Interview

Per Gessle interview in Dagens Nyheter – “It’s truly amazing that everything I’ve done means so much to so many people. You should never take that for granted.”

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Early May, Christopher Garplind from Dagens Nyheter met Per Gessle at Hotel Tylösand to do an interview with him and he also followed Per and the Roxette gang to Munich. Read the original and more detailed article in Swedish HERE!

Christopher describes Hotel Tylösand, Leif’s Lounge, the reception and his hotel room as well, where he finds a book on the bedside table that contains song lyrics and illustrations by Per. In that book there is an interview in which he talks about his mother Elisabeth. She used to write fairy tales for Per which she illustrated. One story was about Ferdinand the ant who was about to be stepped on by a heel, but who just barely escaped. This story comes back at the end of this Dagens Nyheter interview.

It is Per’s wife, Åsa who meets Christopher at the reception the next day and she takes him to a room that is wallpapered with pictures of Dolly Parton. Christopher informs that even though it is only Per and him who are going to meet, Åsa has set out coffee, sandwiches and cakes for about ten people.

Per enters the room and greets Christopher. He looks as he has always looked for the past 20 years, Christopher thinks: slim, tanned and with that hairstyle that brings to mind both Noel Gallagher and a middle-aged woman employed in the public sector in Linköping. He smells good, but doesn’t want to reveal what perfume he uses because “then everyone will just buy the same one”.

The guys leave the sandwiches and pastries alone and have a double espresso each. Christopher says to Per that he has to tell Åsa that he is on a diet and can’t eat any of this. It feels really rude to just leave it. Per understands Christopher. He says he was overweight when he was a kid and it was really tough. Christopher is not exactly “overweight”, but the answer makes him think of something he read, that Per had gained so much weight just before the turn of the millennium that he refused to tour or be in any of Roxette’s music videos in connection with the release of the album Have A Nice Day. He asks Per if it was so, because he felt so ugly.

I haven’t really thought about it that way, that I “felt so ugly”, but I didn’t feel comfortable in myself. You see yourself all the time. When you are in public and working with videos and making different appearances, you have to feel good, both mentally and physically. I didn’t feel good, so I didn’t want to be in it.

It was Anton Corbijn who directed the music video of Stars. He finally persuaded Per to appear for a few seconds as a homeless man, covered in garbage.

We did the next video with Anton in Portofino. By then I had managed to lose eight kilos and was able to participate again.

Christopher is curious how PG could manage to lose weight and asks him for the best dieting tip.

It was mostly just about getting in shape. I’m a bit like that: if there is candy at home, I’ll eat it. It takes a huge amount of mental strength not to do that, and you don’t always have it. I still gain and lose weight, but I try to keep track.

Christopher asks Per if he is grateful every day that he still has hair. Per laughs. He is rather happy that he still has hair. Nobody wants a bald Per Gessle, Christopher adds. Per agrees, but he says it can happen, you can get ill. Christopher asks if Per would wear a wig then.

Ugh, what should I answer? I have no idea. Horrible thought.

The past year has been – as usual – hectic for Per. 2024 saw the premiere of both Sommartider, the biopic about Gyllene Tider, and the musical Joyride, which is based on Roxette songs. He released a solo album Sällskapssjuk, and has toured with Roxette in Australia and South Africa.

After the other half of Roxette, Marie Fredriksson, died in 2019 from a brain tumor that was discovered in 2002, Per has been thinking about how to manage the Roxette legacy. In 2021, he launched the project PG Roxette, but since 2025, it has only been Roxette that applies again – with Lena Philipsson on vocals.

I’ve been thinking for many years about trying to bring Roxette forward in some way. I haven’t really been able to decide how. It was terrible when Marie passed away, and also when our drummer Pelle Alsing passed away a few years ago. The whole idea of taking Roxette forward is based on keeping the old band as much as possible. But the token actually fell when I worked with Lena and when she sang on the song “Sällskapssjuk”, because she was so damn good.

Christopher thinks it’s Per’s band and he does what he wants with it, but Roxette is very much Per and Marie, and now someone else is standing there. Christopher is curious if that could be perceived as a bit unsentimental.

Sure, I can understand that some people think so. But at the same time, it’s my song catalogue. You could also turn the coin around and say: “I’ve spent 30 years of my life writing these songs, will I never get to play them again with another voice?” But I understand, I’ve also thought along those lines. What’s right and what’s wrong? But this catalogue exists, and it’s really my life’s work. Let’s try it and see how it feels, shall we? What harm can it do?

