean ’83 was OK, because the album was OK. ’84 was terrible. ’85 was terrible. ’86 was good, because of “Neverending Love”. But those years, ’84-’85, I feel like it’s my dark period. I didn’t know what to do. Everybody wanted me to write lyrics for them and write songs, but I felt like I didn’t want to do that. It’s impossible for me to have someone telling me „now the second line in the second verse isn’t good enough”, „for me it doesn’t make sense” or the phrasing is not what this person wants to sing. I can’t do that. I tried. All those songs I wrote for Lena Philipsson and basically everyone, it took forever. It takes weeks to finish three lines, because people change and want to change and change and change, and I can’t think like that. I have to be my own creative boss, so to speak. Even today I think it’s really hard to write with other people, unless you send things to one another and I do my own thing and then you can go ahead and work from what I presented to you, but it’s really hard to please someone else.

PP: – Yeah, sure, I can understand that. You dedicated this album to Gunilla, Bengt and their parents. THEIR parents. [He is smiling.] Their parents are your parents. What did this dedication mean to you? Why exactly them?

PG: – I don’t know. Maybe it was because it was the first really personal album. It is a personal album, it’s different. Like I said, there are hints of the same style on “Puls”, “Honung och guld” and “Vandrar i ett sommarregn”, but this is much more personal. So maybe I just felt like it was part of why it was dedicated to my family. My father died in ’78, so this is like five years after. Or four years after. This was recorded in ’82, right?

PP: – Well, ’83. I mean, you probably recorded the demos in ’82, but the recordings of the album started in January ’83.

PG: – OK. I’m just guessing here. Haha.

PP: – Haha. That’s fine. The sleeve became quite dark and the photo is a bit too sad for beautiful Tylösand Beach. Why did you decide on black and white?

PG: – I always hated it. I didn’t want to look like that. I looked like someone else. It’s this little shed you see in the background. It’s on the beach in Tylösand.

PP: – Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s why I’m wondering. Because Tylösand is so beautiful, even if it’s winter.

PG: – I always hated that picture. I think the whole idea came from Kjell Andersson, who was the A&R guy who helped me with this. He wanted to present another side, to get rid of the pop star thing. So he wanted me to look like a bum.

PP: – Very nice. Haha. He succeeded.

PG: – Haha. There are other pictures from that era that I … ah…

PP: – Not your favourites.

PG: – I never really liked them at all.

PP: – Am I right that you bought a piano in 1982?

PG: – I did? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I did! I bought this Kawai, K.a.w.a.i. [he is spelling it and looks at me if it’s correct]. Yes, yes, yes, yeah. I had brought that one to my apartment in Torsgatan. I did. That’s where I wrote all the Roxette songs on.

PP: – But did you write these songs [the “Per Gessle” album songs] on that piano?

PG: – Good question. Well, if I had the piano, I probably did. I know that “Fiskarnas tecken” was written on guitar, because it’s a typical guitar groove. [He starts kind of beatboxing the rhythm while playing air guitar.] I thought that was cool with the groove, with the rhythm. You know, as always when I write songs, I try them on guitar and I try different keys and I try it with the capo on and then I move to piano and see what’s going on. Then I decide what’s going to be the main instrument when I record my demo. Then as soon as I’ve settled for guitar and maybe we put some overdubs, then I get rid of the guitar, if I don’t need it and suddenly, it’s a keyboard song with a little drum machine. You never know what’s going to happen. And that’s the beauty of it. You never know. But when you write a song, it’s important to find the core of the song. And the only way to do that is to fool around and see where it leads. Some songs are just so melody driven, so it has to be played on the keyboard, because you need the ability to use the melodies in the settings. Guitar for me is more like you strum the chords, which could be nice.

PP: – Did you start playing the piano by yourself, like the guitar?

PG: – I took lessons on piano when I was really young and I played “Für Elise”. [He smiles and plays a little “Für Elise” on the piano next to him.] But I never really understood that “Für Elise” is basically like an A minor chord. Nobody told me that classical music is basically the same as pop music. It’s just chords and varieties of chords. If someone told me that you can actually play “The House Of The Rising Sun” or whatever on a piano in the same way you play “Für Elise”, I think my life would have been very different, because then I think I would have started to play the piano much more. Eventually, when I got my first guitar in 1976, I never connected that instrument to my early days on the piano. That was many years later when I realized that shit, it’s the same thing. Maybe I was just stupid, but I never really got that. On the other hand, if I understood that, maybe I would have chosen another way, because all those songs that I wrote, the early songs on guitar, they are really primitive and they are really simple and they are really influenced by the new wave thing, which helped me get self-confidence to play. And if I’d been fooling around on the piano, maybe I would have become a little bit too sophisticated. I remember writing “Billy”. You know the song, “Billy”?

PP: – Hmpf. Yeah, sure! Haha.

