Per Gessle and Molly Hammar on Nyhetsmorgon

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Per was Jenny Alversjö’s guest on Nyhetsmorgon, TV4 this morning. Molly Hammar joined them via Zoom. Watch the interview HERE!

Jenny informs that Per is back with a new single, Beredd. On Friday we got a taste of what’s to come this autumn, because PG will release a new album, Sällskapssjuk. On Beredd we don’t only hear Per’s beautiful voice, but also Molly Hammar’s, Jenny adds.

Here they play a short part of the video to Beredd.

Jenny welcomes Per and asks how it feels to release this song. Mr. G says it feels great. There are only very positive reactions and it’s wonderful to have Molly in this. Per is very happy. Jenny understands that and she says now he works in Swedish again. PG says he has also done some Gyllene Tider in between, but it’s been seven years since he made his Nashville records that were in Swedish.

Jenny says Per is always active. Now this is the first taste from the album Sällskapssjuk, which will be out this fall. Jenny is curious if there is any special reason why the first single is released now. Mr. G says it’s mostly because he wanted to release different duets before the album is out and this way he needed some leadtime. The next single comes in May.

Jenny wants to know more about the background. Why Molly? Because that’s pretty much the only thing they can talk about now, since Per is so secretive about the other collaborations.

PG tells Jenny that he wrote a lot of songs and felt it would be fun to have a different angle this time, to do duets and work with different male and female singers that he likes very much. So he called around and found a bunch of singers that he likes. It’s been an incredibly fun project.

Jenny asks if it was difficult to find these partners. Per says it was easier than he thought. PG says you want to work with people you like, but who have something to add. When you write a song and another personality comes in, things happen with the song both lyrically and musically, so it’s important to find the right one. He thinks it has turned out very nice in this case.

Jenny says it sounds like no one refused to collaborate. Per confirms that and says smiling that it’s unbelievable.

Jenny asks how Per has chosen Molly. Mr. G says Molly is a favourite. She is an absolutely magical singer. She has this magnet, when you hear her voice, you can’t stop listening to her. Jenny says Per mentioned Molly could sing a phone book. PG says she is the classic one who could do that. She is a bit like Adele, she has that kind of voice. You can’t help, but listen to it. So Per is glad she wanted to join him.

That’s a nice compliment according to Jenny. Here they call Molly via Zoom. She is in London. They greet each other and Molly thanks Per for the compliments. Per asks Molly how she is. She feels great, and asks if she doesn’t look fresh. PG says she does look fresh despite that it’s Sunday morning.

Jenny says Molly looks splendid and asks her about how it feels to hear what Per has just told about her. Molly says it’s huge. When Per called her, it was a very big deal for her. Because Per is a legend and a fantastic musician. When they got to meet and then hung out in the studio, then she started liking him as much as a person too. Molly thinks it’s fun that you can be a legend and be incredibly nice at the same time. So she is very happy.

Jenny asks Molly what she thought when she heard the song for the first time. Molly says she loved it right away. She thinks that it’s a classic fine, cross-generational pop song, because it’s a theme that everyone can relate to.

Jenny is curious about how they did the recordings, if they were in Stockholm or in Halmstad.

Per says they met in Stockholm and tested some keys and such. Then Molly came down to Halmstad. The whole album was recorded in Halmstad, by the way, with lots of local musicians. So Molly came down to Halmstad and they had a good day in the studio and a very nice dinner in the evening in Tylösand. Molly confirms it was super nice.

Jenny asks Molly how important she thinks it is to hang around when creating together. Molly thinks it’s important to have a lot of fun together when making music. Otherwise it just gets weird and she doesn’t think this magic could happen then. You have to have fun and laugh together.

Jenny says they would have loved to see Molly in the Nyhetsmorgon studio, but she is in London. She is curious what Molly is doing there. Molly is running around writing songs and she has a great time. Jenny says she should come to the studio when she gets home. Molly says it would be her pleasure.

Jenny says it’s great that they could have her on the show this way. She knows Molly has a lot to do, so they will let her go now and wish her to have a nice time. Molly thanks for that and says goodbye to both Jenny and Per.