Christopher is curious if Per asked Marie’s family for permission, or whatever you want to call it, to do this thing.

Yes, absolutely.

Per stood and sang these songs a million times together with Marie on stages all over the world, so Christopher thinks it must feel strange that she is not there. He wants to know if Per feels sad sometimes.

No, not really. It’s been so long since we did it at the level we were at when we were at our best. Marie got ill in 2002, and after her first operation there wasn’t that much difference, she sang just like before. But her second operation changed her a lot, and after that she was never the same. When we started again in 2009, it wasn’t quite the same Marie anymore. There were problems with keys and with not remembering lyrics. She still had days when she was amazing. But at the end she had to sit down on stage. The Marie I want to keep in my head is from the big tours, “Joyride” and “Crash! Boom! Bang!”. It was magical. But what we’re doing now is something different. It’s not that we’re out there launching new music, but we’re doing, just like many other successful artists who have been around for decades, a kind of emotional journey back in time. We’re managing the Roxette legacy in the best possible way. We make it as close to the original as possible.

Christopher asks Per if there will be a Roxette album with Lena on vocals.

I don’t think so, I can’t imagine that. It would be fun to release a song or two. But that’s not what Roxette is about today, it’s about nurturing our catalogue. It’s a fantastic treasure trove of songs we’re sitting on.

Christopher informs that it’s not just Marie Fredriksson and drummer Pelle Alsing who have passed away in recent years. In the 2010s, Per’s mother Elisabeth, his sister Gunilla and brother Bengt also died at short intervals. Since then, he has been the only one left in his original family.

You become a different person when many people around you pass away. You are reminded that time passes. When Marie passed away and Pelle passed away, all my siblings and mother, the parameters of existence changed in a way.

Christopher starts talking about Per’s immediate family today that consists of his wife Åsa and their 27-year-old son Gabriel. He says that when Per became a father in 1997, there was a bit of a mini-drama after he said in an interview that he didn’t plan on changing a single diaper.

I’ve never changed a diaper. Because my wife always did it first.

When Per turned 40, he said that he was very spoiled and that he had never washed clothes.

I don’t think I’ve ever washed clothes. I’ve always lived in my own little bubble.

Christopher is curious if Åsa got a little irritated by this.

Hm, but you’ve met her, she’s the best person in the world. There has never been any conflict. Then you shouldn’t forget that we toured and toured, travelled and travelled, so we used a lot of laundry service at hotels.

To the question if they have any staff at home, Per replies:

Yes, we have help with cleaning. But I don’t want a lot of assistants, because I want to be at peace. I don’t want to be disturbed by people who are in the way and who want to talk to me about dentist appointments and such.

When Per and Christopher walk around the hotel, people turn around and behave very strangely. Christopher notices that Per seems unfazed by the attention.

I’m used to it. I know that as soon as I leave home I’m on public ground. If I go to the pastry shop and buy rolls for the studio, there’s always someone who wants to take a selfie. I almost always say yes in such situations, but I don’t always do it at one in the morning in restaurants. I usually have a curfew after 10 pm. I can get annoyed when people come up and just interrupt in the middle of a discussion to take a photo – wait until you see that we’ve finished talking! Often they also want to talk about themselves: “I’m also a musician, my parents got married to this song, my dad had this song as his favourite”. I can feel guilty that I’m not more interested in it, because I actually should. It’s truly amazing that everything I’ve done means so much to so many people. You should never take that for granted.

Christopher says that Per comes across as very likeable, and there is very little crap about him compared to others of his caliber. The only thing he can find on the internet, and which is hinted at in some biographies, is that he was completely obsessed with money and very stingy, but that’s it. Christopher’s prejudice that PG was zero percent worried during the ‘metoo-autumn’ in 2017 is confirmed by the fact that Per doesn’t seem to understand the question.

I don’t even remember when it was. That’s both a good and a bad thing about me: I’m so completely ignorant about things. It’s like when people were talking about the financial crisis in the early ’90s, I was like, “Wow, was there a financial crisis? I’ve been on the ‘Joyride’ tour, I didn’t notice a thing”. I don’t even know what year you’re talking about?

When Christopher says it started in 2017, Per asks:

OK. Was it Harvey Weinstein and that? No, I haven’t actually thought about it.