PG: – Haha. [He is reaching out for one of his guitars next to him and plays the riff.] I just played this. That’s the riff, basically. I just played that. And I didn’t know that it was a D minor F C G. At the time it was just a riff. And then the chorus went to A major. [He plays some chords here to show what he is talking about.] I didn’t understand that. I just played that because it sounded cool. All those early songs, the keys that they turned out to be in are just happy accidents or bad accidents sometimes. There are recordings that we couldn’t use with Gyllene Tider, because I wrote a song in a key that was too high. I couldn’t sing it. So it turned out to be terrible and we couldn’t use it. I didn’t think like that. It was much later that I got into the theoretics of music. Nowadays, when I write the song, I always think about what I’m trying to do with my voice. Is it going to be like a ballad thing? Is it going to be like the chorus of “Chans”? That’s the highest I can get these days. Haha. And it needs that, because it needs that energy. Other songs, like all the songs that I did on my acoustic tour, I did the opposite. I took it as low as possible, because it was more like a communicative thing. So I’m like a wild animal in the jungle.

PP: – And we like that. Haha. Regarding the lyrics, how good of a lyricist do you think you were in your early 20s?

PG: – I think I was pretty good, because I was something different. I guess, and they told me anyway, that’s the reason why we got the recording deal in the first place, because people liked the lyrics and the lyrics really stood out. I was struggling a lot to do these storytelling things. It was a challenge for me, but at the same time I liked it, so I tried to explore it. “Honung och guld” is one of those lyrics, “Vandrar i ett sommarregn” we talked about earlier, “Tända en sticka till” is the same thing. When it works, it’s still good, I think. For my standards. Some lyrics are crap, like “Fiskarnas tecken”.

PP: – On this album it’s not about the chorus, but rather the poems.

PG: – That was also conscious that it wasn’t supposed to be a pop record, it was supposed to be something else. I was on the Parlophone label and Kjell Andersson had an influence on all of the artists on that label. Ulf Lundell was very big and they had Magnus Lindberg and they had…, well I can’t remember them all, but there were a lot of singer-songwriters. Obviously, he wanted me to join that path as well. Ulf was and still is an amazing writer and I couldn’t compete with his sort of language or anything, but on the other hand, I still had the power of my melodies. Everything I’ve done is always melody driven anyway. When I look back on old songs, there are still so many songs from the ’80s that haven’t been released. And if I listen to my demos, the songs are sometimes amazing. And it’s the really, really good music. Lyrics are the worst. So that’s why they were never recorded. But that’s how I did that. I’ve just recorded two old songs from the ’80s and I rewrote the lyrics totally and they are just really good. I can’t write music like that anymore, because I’m not that curious in that sense anymore. I was in the ’80s, but today I know too much. So I don’t dare to do silly stuff like I did in the ’80s. It comes with age, I guess. On the other hand, I write a little bit more classy lyrics these days than I did in those days. Most writers, when it comes to pop music anyway, they have their peak when they are 25-26. If you look at all these other amazing writers like Paul McCartney or Tom Petty, they find their identity and their personality when they are very young and then, especially if they get successful, they sort of start to repeat themselves and then the fashion changes. If you go to Tom Petty’s late ’70s stuff, he is a good example, it’s really interesting. And then some of the ’80s happen and then the music scene changes, the productions change, digital music comes in and then he has to adapt. And the band has to adapt. It took many years for him to adapt. It took him 10 years actually, until he did this Jeff Lynne album, “Full Moon Fever”. Then he adapted and it was in fashion again. I think it’s when you are young, as soon as you sort of find out the core of who you are as a writer and as a person, you do your best work. Sorry to say. Haha.

PP: – Haha. Perfect. How much did your troubadour sessions help you to create the sound of this album?

PG: – Ehm. Haha. I think we were recording most of the stuff at the EMI Studio 1, which was a big studio. I think we did it in the same style as we did the Gyllene Tider albums. It’s just with different players. Hasse Olsson on Hammond organ and we used a lot of session players, so it wasn’t very different. I remember we had… Who played the drums? Magnus Persson?

PP: – Yes, Magnus Persson.

PG: – Backa Hans played the bass. They all were extremely good session players, they played with lots of people and I wasn’t used to playing with musicians in that style. I guess it sounded great. It did sound great, but it was different. I was used to Harplinge boys. Haha.

PP: – Yeah, that was quite a big recording team including many musicians playing several instruments. How did you decide about what instruments to use and who to record with?

PG: – Well, I think it was a decision that was made together with Lasse Lindbom, the producer, who was going to play and he was very much part of choosing the people. The difference from Gyllene Tider to these people wasn’t as big as it was later on when Clarence came into my life.

PP: – Yeah, that’s what I also wanted to ask. Clarence wasn’t around, but how do you think he would have made the production of this album and what advice would he have given to you?

PG: – Well, at the time in ’83, he was the keyboard player in Raj Montana Band, which is sort of the same style as Hasse Olsson. He was also playing in Raj Montana Band. So I don’t know. I think with Clarence it would have probably sounded sort of similar. Lasse Lindbom always told me that I was a good songwriter, but the problem I had was that you can’t dance to my music. It didn’t have the rhythm, didn’t have the groove. Maybe I told this before. But then the first song that we recorded for the first Roxette album was “I Call Your Name”. It was a really moody ballad when I did the demo. [He demonstrates it with a „boom, boom, boom, boom”.] And then I heard the sound from the studio upstairs and it was Jonas, Pelle, Tommy Cassemar and Clarence playing “I Call Your Name” and it sounded like, you know, how it sounds on the Roxette record. It’s really bap, bap, bap-bap-bap. It’s really catchy and groovy and everything. And I was so proud, because I felt like hey, Lasse was wrong, you can dance to this song. Haha. That was the combination of Clarence’s brilliance and also of course Jonas’ guitar playing, because Mats couldn’t play the guitar like that and I certainly couldn’t do it. And Anders didn’t play the bass like Tommy did. It’s the same with the Nile Rodgers people on the “Let’s Dance” album by David Bowie. It sounds more like Nile Rodgers than David Bowie, actually. So I think the feeling I had when I recorded that solo album, it felt good to have all these really great session players, but it wasn’t that big a difference. It was more a difference in the style of that you used the banjo or you used harmonica or we even had this sitar sound in “Syrenernas tid”.