Jenny says Per has been in the business for a very long time, but she wants to know if Per has learned anything from this collaboration. PG says it’s hard to say that you learn something, but as he said before, songs grow and change when you work with other people. And as everyone knows, he has worked a lot with duets in Roxette. He wrote so many songs for Marie that changed and raised the quality of the songs simply because of her voice and her personality. And it’s the same here. All these people he has worked with have changed his songs. It’s not like he sat down with seven or eight people and wrote new music together. It’s his songs and his lyrics that they come in and sing to. So there is a big difference here.

Jenny thinks that many people, including her, will forever associate Per with Marie, of course, even if he does duets with other artists. She asks Per what it was like working with others. Per says it’s always exciting. Before you go into the studio and you have a song, it might not feel right. The keys might not fit or there might be too much modulation for it to work. When he chose certain singers, he listened to what kind of voice they have and in theory he tried, this person fits this song, that person fits that song. And some have not worked at all. Then he already knows in advance that it won’t work. Jenny asks if there were a lot of singers on Per’s list to revise, if he had to revise Molly. Per says no, it was simple with Molly.

Jenny can imagine that when Per and Marie worked together, they must have known each other inside and out, so Per rarely got to revise things there. Per says no, but he was listening to the Roxette catalogue and sometimes he heard some strange key changes to lower and higher, so that they can both sing. You can do such technical tricks. The songs Marie sings herself, they are in her register what she enjoyed the most.

Jenny can imagine that there might be an extra reminder of Marie when Per has collaborations and someone else is at the microphone. Per says not really. It’s been so long since Marie and Per have worked together. It was a lovely era in his life that he preserves. But he doesn’t think too much about it now. But the loss is still there, definitely.

Jenny says she knows that Marie wrote some of the music on the new album. Per says it’s actually a song that is not a duet, but he sings it himself. Marie and he wrote it together in the ’80s. Per wrote the lyrics and Marie and Per wrote the music. So it is also a bit special. It was written long before Roxette, when Marie and Per hung out in his attic apartment in Halmstad in the early ’80s and watched Dallas and Dynasty and stuff like that in the evenings. Jenny finds it lovely and she can see Marie and Per in front of her like that.

Jenny wants to know how Per finds such a song. If it was on paper or they recorded it on cassette. Per says it was on cassette and there have been a few demos on it over the years. It has been a little too good to throw away, but it has never found its rightful place.

Jenny asks Per if he has an overview of everything they have worked on. Per says he doesn’t. A few things have appeared in recent years that he has forgotten about, but they are somewhere on cassettes and strange minidiscs. There has been a lot of technology over the years. It’s such a long time.

Jenny asks if the song that Marie co-wrote is also a duet. Per says it’s not a duet, he sings it himself.

The album will be released this fall. Jenny asks Per about the title, Sällskapssjuk. PG says he wrote a song called Sällskapssjuk and he thought it’s a good title when you have a lot of duets. He also thought it was a nice expression, a nice word.

Jenny says Per mentioned before that he worked on the album in Halmstad, he recorded it there. So some of the songs are probably very organically recorded. Per confirms it. He has worked a lot with local musicians to try to find a new angle, a new sound on the record. Everything is a bit homegrown. It’s hard to explain music, but it’s very organic. There is a lot of lap steel and there is a lot of violin. It’s good.

Jenny wants to know how Per finds inspiration again and again. Mr. G says he doesn’t really look for inspiration, but it pops up from time to time. He is not the kind of person who goes and sits down to play the piano and guitar and writes every day. He usually says that he writes as little as possible. Because when he has something on his mind, he becomes very focused and it goes quite quickly. So Jenny says this means Per doesn’t really like sitting and writing like that. Per says he doesn’t like it at all. He has to do it only sometimes. It’s something that has to come out in some way.

Jenny asks how it is to record in Sweden and elsewhere. There must be a big difference between Sweden and the rest of the world. Per has experienced both. PG says there really isn’t that much of a difference. It’s a completely different thing to work in the studio and to be on stage, of course. This communication that you work with when you have an audience in front of you, it’s fantastic. Many people always ask if it’s fun to play Sommartider or The Look, which you have played a thousand times. When you have an audience in front of you that gives so much back, it’s clear that you love to play your hits. That’s why you work, so to say. Jenny says it must be amazing to see those songs live on through different generations too. What a gift!