Christopher says that the image of Per is that he is very rich and very stingy. He asks Per if he thinks he is stingy.

No, I don’t feel like that at all. I feel like I am very generous.

Christopher mentions that in the biography Att vara Per Gessle from 2007, Gyllene Tider bassist Anders Herrlin says the following about the stinginess accusations surrounding Per, which often come to the surface when it comes to how Gyllene Tider’s money is distributed between the band members: “He is absolutely not stingy, but rather incredibly generous, but he is greedy. As if he is afraid of losing something he already has.”

When the band’s drummer Micke Syd Andersson got married in 2005, a year after Gyllene Tider’s reunion success and 25th anniversary the year before, he invited all the band members except Per and told Aftonbladet that it was a “conscious decision”.

It was annoying. I thought then and still think Micke was very unfair, and he knows I think that.

To the question how they solved that, Per replies:

We took a break for eight or nine years, then we got back together and toured again. Well, I really love the guys in Gyllene. I have constant contact with all of them. They are wonderful people and fantastic musicians. Of all the drummers out there, Micke is probably my favourite.

Christopher is curious that if Per loves them so much and they are childhood friends and all that, why can’t they just split those Gyllene Tider tours equally.

I can’t sit and talk to you about our financial arrangements in Dagens Nyheter, you understand that, right?

When Christopher asks Per if he is a billionaire, PG thinks for five seconds and replies “no”.

Another image of Per, as Christopher says, is that he only writes stupid, happy pop songs.

Hahaha, I’ve heard that many times. Those who think that haven’t listened to much of what I write. “Gå & fiska!”, for example, is not really a positive text. But people just think “Go and fish, tjoho!” It actually is about someone who is seriously depressed, but people don’t read the lyrics.

At this point, Åsa enters the room and Christopher is struck by how much she and Per – or “Pelle” as she calls him – seem so damn close. They kiss each other several times. Christopher apologizes that they haven’t eaten anything from what she prepared in the room. She says it doesn’t matter and that the people in the staff canteen will be happy. Christopher asks if she was upset that Per never changed a diaper.

No.

And never washed clothes.

No. Or made a bed. There are many. But we help each other. Per does a lot of things and I do other things. That’s how it is in life. Although cooking is the only thing I wish he did…

Per can only cook rice and pasta. When he is in Stockholm and Åsa is not in town, he goes to a restaurant at Karlaplan where there are two dishes he likes – fish soup and salmon sashimi. But he likes homemade food best, adds Åsa.

—

The next time Christopher and Per see each other is at the end of June in Munich. During the night before, Christopher watched the documentary Roxette Diaries which consists of videos that Åsa and Per filmed from 1989 to 1995. In one of the scenes, Marie Fredriksson, alone with just a piano, performs Spending My Time for 60,000 people in Johannesburg. She sings incredibly, Christopher thinks. It’s starting to feel strange that Christopher will soon be seeing a Roxette concert without her.

However, the audience has received Lena Philipsson unexpectedly well. There are certainly some posts on the band’s social media where hardcore fans declare that “this is not Roxette”, but in general the atmosphere is surprisingly positive, and so is Munich.

Backstage, the band eats and prepares for the gig while Per takes a nap. Christopher meets him in his dressing room half an hour before the show, where he warms up with a cup of tea with grated ginger and honey, which is “good for the throat”.

To the question what the future looks like and if there is Gyllene Tider in it, because statistically, they should come back again in 2032, Per replies:

Now it’s Roxette. Then I don’t really know. But we are starting to get old. So far it’s not a problem, but sometimes when I see really old people trying to play their songs, it doesn’t sound so fun anymore. I’ve stopped going to The Rolling Stones, because the last time I saw them it wasn’t good. And I have a hard time listening to Paul McCartney now.

Christopher asks Per if he has enough self-awareness to quit on time.

I hope so.

Christopher is almost shocked by the crowd reaction and that they sing along to every single line of the lyrics in Munich. They cry, scream, dance. No one is like Marie Fredriksson, but Lena’s voice suits the songs unexpectedly well, he thinks. After almost two hours, the show is over.

As usual, Åsa has spent most of the concert filming and taking photos for Per’s and Roxette’s social media. Afterwards, she hands out plectrums to the hardcore fans at the front and collects gifts for the band. Everyone seems happy with the gig.