PP: – How much experimenting was there for you during the recordings?

PG: – Not very much. I had my songs and… well, Lasse Lindbom is not like an experimental guy, he is more like a basic guy. He just tried to improve the demo. If the song is there, it’s there and then you just try to make it. Nowadays, when you are working on the PG Roxette album or on Mono Mind, you fool around. It’s such a different ball game these days, but I kind of like that. We talked about that the other day in the studio, because I’m using 3 musicians from the Halmstad area for some new recordings and I’m playing lots of stuff myself. I can hear in my head how I want the piano to sound like, but I can’t play it. But in a way I can, because if I play it on a piano in the studio, which is a digital piano, I can remove all the mistakes I make. I just take those tones away. If I do something like this [he plays a mistake on the piano], I can take it away, so it becomes nice. If I want the melody to be in a certain way, I can change it in the computer, I can write it in the computer, which was impossible in those days, of course. So this fits me. That’s why I play some really, really good piano on the new recordings. And I didn’t do that for real. But it sounds like I’m doing that. And it sounds exactly how I wanted it to be, because I hear it here [he points at his head]. That was my problem, to find people who could interpret what I heard, because I couldn’t play it myself. So it’s much easier for me today to be a homegrown musician. I can make mistakes, as always, but I can fix them. I tell Mats that this song is two bpm too slow and I want it to sound exactly the same, „can you just digitally fix it, so it’s two bpm faster” and he does that. In the old days, when you had analog tapes, if you changed the speed, you changed the pitch, but you don’t have to do that anymore. An A is still an A today, because it’s digital, it’s all in the computer, so it’s really cool.

PP: – That sounds very interesting. If we go down song by song, you open the album with “På väg”, a song you wrote the text for and Niklas Strömstedt wrote the music for. When it’s your solo debut and you want to show your singer-songwriter side, why do you decide to put a song first that has the music written by someone else?

PG: – I can’t remember. I remember I was really happy with that lyric and I think the lyric is the reason why it became the opener. Because „på väg” means being on the way to somewhere and it’s just like a great start. And it was uptempo. I think it’s one of Niklas’ best songs and he plays it himself all the time, so I guess he agrees. It was a perfect opener. There is no other song that could be the opener on that album.

PP: – How did you write it together? I mean, did you sit together? Did you send it to him?

PG: – I wish I could remember. But I think… maybe I sent him my lyrics and he wrote music to it, or he sent me his music and I wrote lyrics to it. We didn’t sit down and write it together. I can’t see it. I don’t think we did that. There was another track called “Man varnade för halka”, which is my lyric, but it’s his music, isn’t it?

PP: – Yes, it is.

PG: – I’m sure I sent him my lyrics, because I had this lyric lying around. I probably tried to make music for it myself, but failed. That’s how it goes normally. You don’t really have a finished lyric that lies around for a very long time without trying to make music to it. So I probably screwed up, I can’t remember. But he wrote some really nice music for it.

PP: – “Hjärtats trakt” would have been the album title. Could it be that this was the very first song you wrote especially for this album?

PG: – Could be. I think that song is like the essence of the whole album. It’s a little bit more adult than the Gyllene Tider stuff and also the way it’s done. It’s done in a low key and it’s a little bit different. It doesn’t sound like Gyllene Tider at all. Which was intentional, of course.

PP: – The song has this „syrenernas tid” expression in the lyrics, while you also have a song on the album with this title. It’s very strange, because it’s not a common expression. I mean, probably in Swedish it is, but using it on the same album in a lyric and also in a separate song, it’s very interesting.

PG: – No, it’s not a common expression in Swedish either, but I think the symbol of the „syren”, I don’t know the English word for „syren”, do you know? I don’t know. It’s a flower, but… [he is reaching out for his mobile to check Google.]

PP: – It’s lilac.

PG: – Lilacs! Thank you. I was reading a lot of Hjalmar Gullberg, a Swedish poet, which you probably haven’t heard about. Haha. I was never a big reader of poetry, but his stuff appealed to me a lot. I liked his choice of words and he had some lines about lilacs, „syrener”. That’s probably where I got the inspiration to write something on my own.

PP: – Is “Syrenernas tid” the way you wanted it to be on the album? I mean, when the „syrenernas tid” part comes in, it feels like it could be rockier than it actually is, with heavier guitars.

PG: – You mean that particular song, “Syrenernas tid”?

PP: – Yeah, that one.

PG: – That song was a big mistake. I thought that was a really good song, but the key is so low and I couldn’t really sing it. So if I had a little bit more energy in the vocals, we could use a little bit more energy in the guitars. I never liked that version at all. It’s a nice song. The same with the song that I did with Marie, “Om du bara vill”. I thought that was a good chorus.

PP: – “Om du har lust”, you mean.