The album is coming this autumn, there will be more duets. The next single comes out in May. Jenny asks who will be Per’s partner in that, but Mr. G doesn’t reveal. Jenny asks for a hint. Per says it’s a fantastic male or female singer. Haha.

Jenny thanks Per for coming and hopes to see him again in spring. Per says it’s always fun to be here.

Stills are from Nyhetsmorgon.

Per Gessle on Musikplats about his upcoming Swedish album

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Per Gessle was Fredrik Eliasson’s guest on Musikplats, Swedish Radio on Friday. Fredrik asked Per about his new single and upcoming album, as well as the Gyllene Tider movie and the Roxette musical. Listen to the interview HERE!

Fredrik asks Per to talk about his new song, Beredd, which is a duet with Molly Hammar. Per explains his upcoming album will be a duet album and he wrote songs that he thought were lyrically suitable to be duets. Molly is one of his favourites. Mr. G thinks she is an outstanding singer. She is completely unique and Per was so happy that she wanted to join. The song turned out damn good. According to PG, it’s magical to work with the kind of powers that many of his partners on this record have. But above all, Molly is superb.

Fredrik asks Per why he wanted to do a duet album. Per explains, if you do it right, when you do duets, the songs become even better. A good singer has such a strong personality and such strong power that you can take advantage of that in the composition. Time usually flies when you listen to a duet that is well done. Then there is another aspect. Purely musically, it will be exciting. You usually work with different registers and different tones. You might make a lot of modulations from a purely technical point of view in the composition and how you arrange everything. That’s also exciting. Sometimes it can happen that you bring in a singer and it falls flat, because the communication between the two in the duet is not happening. Now that hasn’t happened, because he has chosen very talented and competent singers. In this particular case, he got lucky with each partner and it worked well thanks to the artists he has chosen. He won’t reveal who they are. Fredrik was already going to ask who else is there. PG won’t tell, he says Fredrik has to wait a bit.

Fredrik is curious if it was difficult to bring them duet partners along. Per says he is a bit like „will I really dare to ask this person”, because you never want to be rejected. But no one has actually turned it down. It is also the case that nowadays you work a lot together, e.g. in songwriting teams. But this is not like that at all. These are Per’s songs. So he sort of brings in guests for his music and his lyrics.

Fredrik wants to know if Per sees these partners almost as an instrument in his music. Mr. G says, you could say that in this case, it’s a bit like that. It’s a test. When you first go in and record a new voice, it’s automatically a test and you never know if it will work. You do everything you can, which is in your power, trying to find the right keys, trying to write a text, a song that you think fits this particular individual. But you never know. Per says he doesn’t know what to call it. It might sound negative if he calls it an instrument, but it has absolutely only been positive.

Fredrik says the thing with duets is that they must end up somewhere, so that you have the feeling that one and one makes three. That’s how it is, Per says. Fredrik is curious if that is what Per is after, in this form. Per laughs and says he tries to do that with everything all his life, that one and one makes three. The text and the music makes three. His family, inserts Fredrik smiling. It’s been like that through Per’s whole journey. He tries to find partners and people around him who make him and what he does even better. His job is very much to try to find such people that he feels that he or she and Per communicate well and they convey something that makes things a little bit better than they might have been in the beginning. And then if they succeed, one and one will make three.

Fredrik says Per has a lot going on right now. Per should have become a juggler. Haha. Per says he is retired, for God’s sake. Haha. Fredrik says Per is far from quitting his job. Per says he has a hard time doing that. He is his job in a way. It’s probably a bit of a coincidence that a lot is happening around him and his music this year. It’s the Gyllene Tider movie this summer and the Roxette musical has it’s world premiere in September. It’s super exciting, he says.

Sommartider, that’s the title of the Gyllene Tider movie. Fredrik asks Per what was it like to see himself on the screen. Per says it was super weird. He hasn’t seen the movie yet, he has only seen some scenes and they are great. The script is fantastic. The concept is that the movie is about five guys in a small town who form a band and for some inscrutable reason try to enter Café Opera in clogs. The film is not a tribute to Gyllene Tider’s long 40-year career. It ends when Sommartider is released in 1982. So it’s about five small-town boys who meet and get to be part of a very strange fate.