The tour manager has set out buckets of ice-cold beer and a tray of cheese and cold cuts. Lena drinks a steamy glass of white wine and Christopher is ashamed that he is sweating the most of all even though he is the only one who hasn’t played.

Christopher asks Per if life sometimes feels unreal, because he has succeeded in something that people usually don’t, especially not if you are a guy from Halmstad. It’s like one in a million.

I recently picked up something from Billboard. There are 18 songwriters in the world who have written three or more US number-ones on their own. Of the 18, four were from Europe, and they were Phil Collins, Paul McCartney, George Michael and me. Then I thought, “Shit, what the hell is this? This is really sick!” Then I can really pinch my arm.

To Christopher’s question, if Per has ever thought that his life is a kind of “The Truman Show” just because everything has been so crazy, Per replies:

Well, maybe not that far. I’ve been reflecting on the meaning of this. But it… has been a nice life.

As a last question, Christopher asks Per if he has any illustrations of Ferdinand the ant left.

No, I wish I had some. But I can see it in my mind. I can see how he just manages to escape the heel. The heel is huge.

Thanks for this great and extensive interview, Christopher Garplind, Dagens Nyheter and for the photos in the article, Veronika Ljung-Nielsen!

All interview text is written by Christopher Garplind for Dagens Nyheter in Swedish. Here it is a translation by RoxBlog.

Interview with Per Gessle by Hallandsposten before the Roxette tour start

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Jan-Owe Wikström did an interview with Per for Hallandsposten before the Roxette In Concert 2025 tour starts tomorrow. Per regarding the tour:

It’s the most exciting and the most uncertain thing I’ve done since Gyllene Tider’s comeback in 1996. You don’t know at all how it’s going to work, how it’s going to be received.

He explains it’s absolutely not a new band. It’s him, one half of Roxette, the Roxette band where Jonas Isacsson is back for the first time since 2001 and then Lena who is hired as a singer. The other option would have been to not make a comeback at all so this was the next best option, he points out.

Per tells Jan-Owe that it’s 26 degrees in Cape Town right now and he didn’t understand at first why he had an allergic shock, until he realized that it’s full pollen season over there. He took one pill and it was over in an hour, Per laughs.

We’ve actually sold as many tickets this time as when we were there with Marie. I never thought that! At the same time, the music industry has completely changed, where in four years we’ve increased the number of streams on Spotify by 40 percent. So I think it benefits us “craftsmen”, people want real music live.

It could even have been a joint tour with Bryan Adams in Australia, Jan-Owe says.

Yes, indeed. We play almost in parallel, so he wondered if we would go together. But unfortunately, we had already booked venues and started selling tickets. A bit of a shame, because it would have been great fun.

At the rehearsal a little over a week ago, there were 21 songs left. Per reveals:

There have been a lot of “kill your darlings”, but that’s because many songs have the same character. But there will still be two that we’ve never played live with Roxette before.

To the question how the rehearsals felt, he replies:

Very good! Lena is extremely professional. Now it’s about finding our roles. Marie and I had known each other for so long, so it was natural for her to step forward as long as she could. Then I got to the front on the last tour and solo and with Gyllene Tider, I’m the one who does it. We’ll see how it goes here. I mean, the rehearsals are one thing, but in front of just over 10,000 people: “How will Lena act in, for example, “Sleeping In My Car”?” So it’s going to be a challenge, really fun. It’s just a matter of not interrupting each other. Hahaha.

Jan-Owe asks who decides in such situations. Per explains that Lena of course had ideas regarding her singing, but otherwise, Per has the final say.

After the two Halmstad gigs at the end of July, Per has nothing else booked.

We’ll see. But I have several projects that are currently on hold.

To the question if there could even be new Roxette songs with Lena on vocals he replied:

Not at the moment. That has never been the intention, it has been that the song catalogue should live on. People want to hear Roxette’s old hits, not something new. But at the same time – when you work together for as long as we will now, you never know what it might lead to.

Jan-Owe is curious if there are any plans with Gyllene Tider.

Right now it feels a bit finished, but it has felt that way before too… If this tour develops into what I hope for with gigs on more continents, Roxette will be priority 1.

Interview with Per Gessle in Svenska Dagbladet – “Marie always made my songs better”

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Elin Liljero Eriksson did an interview with Per for Svenska Dagbladet. Elin and Per met in the Cornelis room at Södra Teatern in Stockholm.