PG: – Oh, “Om du har lust”, yeah. Haha.

PP: – Haha. So many songs.

PG: – So little time. [He smiles.] It was too long and didn’t have the ability to edit it down and it was in the wrong key. I never liked it. It was a single, I think, wasn’t it?

PP: – “Om du har lust”? Yes, that was the only single off the album.

PG: – Terrible.

PP: – Who picked that one?

PG: – EMI and Kjell, probably.

PP: – So you would have probably chosen another single from the album.

PG: – Well, there aren’t any singles. “På väg” is probably the catchiest song and the song that stood out for me was “Tända en sticka till”, because I thought that was a really beautiful ballad. But it’s not a single. It’s pretty tedious when you play it. I played it a couple of times on stage, even in the modern age, but I always get so tired of it after playing it twice. It’s like 4 minutes of wasting my time.

PP: – “Timmar av iver” is a very cool, short and fast song. Less than 2 minutes. Where did the inspiration come from for this one? It’s very different from the others.

PG: – It was because I started fooling around on the guitar and detuned the E string to a D instead, so it’s a detuned guitar. So you can get a „daw daw” at the end of the riff. When I played it, this riff [here he is humming it], it’s like a banjo style. So someone said, probably Lasse, that we should bring in a banjo. There is a banjo, I think.

PP: – There is, there is. Haha.

PG: – Haha. I haven’t heard this album since 1983. I think I played that song live on the “Mazarin” tour, didn’t I?

PP: – You did!

PG: – It’s not bad. It’s not really me, but it’s OK.

PP: – And “Regn”? You probably wrote it for Gyllene Tider.

PG: – Yeah, that’s a good song. It’s a terrible arrangement and production of that song, but its riff is really good. [He is reaching out for his guitar again to play that riff.] It’s a good melody. That was the whole idea, that riff. And so it became another rain song about rain. Rain is good. Haha.

PP: – Rain and trains. Haha.

PG: – The symbolic thing of rain, you can do so many things with that. I think every lyric writer is fascinated by rain. I wrote a lot of rain songs in my days.

PP: – I also like this lyric part very much: „Dina ögon har färgen idag / Som himlen hade igår”. It’s very nice. I love this expression. I mean, it’s very simple, but I think it’s beautiful. [He smiles.]

PG: – I can’t remember all the songs until we finished this, but this song could have very much been a Gyllene Tider song.

PP: – And in some interview you mentioned that you also have an English lyric to it.

PG: – It’s probably called “Rain”. Nah, it was “Run To Me”. [He starts humming „run to me”.] It wasn’t “Rain”.

PP: – Then comes “Indiansommar”, which really gives the feeling of Indian Summer. It’s an instrumental. And I guess you wrote it on piano, but it turned into this wonderful harp sound.

PG: – Yeah, we had a harp girl who came in with a big harp. Was that something else?

PP: – There was “Ledmotiv från Indiansommar”, which has a different sound and there was “Indiansommar” with the harp.

PG: – OK. And then we had another harp for “Blå december”, right? Doesn’t that start with a harp as well?

PP: – Yes, it does.

PG: – Lots of harp.

PP: – The harp era.

PG: – That was fun, because this girl came in and she was really young and really tiny and she had this huge harp. I was like, shit, is it worth it? We’re gonna use like 12 seconds of this and she was tuning and all these pedals and stuff. It took forever, but she played wonderfully.

PP: – Yeah, it’s beautiful.

PG: – It’s a beautiful sound and even today we use harp. When these early synthesizers came out, the digital ones like the Yamaha DX7, they had great harp sounds. You always used harp sounds.

PP: – “Ledmotiv från Indiansommar” has a very different sound. It’s almost the same length and it’s less soft. It sounds more like a soundtrack without the harp. Were there such thoughts in your mind back then? Making soundtrack music?

PG: – It sounds like country or Western.

PP: – Yeah, like a Western movie soundtrack.

PG: – Well, I’ve always been interested in that kind of themes in movies. We always, not always, but we usually do an instrumental song with Gyllene Tider, “Knallpulver”, for instance. And we did… What’s it called? “Shopping With Mother”. Or “Theme From „Roberta Right””. It was actually Gabriel who wrote the lyrics to that.

PP: – Yeah, I remember that.

PG: – The name Roberta Right came about. It felt like it should be a TV series, so it became a theme. I was always interested in these little snippets of 40 seconds of instrumental music. I’m just thinking about that. It might be because I’m this melody guy and sometimes you don’t want lyrics to interfere with the music. And it’s nice. That is actually one thing that I’m really looking forward to with the Roxette musical that’s going to come out. Because the underscore will be lots of Roxette music of course and I think it’s going to be really beautiful, played without lyrics. The melodies are so strong and you can travel from here to there with just the music. I think that’s really cool. And it works.

PP: – So you are already at the point when you are discussing such stuff that there will be underscores.

PG: – Yes, absolutely. We are still fooling around with the script for that one, but it’s getting there.

PP: – Cool, however, we still have some time until we can see it.

PG: – It’s going to open up in October next year.

PP: – Set in my calendar.

PG: – They are going to start selling tickets this autumn and it’s 76 shows.

PP: – Wow! A lot of shows!

PG: – Yeah. It’s gonna be cool. I hope. Otherwise I won’t go to the opening show. Haha.