Fredrik asks what Per thought when they came up with the idea that this would happen. Per says he was both flattered and horrified and he thinks that applies to all of them in the band. But at the same time, it’s a very special story that they have been part of and how it happened. They had actually only done six concerts in front of an audience when they became No. 1 with Flickorna på TV2. So they were all rookies. Then it went so fast and with the background they come from, it’s a very exceptional journey. So it’s clear that it’s very grateful to make a film out of it.

Here they play a little bit from the trailer for the movie. Fredrik asks Per if what we get to see is how it really was, if the feeling is there. PG says the feeling is absolutely there and that is the most important thing. It’s there how they meet, how they rehearse and how Marie comes into the picture.

Valdemar Wahlbeck plays the role of Per. Fredrik asks PG how Valdemar found Per and the character. Per says he wasn’t at the auditions at all. Mr. G says when Valdemar was chosen and got the job, they met quite a lot and talked and he always came super excited and had a thousand questions about how it was, how Per did this, why Per did that etc. And Per answered as best as he could and what he remembered. So Valdemar must have brought that into his role in some way. Valdemar is from Halmstad, his father and family are from Halmstad, so he has this dialect that Per has. That also helps.

Fredrik says, the film takes place in the early years up to 1982, Sommartider is released and then, he is curious what happens next. If there will be a sequel. Per mentioned that Marie Fredriksson comes into the picture in the movie. So he is curious if there will be a movie about Roxette. Per says you never know, but there is nothing planned at all. One thing at a time and this is a really exciting thing. Per smiles and says, let’s see how it turns out.

Speaking of Roxette, Fredrik mentions that there is a very close connection between Roxette and Gyllene Tider. He refers to Per’s recent post on Instagram, where he states that Gyllene Tider was called Roxette internationally on the Heartland record. Per says, after the guys in the band, everyone but him did the military service in 1983, then they made a new album in English. Their first and only English album, The Heartland Café. That record came out under the title Heartland in the US on Capitol Records and then the band was called Roxette. So the first Roxette record is actually Gyllene Tider’s Heartland album. Per remembers that he was in Los Angeles in 1984 and found this Roxette album at Tower Records on Sunset Boulevard next to Roxy Music. That was pretty damn cool. Fredrik says then Per saw straight into the future. Haha. Mr. G says he was very impressed. Fredrik says, and imagine that it turned out the way it did a few years later. Per says it’s unbelievable.

Here they play The Look, Roxette’s first US No. 1 in 1989. Fredrik informs that Roxette’s music becomes a musical. Joyride – The Musical premieres later this year, but it’s not about Roxette. Per says the musical is based on a book called Got You Back written by Jane Fallon, who is a great English writer. It is a love triangle drama about a man who has a wife in London and a lover outside London. The ladies find out about the situation and they take revenge on him. That’s the story briefly.

Fredrik asks how it all came together. Per says they have been looking for a good script for many, many years. And this is the first script that has all the components to build a good musical on it. Then people have processed the script to get the songs in at different places and tested and discarded and inserted new ones. Right now they are at a slightly too long version, Per smiles, but it’s fantastically cool to be a part of that journey.

Mr. G says that both the film and the musical are completely untrodden ground for him. He is just like, „wow!”, „oh my God!”, how many people are involved. He was at the costume department and there are 370 different garments that are handmade and hand sketched, ’80s and ’90s style. It’s a hell of a job and they have fantastic skills. It’s a completely different world. So Per is super happy to be a part of this. The musical premieres on 6th September in Malmö.

Fredrik knows the question is almost impossible to answer, but he is curious, when Per browses the Roxette song catalogue, which is the one for Per, no matter if it’s been the biggest hit or not, but that’s been the most defining song in the catalogue, that has really taken him to a place, emotionally or in any other way. So simply, which song means the most to Per. PG says the one that has taken him to another place should of course be one of the great songs, It Must Have Been Love or Listen To Your Heart, but one song that he has always loved is a song that is actually in the musical as well. It’s What’s She Like?, which is on the Crash! Boom! Bang! album. He likes that song for different reasons. He likes the song composition, the lyrics, and Marie is as good as only she could be when she sings this song. So PG thinks that’s his favourite song. Fredrik thanks Per for stopping by and plays What’s She Like? at the end of the conversation.

In the program it turns out that Beredd is the song of the week. Congrats!

Photo from Fredrik Eliasson’s Instagram

Per Gessle’s new single, “Beredd” is out!