It has been a busy year for Per. In addition to the feature film about Gyllene Tider and a musical with Roxette’s songs at Malmö Opera, he has turned 65 and released his first album of original material in over eight years – the duet album Sällskapssjuk. Now he is preparing for a world tour with Roxette next year, together with Lena Philipsson. He is really longing to go on tour again.

How his most successful project would be managed after Marie Fredriksson passed away in 2019 has not been a matter of course. Per explains that at first he didn’t want to continue with Roxette. Then he felt that this is over 30 years of his life and he has written almost all the material, songs that he wants to live on. Roxette has also been streamed more than ever in recent years. When he then made a single with Lena for his latest album, it felt right to ask her. But they haven’t started a new Roxette, Lena is hired to manage the Roxette catalogue.

PG is shocked at how many tickets they are selling for the new Roxette tour. There has been skepticism from some fans, but there are a lot of people who think it will be fun to hear the songs again.

Per wrote the lyrics of Kärleken är evig, Lena’s song that ended up at the second place in Melodifestivalen 1986. About writing songs for other artists, PG says he never liked it. Also if you write together with others, it usually means a lot of compromises that don’t make anyone happy, unless it becomes a hit. But that’s not really why Per is doing that. He is at his best when he gets to do things his own way, which is reminiscent of his upbringing in Halmstad.

I was a loner during my school years. I lived in my little bubble, listened to an extremely lot of music and was quite shy. But I was the one who got to sing “Staffan var en stalledräng” in third grade. I can’t believe I dared it, because it was incredibly unlike me. But there was something in me even then, that I wanted to be a pop star.

Per’s mother was a teacher of porcelain painting, his father was a plumber. They had a piano which was sometimes played by Per’s sister, but no deeper interest in music can be traced in the family, except to a violin-playing relative in the 1800s.

I don’t know where it comes from, but I’ve noticed that I have a completely different musicality than the fantastic musicians I’ve had the privilege of working with all these years. To this day, I can’t sit down at a piano and play my songs. I can play them wrong in the most ridiculous places. But if you ask Roxette producer Clarence Öfwerman to play anything from The Beatles, for example, he’ll play it even though he has never done it before. What I have is that sometimes I hear something in music that they don’t.

Elin wants to know if Per hears melodies.

Yes, I don’t know how they get to me. I have no idea how to write a hit. I’ve never had a formula for it. But I’m so glad I love commercial pop music, it’s in my DNA. That’s why there has been a lot of that kind of music. The melodies are the interesting part.

Elin is curious if Per has ever had complexes about not being a typically trained musician. Mr. G thinks „complex” is perhaps not the right word, but he has always felt inferior. Already on Gyllene Tider’s early tours, MP had to go on stage and tune Per’s guitar, because Per couldn’t. But when it was tuned, PG rolled on.

About Marie Per says:

Marie always made my songs better, that’s why I needed her. If she could have written those songs herself, she would have dumped me in the nearest trash can. But she couldn’t. We complemented each other very well.

Marie joining Roxette was not a given.

She was much bigger than I was at the time. No one around her, including the record company and producer Lasse Lindbom, wanted her to do anything with me. She did this against everyone’s will.

To the question how that could happen Per replies:

On the one hand, we had a fantastically pleasant relationship, but above all we were united in the desire to play abroad. But from Marie’s side, it was always the feeling of “we’ll see what happens”. Therefore, it was important for me to deliver. So I wrote the “Look Sharp!” album that was full of goodies. She liked the material for it very much, and I noticed that she sang in a different way when I could have a say. There was a sexiness in songs like “Dressed For Success” and “Dangerous” – a completely different Marie than the one who sang ” Ännu doftar kärlek”.

Look Sharp! was the start of a global Roxette hype that led to intense touring for several years. Elin says that despite the fact that both Per and Marie had partners, there were often rumors that they were a couple.

No, I have never had a relationship with Marie. We had a very intense relationship through Roxette, it was like our child. But after the Crash tour in the mid-1990s, everything changed, because Marie had a child. Then it became a different focus in her life, which was perfectly fine.

Per says he doesn’t really feel at home in the music industry anymore. It’s not because it is worse or better. That’s because it’s different from how it was when he was growing up. That’s why he still likes album covers. If you are 15 years old today, you don’t care about that.