PP: – Haha. “Historier vi kan” is a John Sebastian song. When did you first meet the “Stories We Could Tell” song?

PG: – It was actually Kjell’s suggestion that we should do that. I met John Sebastian in Los Angeles in 1981 and stayed at his place for like 3 days together with Anders, up in Woodstock. He was a really nice guy and so when I came back, Kjell said maybe you should do a cover and I said yeah, maybe I should do something from John Sebastian, because he was so nice to us. And then Kjell came up with this song. I never heard it before and I thought it was… well, it’s not really me, but I can try it. So I translated it.

PP: – Was it easy to translate it? Because it’s very similar to the original text, but still there is you in it.

PG: – I can’t remember, but it made sense. It’s a good song. And then of course, much later on, I realized that Tom Petty did covers and covered that song as well. Then suddenly I liked it a little bit more. Haha. It’s always crazy, because normally, when you do covers, in the old days, like Gyllene Tider in 1980 or even earlier or ’81 or so, we played “S.O.S.” by ABBA, we played “Send Me A Postcard” from Shocking Blue, all those songs. But it was because we liked them and we knew them by heart, because we were fans of the songs. But in this case I never heard this song before, it was suggested by Kjell, so I don’t really have a connection to it. I guess the reason why we did it was it had this sort of country style that I couldn’t really write myself. If you have a song like that on the album, you show a certain temperature of the album. In those days it was all about albums. You had 40 minutes to present something, which is really interesting.

PP: – I remember you mentioned in interviews that you think “Sommaräng” is John Holm’s best song. It’s from the same album as “Den öde stranden”, so I’m wondering why you picked “Den öde stranden” to cover.

PG: – Because I think you could do much more with “Den öde stranden”. I think I did a terrible version of it. Janne Bark is playing the guitar and I just… nah, it’s terrible. But anyway, “Sommaräng” by John Holm, you can’t touch that one, because it’s brilliant, his singing too. It’s ridiculous to try to do a cover of that one. I also felt that if I do a cover of John Holm’s stuff, I also show people where I belong. I belong to that sort of Swedish singer-songwriter pop thing, the early ’70s. So that was also a way for me to show my roots.

PP: – So that’s why you decided to do a cover? Because I guess you had several other songs of your own.

PG: – Yeah, but it makes sense. And like with “Stories We Could Tell”, it shows a different side of you. With Roxette sometimes we played “So You Want To Be A Rock ‘n’ Roll Star”. And we played “Hanging On The Telephone”, we played “(I’m Not Your) Steppin’ Stone”. It’s fun to play those songs, but also it shows where you come from. Where your roots are. If you don’t know anything about an artist, you go on the Spotify page and you find that he or she has done some cover versions, you immediately realize that hey, this is their taste in music. So you listen to their own music with a different point of view. I do anyway.

PP: – And what about “Fiskarnas tecken”? How did astrology come into sight?

PG: – My sister was really into astrology. Especially in those days, and I wasn’t that much. I was fascinated by it maybe, but I wasn’t really into it. No, terrible song.

PP: – I don’t think it’s terrible, but it’s different.

PG: – [He is reaching out for his guitar, tries to remember the rhythm and plays a little.] It was a rhythm that I learned for some reason. Maybe it was just good enough to become a song.

PP: – Then there is “Rädd”, which is yet another duet with Marie. Did you write it with Marie in your head? That you would sing it together. Was she the obvious female vocal choice for you?

PG: – Yes, I think so, because that was that era when I introduced Marie to EMI, basically. Because in 1982 she did this MaMas Barn album with Metronome, which was Warner at the time. So this was a way to bring her into Kjell and Lasse Lindbom territory. I don’t think I wrote it specially for her. That particular song, you could do it like a duet thing.

PP: – Yeah, in the lyric book the original text is visible and you wrote hon / han, hon / han, who sings what. It’s just not written that it’s Marie / Per, Marie / Per.

PG: – Haha. I never really liked it that much. It’s just that it was different from what I was writing with Gyllene, so probably it was different enough to record. And as soon as Marie opened her mouth, it became amazing. So suddenly, it just sort of became OK. I never listened to it.

PP: – “Tända en sticka till”, one more song with Marie. Was it the last one you recorded for this album? Because it was written in January-February 1983, so it was already when the recordings started for the album.

PG: – Yeah, it was pretty late in the recording. I felt immediately that it was for me, the key song of the album. It’s about the lyrics. It’s a nice lyric, it’s very fragile and very sensitive. When you write about certain subjects or certain moods, you can write about the same thing in so many different ways. Nine out of ten it becomes really clumsy and you overdo it or you just choose the wrong words or it becomes too obvious or it should be more obvious or whatever. There is so many problems along the way. “Tända en sticka till” is very simple. What I particularly liked about it was in the second verse, if I remember things right, when we sing together and I’m using this quote from the girl in the lyrics. That continues into the chorus and so it’s the girl, Marie in this case, who finishes off the lyric, basically. And I thought that was a really beautiful way of writing. It’s very simple and it’s by far the best lyric of the album, because it’s the most personal.

PP: – A couple of years later you revisited it for “Gammal kärlek rostar aldrig”. It got more stripped down. What made you change the sound and the length of it?