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Per Gessle has released Beredd as the first taste from Sällskapssjuk, his upcoming Swedish album. The single contains two songs:

Side A             Beredd
Side B             Ingen förstod vad som hände

Beredd is a duet with Molly Hammar, who is one of Per’s absolute favourite singers. PG thinks Molly has that magical power that makes you can’t stop listening to her. Per is proud that she wanted to join him.

Molly says:

When Per called and asked if I wanted to do “Beredd” with him, I felt very honored and it was obvious for me to do it. It’s a cross-generational song in many ways as I relate to it on many levels as I think others will, and when Per Gessle calls there is no other answer than yes.

Per says:

The recording was almost impertinently easy. Molly came down to the Sweetspot Studio in Harplinge outside Halmstad, took a microphone, sat down on a couch and did some testing. After the second take, it was done – as clear as it gets.

Listen to the single on any streaming platform HERE and don’t forget to pre-order the physical copy, 7″ vinyl that is released on 1st March at Bengans and at Ginza!

A video to Beredd premieres at 12 pm CET HERE! Don’t miss it!

Beredd

Ingen förstod vad som hände
Hur gick det egentligen till?
Vi var bara två vänner
Som gjorde att tiden stod still

Och ingen av oss var beredd
Vi kände det vi kände, kanske blev du rädd
Jag tog dina händer och höll nästan andan
Vi såg på varandra
Såg på varandra

Du lämnade dörren vidöppen
Och sprang nerför gatan mot stan
Musiken och festen och livet
Blev aldrig mer likadant

Ingen av oss var beredd
Det hände det som hände och kanske blev du rädd
Jag tog dina händer och höll nästan andan
Vi såg på varandra
Såg på varandra

Ingen av oss var beredd
Vi kände det vi kände, kanske blev du rädd
Jag kysste dina läppar och tappade nästan andan
Vi såg på varandra
Såg på varandra

Ingen av oss var beredd
Det hände det som hände, kanske blev du rädd
Jag kysste din mun och tappade nästan andan
Vi såg på varandra
Såg på varandra

Words & music: Per Gessle
Published by Jimmy Fun Music

Produced by Per Gessle + Andreas Broberger

Recorded at Tits & Ass, Halmstad February + March + November 2022 + January 2023 and Lost Boy Studios, Umeå December 2022 + January 2023 and Sweetspot, Harplinge November 2023

Engineers: Mats Persson (T&A), Andreas Broberger (LBS) + Staffan Karlsson (Sweetspot)
Mixed at Lost Boy Studios, Umeå by Andreas Broberger + Anton Ekström November 2023

Per Gessle: acoustic guitar + keyboards + vocals
Molly Hammar: vocals
Helena Josefsson: backing vocals
Fredrik ”Gicken” Johansson: electric bass + lap steel
Mats Persson: electric guitar + mandolin
Andreas Broberger: keyboards + programming + electric guitar + backing vocals

Ingen förstod vad som hände

Words & music: Per Gessle
Published by Jimmy Fun Music

Produced by Per Gessle + Andreas Broberger

Recorded at Tits & Ass, Halmstad February + March + November 2022 + January 2023 and Lost Boy Studios, Umeå December 2022 + January 2023

Engineers: Mats Persson (T&A), Andreas Broberger (LBS)
Mixed at Lost Boy Studios, Umeå by Andreas Broberger + Anton Ekström January 2023

Per Gessle: acoustic guitar + keyboards + vocals
Helena Josefsson: backing vocals
Fredrik ”Gicken” Johansson: electric bass + lap steel
Mats Persson: electric guitar + mandolin
Andreas Broberger: keyboards + programming + electric guitar + backing vocals

 

Photo by Fredrik Etoall

Sleeve design by Wickholm Formavd., Stockholm

Per Gessle in duet with Molly Hammar

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Per Gessle releases the lead single from his upcoming album on 23rd February. Beredd is the first taste from Sällskapssjuk – Per’s first record with new material in Swedish in seven years. The album was recorded in Halmstad and mostly consists of duets with a number of brilliant singers and artists.

Per says, smiling:

Somehow it seems to be my destiny ever since Marie Fredriksson and I started working together in Roxette – my songs always get a little better when another strong personality comes into the picture and adds their unique thing.

On Beredd it’s Molly Hammar and Per who get together at the microphone – in a way that makes the creator slightly lyrical.