Elin informs about the many projects in Per’s life. In addition to Gyllene Tider and Roxette, he has released several solo albums, runs Hotel Tylösand together with his wife, where he also has the photo gallery Tres Hombres Art and a solid Ferrari collection. He has a house and studio in Halmstad, in addition to his two floors on Strandvägen in Stockholm where he lives. Financially, he could have sat back a long time ago, but Per Gessle can hardly handle free Sundays. He says then it is impossible to get hold of anyone, the offices are closed and everyone is hungover. He wants access to things. Per says you can try to use Sundays as a contemplation day, but every seventh day is a bit too often.

Elin is curious what Per does when he contemplates. Mr. G says he walks and thinks a lot. Åsa likes to have the TV on in the mornings, which is a big schism in their family. Per is easily stressed by too much information, and if it is negative, which it often is these days, he can get quite low. Silence is a way for him to survive.

I never have music on unless I’m actively listening to it. Not in the car either. If it’s a nice car, I want to listen to the engine.

Regarding losing many around him in recent years, Per says:

It has obviously been very tough and has probably affected me more than I think. You are reminded of the impermanence of life.

Elin asks Per if he often thinks about death.

No. The most annoying thing about aging is that it’s so easy to look back. Besides that, it’s a very young world we live in, it’s not quite made for my age. 40 years ago I thought it was great, now it’s something I have to fight against. But if my ambition had been to only do bigger and bigger things, I would have gone crazy. Because what am I supposed to do with it? If I come up with an idea, I implement it. If I feel like it, I write a song. There will probably be a day when I feel like I’m done, but I’m not quite there yet.

Read the original interview in Swedish by Elin Liljero Eriksson and check out the photos by Rickard L Eriksson HERE on Svenska Dagbladet!

Rickard also shared the photos on his Instagram.

Interview with Mikael Bolyos about Marie Fredriksson’s upcoming live album release

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On Friday, 6th December, a double vinyl live album (also available digitally!) of Marie Fredriksson’s last solo tour (Nu!) in Sweden will be released – ten years after the tour and almost to the day five years after she passed.

Former RoxBlog member Kirsten Ohlwein and Oliver Zimmerman thought we would all want to hear more about the release and that was reason enough to ask Marie’s husband Mikael Bolyos – who is behind the release – about the new and yet not so new album.

Kirsten Ohlwein: – Mikael, you can imagine that everyone is super excited about this release, it’s a dream come true. The last live album we got was “Äntligen”, which was 24 years ago. First of all, I am pretty sure many fans wonder: How are you doing these days? You know you are in the thoughts of many people out there who send you their best wishes and highest regards.

Mikael Bolyos: – That’s very kind of you, it’s touching and I really appreciate it! I am alright, thanks.

KO: – It’s been ten years since the “Nu!” tour which we all loved and have the fondest memories about. Now it’s apparently time to release the live album. What has been the initial thought to look into the live recordings again and decide that the material is good enough to release it?

MB: – I always wanted to release a single, EP or even more songs from the concerts, and when I heard a video clip last summer, I decided to go through the concerts again.

KO: – Can you tell us which shows have been recorded back then and why you picked Stockholm as the one to release?

MB: – We recorded every show in 2014. Christoffer and I went through all of them and realized that Marie and the band sounded so good at all of them, it was impossible to choose. The Stockholm concert took place at “Cirkus” which is a great venue, the crowd was very enthusiastic, and it was a magic night.

KO: – How long did it take to go through the material again and when did you make the final decision to release the Stockholm show as an album?

MB: – I started to listen to the different concerts pre summer 2024. It took a couple of weeks and together with Christoffer Lundquist we decided that the Stockholm show had an energy that was impossible to ignore. Peter Domnérus at Cosmos Music (our record company) came up with that brilliant idea to release the whole concert on a double vinyl record.

KO: – Were the moments when you went through the songs again when you thought: „Wow, this is much better than I remember it” or „why didn’t we do this earlier?”?

MB: – As you probably remember, Roxette started a world tour later the same year, 2014. Christoffer made some mixes already then, but we were all too busy to start the work with releasing anything from the “Nu!” tour. The Roxette tour went on until spring 2016, when Marie was too weak to continue. It was a very tough time for Marie and our family. And if this wasn’t enough, I had to do a heart surgery in 2017. I was recovering during 2018 and in 2019 as you know, Marie passed away.