PG: – It’s the same when we did the acoustic tour. Some songs that you wrote when you were really young get a different meaning when you are singing them later on in life. This particular song I felt was a little bit too long on the ’83 album, so I just made it shorter and a little bit more efficient. But I don’t know if that was very good either. I think someone else should record it, because it’s a strong song and it’s a strong melody. It’s a beautiful song, but I never really captured it properly. And as I said earlier, when I play it live, I always get bored with it immediately.

PP: – Talking about melodies, which song do you think has the best melody on the album?

PG: – [He is thinking for a while and then…] “Regn”. It’s got the best melody. “Regn” is the most typical song for me, if you look at my catalogue. I have written in that style all my life. The chorus of “Syrenernas tid”, or maybe the chorus of “Om du bara vill”…, nah, “Om du har lust”.

PP: – Haha. “Om du bara vill” is a very cool song as well, but here it’s “Om du har lust”.

PG: – Haha. There are good melodies there as well. But they never really get solved properly. I don’t know. I have this love and hate relationship with this album I guess. When you look back on all these albums that you’ve made, there are highlights and there are low things, songs that you don’t like. But you have to go through those motions in your life. Without that album, I would never have done the next album. And without that album, which was even worse, I would never have done all those songs that became the first Roxette album, which became a pretty nice album. And without that, the “Look Sharp!” album wouldn’t have happened. You have to be kind to your history all the time, because it always makes sense in the end. There is a purpose there I guess.

PP: – Very wise thoughts. [He smiles.] The album got a re-release on CD in 1992 and then we got the bonus tracks. “Överallt” and “Man varnade för halka”, which we already mentioned.

PG: – Ah, “Överallt”! I remember “Överallt”, because Lili & Susie were singing backing vocals. They are out playing with Micke Syd nowadays, yeah.

PP: – Yeah, yeah, I saw pictures of their parties. Haha.

PG: – Haha. They were EMI artists in those days and then they moved to whatever it was called… Ola Håkansson’s label and became successful with “Oh mama” and all those dance tracks. Yeah, they were singing on “Överallt”. [Here he starts singing „övera-a-allt, över-övera-allt”.]

PP: – Haha, you remember the lyrics. Why was it only a B side?

PG: – Because I felt it was really terrible. I didn’t like the lyrics and I thought it was like a… I don’t know. I listened a lot to a specific type of country music. What’s his name? He died. He was the lead singer of the Amazing Rhythm Aces. What’s his name? Do you remember? [My facial expression says no.] No. Haha. An American guy. He was on EMI on Capitol Records and he did some amazing albums and I listened to him a lot in those years. So I think “Överallt” was very much inspired by his style. It’s not really country, but it’s countryish. What’s his name? Shit… I forgot about him. All those albums that he did, they are not on Spotify and I miss them a lot. I have them on vinyl, but you know, I never really pick them up.

PP: – What’s the name of the band? [I reach out for my mobile to search for the band on Wikipedia.]

PG: – Amazing Rhythm Aces. They had a big hit with a song called “Third Rate Romance”. And he was the lead singer, and his name is…

PP: – Just checking Wikipedia. [I start reading out band member names.] Billy Earheart…

PG: – No.

PP: – [He is constantly shaking his head while I’m reading further.] Lorne Rall, Kelvin Holly, Mark Horn, Barry Burton, Duncan Cameron, Jeff Davis, James Hooker, Butch McDade, Danny Parks, Scott McClure, Mike Brooks, Russell Smith.

PG: – Russell Smith!

PP: – Ha, the last one on the list. [We burst out laughing.]

PG: – He did two solo albums that were really good. He’s got an amazing voice. One of the best voices. I actually saw him when he was supporting on a tour. He was supporting Mink Deville. Remember Mink Deville? That was an odd combination. But Russell Smith… I saw him live in the early ’80s in Lund.

PP: – Lots of things happened in the early ’80s. The third bonus track was “När morgonen kommer”, which I think has very strong lyrics. Why was it a leftover? Do you remember that?

PG: – [He is scratching his head.] All those songs that were in the CD box, you know there was a demo version of leftovers. “Nu lyser det från hus och rum”. “När morgonen kommer” is one of those songs that I recorded, but I didn’t use. I never really liked that either. Like I said, that era is me trying to find another way of writing and trying to find another personality and the style in my writing and all those songs are just wannabes. I’m not there. I’m not ready for that yet. But without those, I would never be ready for it. So you have to go through all these. That’s why I don’t really like this album. The “Mazarin” album is sort of the same style, but it’s so much better, because I was a better writer and a better singer. Everything was better. So it was a stepping stone to something else.

PP: – As you mentioned, there is this “Demos 1982-1986“ and there are 4 related tracks. Listening to those, they sound like final songs. So I guess all album song demos must have sounded quite similar to the final result as well. Am I right?

PG: – Yeah, probably.

PP: – Will those demos come out one day or are they so similar that it makes no sense?

PG: – [He is thinking.] I don’t know if I have all those.

PP: – What device did you have to record the demos back then?

PG: – 1982-83… I probably had this 4-track Tascam or TEAC machine, but we recorded lots. Most of it I recorded with Mats, so then it was probably an 8-track machine we had at the Tits & Ass studio. I don’t know where Tits & Ass was located in those days. A long time ago. Mats probably remembers everything. „Oh, I didn’t like that intro, bla bla bla”. Haha.