Molly is one of my absolute favourite singers. She has that magical power that makes you can’t stop listening to her. I’m so proud that she wanted to join.

Molly says:

When Per called and asked if I wanted to do “Beredd” with him, I felt very honored and it was obvious for me to do it. It’s a cross-generational song in many ways as I relate to it on many levels as I think others will, and when Per Gessle calls there is no other answer than yes.

Per says:

The recording was almost impertinently easy. Molly came down to the Sweetspot Studio in Harplinge outside Halmstad, took a microphone, sat down on a couch and did some testing. After the second take, it was done – as clear as it gets.

“Sällskapssjuk” is a very exciting album and project for me. It’s a wonderful challenge both as a songwriter and a producer to try to put together the puzzle of different voices and talents. The Molly song is first out. More to come!

Pre-save the single HERE! Watch the video teaser HERE!

Alan Hunter meets Per Gessle on ’80s on 8 on SiriusXM

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While Per Gessle was in Miami in January, Alan Hunter – one of the original five VJs on MTV – invited him on his show on ’80s on 8, SiriusXM.

Alan is thrilled to be here with a special guest from a much beloved ’80s band. He has one half of the Swedish duo Roxette, Per Gessle on the show. He tells Per what a pleasure it is to see him. Per is just as happy, he says it’s great being here.

Alan feels like all of their kind of MTV-centric, ’80s-centric family went through this thing together back in the day and here they are a few years later still alive and well. Per says, thank God. Alan also says Per has his ever present boyish charm. He is curious what the deal is, whether it’s the hair or just good living. Haha. Per says he is actually celebrating his 65th birthday while he is here in Florida. Alan says it’s a good place to celebrate it, as long as you don’t have to wear a thong on South Beach. PG says he tries to avoid that. He is feeling good. He has been very lucky in his life, having a great career and no big health issues. So he just keeps on keeping on.

Alan says Per comes from a healthy country, at least he perceives it. America has its issues, but Alan thinks people in Sweden take care of themselves. Per doesn’t know what Alan is referring to actually, but he thinks it’s a different ball game in Scandinavia. He isn’t really leading a healthy lifestyle though. He drinks too much wine and eats too much. Alan says the debate is out on that wine thing.

Alan wants to throw a few stats out. He’s got an initial thought about Roxette. Nineteen Top 40 UK hits, four number ones in the US, 80 million albums worldwide. This number is astounding to a lot of people who even love and know Roxette. Alan is not comparing Roxette and ABBA, but it’s the same sort of American-centric exceptionalism. It’s their arrogance related to these bands from somewhere else. He doesn’t think they have appreciated ABBA over the years until someone told them how huge they are and then they go and see their show. People who are in the business that loved Roxette on MTV, they know the songs, but Alan doesn’t think they realize how huge Roxette is internationally. Per thinks the problem here in the States is that they didn’t tour that much here in those days. Lots of people know the songs, they know Listen To Your Heart, It Must Have Been Love, The Look, Joyride, Dressed For Success, but they don’t necessarily know that it’s the same band who is playing all those songs. Per says it’s easier for them in Europe, where they toured so much or Australia for that matter, even South America. They toured so much, playing football stadiums in those days. There everyone knows everything about Roxette, but it’s different in the US.

Alan says the power of live shows, it was very MTV-centric back in the ’80s. People had nothing to do, but turn on their televisions. Of course, that did increase live performances as well. The two were aided by each other, but now more than ever, acts are all about playing live. Per thinks they had a big advantage in the ’80s, because they came from a live scene in Sweden before Roxette made it big internationally. So they knew how to treat a crowd, they knew how important that was. It was always fun for them to play live gigs, because they knew they were good. Marie was an amazing front person and an amazing singer, ad libbing every night. They were just as much a live band as they were a band working in the studio.

Alan thinks we get that same vibe from a lot of UK bands and other bands from Europe that they appeared on MTV – like Duran Duran or U2 – as poster boys for the video age, but they had been playing the clubs, they had been paying their dues, they knew how to play live. That was almost even different from some of the American acts that came up during the golden era of video.