The following years, I have been mourning. On 1st June this year I wrote to Christoffer and asked him to make a first brief mix of all of the songs, and in October we sat together in his AGM studio to do the mixes, and here we are now!

KO: – How did the process of going through the tour material feel for you? I can imagine that it wasn’t the easiest thing to do for you and yet probably very warm and special as well?

MB: – It was many tears…

KO: – What are your memories regarding that tour? What did you preserve from back then? Which one was your favourite song to play and what were your favourite moments?

MB: – It was a very special tour. Marie was so keen on doing the tour, she knew it was going to be her last Swedish tour, singing her own songs. Personally, I felt so good touring again, playing music in a band, consisting of friends. I always liked to play “Bara för en dag”, and “Efter stormen”, but my favourite moment was playing ”Så skimrande var aldrig havet”.

KO: – You have been quite busy spoiling fans with unreleased stuff in the past years. Every now and then you find a song or a recording that gets to be released either in December or May. We are very grateful for that! Is there more to come in the future?

MB: – Sorry to say, but I don’t think so. This double LP will probably be Marie’s farewell.

Thank you so much for your time, Micke and thanks a lot for your interview, Kirsten!

Live från Cirkus is out on 6th December! The record is a beautiful 180-gram double vinyl in a gatefold edition, with a total run of 1,000 copies. You can order it at Bengans.

Tracklist

Side A

  1. Så stilla så långsamt
  2. Kom vila hos mig
  3. Bara för en dag
  4. Det regnar igen
  5. Sista sommarens vals

Side B

  1. Ber bara en gång
  2. Sparvöga
  3. Ett hus vid havet
  4. Ett bord i solen
  5. Så skimrande var aldrig havet

Side C

  1. Ännu doftar kärlek
  2. Så länge det lyser mittemot
  3. Om du såg mig nu
  4. Efter stormen

Side D

  1. Den sjunde vågen
  2. Mellan sommar och höst
  3. Den bästa dagen
  4. Tro

Interview with Per Gessle and Fredrik Etoall at Hotel Boman in Trosa

by

Östra Strömlands Posten was there at the vernissage of Fredrik Etoall’s exhibition at Hotel Boman in Trosa on 9th November and they did a short interview with both Per Gessle and Fredrik Etoall. Fredrik’s Roxette, Per Gessle, Marie Fredriksson and Gyllene Tider photos are on display at the hotel.

There was no room for all the questions and answers in the newspaper, so they shared the complete conversation with Per on their Facebook page.

ÖSP: – What do you think of the evening so far?

PG: – It’s great fun that so many people came. Fun to hang out with Fredrik for a few hours as well. He is so energetic and talented. He has a unique eye, he sees things no one else sees. We find it easy to work together and it’s always close to laughter with Fredrik. We got to know each other at a photo session with Roxette and those photos have really stood the test of time. The pictures with just Marie are from her solo time – they are amazing!

ÖSP: – Now you go on tour again. How does that feel? Is it always the same fun?

PG: – It’s always just as fun to go on tour and I tour almost every year. I like tour life and the energy you get from the crowd.

ÖSP: – Kristin Boman [owner of the hotel] mentioned that you are one of the most productive people she knows. “Per is always writing something”. After as many years as you have been at it, you would think it would slow down a bit, right?

PG: – My creativity is probably quite constant. I look for ideas every day, all the time. The thing that has slowed me down – because I do think I have slowed down –, is that the music business has changed so much. It’s not nearly as fun as it used to be. Now it’s business at all costs. Gyllene Tider would never have gotten through today like we did back then with our strange ideas and my strange lyrics. No record company would have invested in it, because today there is a lot of formulaic thinking with Idol and all that. It’s a machinery today like any other industry. It wasn’t like that, if you go back to the ’60s or ’70s when the music industry exploded with The Beatles for example and completely different opportunities for crazy people like David Bowie. Music back then had much more power than today and played a different role in society. Take the protest songs against the Vietnam War, for example. Just as the music industry has become more structured and compliance-driven over time, sectors like healthcare and social care now also rely on frameworks such as Avensure’s health and safety services for care homes to ensure that organizations meet strict regulations while maintaining safe and supportive environments for both staff and residents.

ÖSP: – Is it possible to summarize what you want us listeners to experience when we listen to your songs?