PP: – There was “Blåa jeans (Och röd läppar)”, where the guys from GT were playing the instruments. Was it made for Gyllene Tider originally?

PG: – No, I think it was made for this solo album. I recorded that demo at a studio called Studio 38, Getinge. I think, actually I did a lot of demos there, yeah. I used that lyric. I rewrote that lyric and that became another song… [He is thinking.]

PP: – “Enkel resa”.

PG: – “Enkel resa”! Thank you!

PP: – Why did you get back to this song so many years later?

PG: – It has a great story. This guy waking up, leaving in the morning and then being very confused. It’s a complicated, but at the same time a very simple story. So I just felt like it deserves a better song than it had before. And I think “Enkel resa” is basically Mats’ music. It’s this groove, which was sort of odd. And I just felt like I had to do something. So I fooled around with this lyric. It’s always hard to write lyrics to a finished melody. I mean, it’s easier if you do it at the same time. Then you can change the melodies, expand them or make them shorter, because the lyrics demand that, so to speak. But if you have a finished piece of music that someone else wrote, you have these melodies that you should follow, otherwise the other person might get pissed off, but in MP’s case, he doesn’t mind.

PP: – How do you remember “Segla på ett moln”, recording it with Marie on vocals?

PG: – I always liked that one. I thought that was good and I thought she did a great job. I like that lyric for some reason. It was also filled with symbols. I don’t know how it wound up on Anne-Lie Rydé’s desk, but it was probably because she was on EMI.

PP: – Maybe she found it on the desk at EMI. Haha.

PG: – Haha. They probably needed a strong melody and they had this and I didn’t really need it. So they did a version of it.

PP: – Later you recorded it again with Helena.

PG: – Yeah, it’s because we’ve done it live. On the “Gammal kärlek rostar aldrig” album I tried to collect all those songs from the old days that felt relevant. I don’t know whether it was a good idea or not, but it was something to do during the pandemic. Haha.

PP: – It was a very good idea, I confirm. There are these two other demos, “Nu lyser det från hus och rum” and “Var blev du av?”. “Nu lyser det från hus och rum”, I think it has a beautiful melody and the accordion enhances it.

PG: – It’s a waltz, isn’t it? [He starts humming „umpampam umpampam, nu lyser det från hus och från rum”.] I listened a lot to “Hearts And Bones” by Paul Simon in that era as well. And I think when you mentioned “Var blev du av?”, I think it’s a lot of that sort of style that I listened to. Like “René And Georgette Magritte With Their Dog After The War”. All those songs from that album I liked a lot. I think I was really inspired by that sort of soft kind of music. It wasn’t a point for me to write pop songs, because pop songs belonged to Gyllene Tider. Solo albums you should do differently. That doesn’t make sense to make an album that sounds exactly like Gyllene Tider.

PP: – Definitely, sure. Are there any other songs written for this album that we haven’t heard yet? Songs that weren’t released as either an album song or a demo?

PG: – I don’t know. There probably are. I won’t go into my archive here, but I’ve tried to find all the cassettes and all the tapes and move them into digital format. So I have most of it, but it’s probably rubbish. Most of it anyway.

PP: – We don’t mind! Haha.

PG: – It has to have some sort of quality that you should be able to listen to it without getting red in the face. [He is touching his cheeks.]

PP: – Why didn’t you tour with the album? Wouldn’t it have been great to show the audience this side of yours or use it as a promotion back then?

PG: – [He is thinking.] Yeah, good question. I can’t remember. I don’t even know what I was doing. We had this little band with Lasse and Marie and MP. Exciting Cheeses. That one must have been the same era, right?

PP: – That was a bit later, I think.

PG: – It’s like ’82-83. I don’t know. I don’t know if I felt like… It was just one album and then I would have had to play “Sommartider”. Haha.

PP: – Haha. Why not?

PG: – That would never have been a good idea since the band was still going. Maybe I just felt like I’ll do another tour after the second album, but that never happened, because that album was terrible anyway. Haha.

PP: – Looking back at the time, I’m not sure you had enough experience and self-confidence yet to trust your gut feeling, which now you think is very important. Was there any point in the making of this album when you felt you should rely on your gut feeling, but you chose a different way?

PG: – [He is thinking.] No, I think it felt OK all through. I mean, it was like a different thing to move away from the Gyllene guys and work with session players. It was exciting to work with Marie. I remember we did quite a few TV appearances from this album with live bands. Reg Ward was playing saxophone, I don’t know if Backa Hans [who played the bass on the album]… Mats Englund was playing bass on some tracks as well live. So it was different and it was exciting in a way. I mean, it wasn’t something I didn’t want to do. I wanted to do it, but I always felt that I was a number too short for what I was aiming at. When it came to this style, I wasn’t ready for doing that kind of stuff. When I did “Mazarin”, I felt that suddenly I had the quality. A different quality in the material for the “Mazarin” album. And that might have been because I hadn’t been doing anything in Swedish for such a long time in 2002. So I collected lots of stuff, but most of the stuff was written for the “Mazarin” album anyway, so it’s just that I was a different person then and also it was a different environment working with Christoffer for the first time. In his crazy studio. It was just really amazing. We made it very difficult for us, starting with my favourite track, you know, “Tycker om när du tar på mej”. And we did so many takes.

PP: – Talking about “Mazarin”, it turns 20 this year.

PG: – Hahaha.