Per says it was fun to be part of it, when MTV happened and the video became so crucial to illustrate your songs. That whole circus was just amazing to be part of it. He remembers they did the video of Listen To Your Heart on an island in Sweden. Coming back to the States, people asked them if they built the castle just for the video. Haha. It was like a 17th century castle. There were no budgets and anything was possible. Alan says that was the good thing about the early days of video, you didn’t need a million-dollar budget.

Here they play Listen To Your Heart.

Alan says Marie was Per’s late great collaborator in Roxette and they all mourned with Per when she passed away five years ago. Both Marie and Per had their burgeoning solo careers in Sweden and in Europe, but they had a very funny introduction to the United States via a little radio station in the Midwest. Alan says everyone knows that story well, but asks Per to tell it again. PG tries to make it short. They were touring in Sweden and there was an exchange student from Minneapolis in Sweden in the summer of 1988. He became a big Roxette fan and he went back to Minneapolis, bringing with him the Look Sharp! album, which was the new album from Roxette at the time. There was a radio show at the KDWB in Minneapolis where listeners could request songs or they could bring their own records to the reception and have them played on the radio. So he did just that. He left the Look Sharp! album at the reception. They didn’t play it, they didn’t listen to it. So he wanted it back like 2 weeks later. And by fate, the program director of the radio station, Brian Phillips was there when he took the record back. Brian noticed the record sleeve. It was like a newspaper, sort of a very special sleeve for the album. So Brian Phillips, the program director got really interested in the sleeve and he asked the guy what it is. They guy said it’s a Swedish band. He wanted the radio to play it, but they didn’t. Then Brian thought let’s listen to it and he played the first song of the album. That was The Look. So they started playing The Look on the radio. Alan says, so if it had been another song that was the first track on the album, that might have been another hit for Roxette. Per says, or maybe it wouldn’t have happened at all. It’s a crazy story, but it’s a snowball from that radio station. Alan says things bubble up here in America. They have had that story told with many other artists. A local DJ likes it and it builds a grassroots following. Nowadays it’s social media as a grassroots.

Alan is curious what was that first moment when a record company person or somebody in Roxette’s group said, hey, you are about to take off in America. If it was overnight. Per says he was having lunch in Stockholm and a friend of his who worked at Warner Music at the time came over with a Billboard magazine and he asked if Per had noticed they were in the charts. This radio chart was called Bubbling Under. It was on two radio stations, KDWB and somewhere else, it said Roxette, The Look. Per was surprised, because that was an album track, not even released in the States. He was wondering how on earth this happened. It took about a couple of months and they were on the charts before the song was commercially released. But you couldn’t get on the Billboard Hot 100 chart unless you had a commercial release, so they rush-released it and it entered at No. 50 or so. Then it took eight weeks to go to No. 1. Alan can’t remember if the video was shortly thereafter or a part of that mounting campaign, but he thinks it was around the same time. It appeared on MTV and they were like, holy cow, another Swedish band. They didn’t play ABBA, but they did play Roxette. In the spring of 1989. That’s a great story. Then from then on, it took off.

But The Look is not Roxette’s biggest hit. Still to come was the movie. Alan asks Per what happened when Hollywood started to call in 1990. PG says that was funny as well. They had four big songs from the Look Sharp! album. The Look, Dressed For Success and then Listen To Your Heart became another No. 1 for them and Dangerous became No. 2 on Billboard. So at the time they were a pretty hot band and so they got this request. He was having lunch in Los Angeles and EMI Records asked Per if he could write a song, soundtrack to a movie. David Bowie was in there and Natalie Cole and lots of great artists. Good company, Alan says. PG agrees. Per told EMI he couldn’t do that, because they were travelling, promoting Look Sharp! all over the world. They were heading for New Zealand or something. But he said they had an old Christmas song from 1987, which had only been released in Sweden. It’s a great song, a ballad. He could rewrite the lyrics a bit and they could do an updated version of it. That was It Must Have Been Love. Mr. G sent the song to them and they loved it. The movie was of course Pretty Woman. At the time it was called 3000 or 3000 Dollars, because he hires the girl for 3000 dollars. PG remembers he got the script to the movie. It was really thick and he threw it away at Los Angeles airport. He didn’t want to read it. At the time it was a low budget movie. Roxette were like, OK, let’s do it, but it wasn’t a big thing. And then of course it became the biggest song of their career.

Here they play the song that started the whole Roxette journey in America, The Look.