PG: – I hope that in my best moments I can give those who listen to me the same thing that I get from the artists who mean something to me. Music is so amazing. It gives comfort and strength and you can feel that a text is about you. All the songwriters and composers I’ve listened to all my life, Joni Mitchell, The Beatles, Paul Simon and Tom Petty not least, Randy Newman and Kris Kristofferson – they are all great storytellers. If I can give someone a fraction of what they have given me, I’m more than happy.

ÖSP: – Can one get to know you better through your lyrics or do you write more generally?

PG: – I think so. When you write a text, it often starts with an idea that you recognize yourself in, but then in verse two it can become something else, to make it even more exciting. I’ve written maybe a thousand songs and I’m not THAT interesting (Per laughs), but I can tell about feelings and about how I react to things and so I try to make it universal, but in my own way. My biggest enemy is always that it will become clichéd or predictable. Sometimes you succeed, sometimes you don’t.

ÖSP: – Do you ever release something you are half-satisfied with?

PG: – No, never these days. It has happened before but not anymore. I have lots of songs lying around where the lyrics don’t fit and then the years go by and sometimes I can get distance from them and I can pick them up again. On this record there are two songs, “Hoppas” and “Ingen annan”, which I wrote in 1984 for my second solo record “Scener”, which I had forgotten. There was a girl from Hungary who manages a big Roxette community. She saw a photo of cassettes I have and she recognized two titles, so I listened to them again and they are great songs, but the lyrics were crap. The music was terrifying. It was written by a 25-year-old me who was curious in a different way. In early Roxette songs I can hear that I don’t really have the ability to write English lyrics, like in “Neverending Love”. At best, they are a bit fun, but not very good. Then I had a period of 18 years where I didn’t work in Swedish at all, so then I learned to write texts in English.

ÖSP: – Do you have any favourites among your own songs?

PG: – Yes, I have lots of songs that I like, for example, the songs I wrote for Marie: “Queen Of Rain” and “What’s She Like?” which Marie sings fantastically. I like “The Look”. It’s a totally insane song with three chords that turned out right.

ÖSP: – Favourites from the latest record?

PG: – “Plåster” with Amanda Ginsburg. I had recorded almost the whole record before I realized it was going to be a duet record, so in some cases I re-recorded the songs. For example, I recorded the first half of “Beredd” with Molly Hammar, so that it would fit her key. In most of the other songs I chose singers who sang in my key, for example Lisa Miskovsky suits me very well. Lena Philipsson works well too. I get a little pressured in the parts I sing, but then Lena sounds fantastic, so it’s worth it. I have a fun job!

ÖSP: – What do you think of Bomans and Trosa?

PG: – It’s a pleasure to be here. It’s Sweden’s second best hotel… Nah, kidding aside, Bomans is one of my favourite hotels in the whole world, wherever you go it’s completely unique. Every time I’m here, I never want to leave. Trosa is wonderful with all the water, especially in the summer. If you walk around inside Trosa it’s fantastic, I love being here. Sometimes I have a bit of a problem with mosquitoes here. We don’t have mosquitoes at all in Tylösand.

 

ÖSP: – If you had to choose one or a few of the pictures exhibited here, which would you choose as your favourite pictures?

FE: – A photo that is the backbone of me and the book in this project. It’s the photo of Marie in the window. It’s so “pinch me in the arm” strong and it’s unbelievable that I’ve taken it. The picture is Marie and what she has done for Swedish music and the Swedish people and also internationally, and so the picture carries so much of what she has been through. Then there are many photos that I think are incredible. The book cover is also special. Technically it may not be the best picture, but as Per also puts it, “there is no one who has taken such a picture of Marie and me”. Many probably thought that there has been some romance between Marie and Per, but as far as I have understood, there has not. When we took the picture, there was only protection. Other pictures might be cooler, but this one is so unique based on all the speculation and what had happened to Marie, so it’s just protection.

ÖSP: – How do your photos come about?

FE: – Conscious luck is what I usually talk about. I do an incredible amount of preparation for everything I do. It doesn’t matter how much I prepare, it won’t happen that way anyway, but if I’ve prepared, I’m ready for a chance. The photo of Marie in the window just happened. Just like the one by the piano. I told Marie that I listened to one of her songs with my team every morning, “Den bästa dagen”. “Come and sit next to me,” she said, and then she played it for me. While she was playing, I snuck up and took the picture. It is almost out-of-body.

Photo and interview by Jessica Gustâv