PP: – Haha. Just to make you remember, if you want to do something, in June.

PG: – All these anniversaries… Haha. So, we made it hard on ourselves to start with that song. I was really frustrated that it didn’t go anywhere. Sometimes, when you change the environment and change a group of people that you work with, sometimes you feel instantly [he snaps his fingers] that this is going to work or sometimes you need to adjust. You need to adjust your compass in your mind. It happens all the time, especially now when I’m working on new stuff with new people. I have to go back and listen on my own. Take a walk and listen and listen again. I have to listen in a different way to get the whole new concept. And then suddenly, it’s like [he snaps his fingers again] yes, it makes sense. This is really cool, but it’s not like what I was aiming at, because I didn’t know that this existed. Gyllene Tider is the opposite, because when you work with Gyllene Tider you know exactly what you are going to get. So it’s really up to me to deliver a good song. If I deliver a good song to Gyllene Tider, it’s going to sound amazing in that style. But the challenge sometimes is to go out of your comfort zone, find new people and see what’s going on. But you have to be ready for that and you have to have the capacity to decide that this is a good move and this is a terrible move. And that’s all to do sometimes. In 1983 I wasn’t ready to make those decisions. I just did it.

PP: – How do you feel this record formed you as a solo artist? Because your solo career is very diverse. I mean, there are a lot of colours in it from era to era.

PG: – I just think it was something that had to be done to get out of my system while the others were in the army. Haha. Then we just went back to do this “The Heartland Café” thing, which was, in hindsight, really weird, because we should have got another producer. It was just strange.

PP: – With the experience you have now and the success you have achieved, what would you want your 24-year-old self to think about himself and music at the time of releasing his solo debut album?

PG: – I think it was the right decision to make. Lasse, Kjell, all of us, we were doing the best we could at the time to make the best possible album. Like I said earlier, it was the right decision and it was the right move at the time, but there are certain songs that I don’t really like, because I don’t think they are up to the standards that they should be. It’s the same with “The Heartland Café”. There is a song called “Can You Touch Me?”, which is the worst. It’s like “Physical Fascination” from Roxette. Haha. I don’t like those songs for some reason. It’s just that they are there and at the time I felt like, yeah, this could be a single. Haha. You just change. Then when time passes by, you look back and see that was a really stupid decision. On “Joyride”, for instance, “Physical Fascination” actually took the space from “The Sweet Hello, The Sad Goodbye”, which is so stupid, because that’s such a great song. It’s a very long song. The Roxette version is very long. The solo is really long, but it’s a beautiful lyric and a beautiful song. It’s one of my finest songs. So how you can make that decision, I don’t know.

PP: – I think it was a nice first step in your solo career. [He is laughing.] I really like those songs, of course, because when we are looking back at your history, it’s interesting to see how you evolved.

PG: – That makes sense, I guess. We talked about that earlier that you have to go through the motions to get to the next level all the time, in everything in life. So that’s just the way it is. You can’t skip 10 years of writing and nothing happens.

PP: – So that was all related to the debut album, but I would like to ask some more questions, just very short ones. I promise not to waste your time. [He is smiling and nodding that it’s OK.] It’s just that I’m curious about what you are doing now in the studio. Are you dealing with some solo stuff again? Because the other day Per Thornberg posted a picture with you in the studio. Are you working on a new solo album?

PG: – Yeah, and it’s almost done. Haha.

PP: – Oh my God! OK, so in autumn you are starting another album. Haha.

PG: – It’s just that I had a great flow this winter and work with new people. It’s not done yet, but I have recorded 12 songs. It won’t be out until like a year from now.

PP: – We are getting used to it. Two years, one year…

PG: – Haha. That’s the way I work. Now we are releasing Gyllene Tider on Friday, the first single, then the “Incognito” PG Roxette EP at the end of April, and then there is another Gyllene Tider single and then there is the Gyllene Tider album, then there is a tour. And then there is some other stuff that I won’t talk about, coming out in the fall and then it’s new year and then it’s new balls. We have this big thing, the big opening at Hotel Tylösand on May 1st. We open up a new part of the hotel, totally new. So that takes a lot of my time, because I’m very much part of that.

PP: – Are you building the furniture? Haha.

PG: – Haha. Sort of. I can only work with this album in April and May. But then it’s not like every day or so, because I’m so busy with all the other stuff. But then in June we start rehearsing for the tour, and then July, August until September it’s concerts, so I won’t be able to write or do recordings. It’s pretty busy. But it’s cool. The Gyllene Tider album is really cool, and the new stuff that I’m doing is pretty different from anything else. Per Thornberg is involved. He is a jazz saxophone player.

PP: – Yeah. You worked together with him already.

PG: – Yeah, he is doing a lot of stuff. There is another saxophone player as well and trumpet players. It’s fun, yeah.

PP: – Very cool and exciting! Thank you very much, Per, I really appreciate your time spent on this.

PG: – My pleasure.

PP: – I’m looking very much forward to everything related to “Hux Flux” and “Incognito” and the new stuff and all.

PG: – Haha. It’s nice, thank you. Well, alright. Have a great weekend!

PP: – You too! I hope I didn’t ruin it for you. Haha.

PG: – Nah, it’s fine. I had a good time.

PP: – Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Bye-bye!

PG: – See you soon! Bye!

Stills are from the Zoom meeting.