Alan says he could talk forever about the first half of Roxette’s career, but there are a bunch of things happening now and he wants Per to prioritize them for the listeners. He says Per had a European Tour under the banner of Roxette, carrying the flag. He is curious about how it went and what we are looking forward to in 2024. Per tells Roxette with Marie, they called it quits in 2016. Marie passed away in 2019. In 2018, Per did a Per Gessle’s Roxette tour on his own in Europe and he just released a live album from that tour.

For the future, what’s special this year is that there is the opening of the Roxette musical in September, starting in Sweden. They will be going to at least all over Europe within the next couple of years. Alan says the musical is titled after Roxette’s 1991 album, Joyride. He says he has been immersing himself in it over the past couple of days, kind of reliving how much fun he had with that album and how good it was. Per thanks for it. Alan says for him, Marie never sounded better, she wails. What a voice she had. Alan thinks some people maybe missed that with the pop quality of The Look and the fun videos that we saw of Roxette, you don’t realize what a great singer she is.

So, Joyride is the name of the musical. Alan asks if it is a Broadway stage type of musical. PG says it is. It’s based on a book called Got You Back by English writer Jane Fallon. It’s a fun story with a happy ending. It’s got loads of the Roxette stuff in there. Per thinks if the stage version will be as good as the script is at the moment, it’s going to be a big one. It’s still seven months away though. Alan says it’s in development now, kind of a jukebox of Roxette songs. Alan wants to know if Per is writing any original stuff for it too. Maybe around the edges they will say, look, we got a hole here, you need to write something. Per says they are talking about that, but at the moment there is nothing new. Alan says Per will just sit there and collect the royalty checks when it becomes a huge worldwide hit. The guys are laughing.

Alan says they have had a couple of good collaborations recently. He thinks Roxette’s music is meant to be remixed over and over again. He loves the Galantis version of Fading Like A Flower, a song from the Joyride album. It’s a beautiful rendition according to Alan. Per thought that was really cool as well. PG thinks it’s nice to do that, because there are always new generations, new people come every year and are interested in what you do. Popular music is always changing and that’s the way it should be. Some artists think they don’t want to be part of that, it’s the original that counts. But a song is never really finished, it just has its own life. It’s the same thing when you play live. You try to play it differently every time. Even though the basic thing is the same, it always becomes a new thing every night. Alan thinks that’s the beauty of modern pop music. He has younger kids who listen to modern pop music and the cross fertilization and the collaboration with older artists, e.g. Sting playing with Pink and Marshmello. Alan thinks it’s amazing. It’s a nice homage to the music from decades ago, and of course it should still live in whatever format.

Alan says there was also an Alle Farben remix of Listen To Your Heart in 2023. He wasn’t familiar with that DJ before, but he thinks that remix was gorgeous. Per tells he is a German guy, very different from Galantis, but he is very good. He did a great job, because Listen To Your Heart is not that easy to do tempo-wise. It’s good for the clubs, Alan says. Roxette is back in the clubs, if you will. In the late ’80s they were doing The Look and it sounded great when it was loud and you were dancing to it. Alan is glad Roxette is back and he is glad Per is here and he is waving the Swedish flag.

Alan asks what is in the water in Sweden, by the way. He remembers hearing a producer several years ago working on a project and they were talking post ABBA and how everybody then wanted to see what was happening in that part of the world. The music that was being produced in Scandinavia was just nuts, all these young artists going there. So Alan asks Per if there is something still in the water there. PG thinks that the whole Swedish pop wonder is declining a bit, but they had an amazing decade. Even more than a decade. Max Martin, Shellback, all those writers, producers and also artists, The Cardigans, Robyn, The Hive, so many Swedish bands. It was a golden era. The music business and the industry changes all the time, so you never know what’s going to happen tomorrow. Maybe that was the golden window for Sweden.

Alan is curious if Per sits around waiting for a muse, hoping for a muse. He wants to know what’s the inspiration for Per. If it is the musical that’s coming up or he wants to make an album of new music, or to play live. Per says at the same time he had been working with Roxette, he had been working in Swedish and also in English with other projects. Just as they speak, he has just finished a Swedish album that’s going to come out this year as well. He is going to do a lot of promoting and gigging with that Swedish album. He laughs and says they won’t notice it here in the US. Alan asks Per to give him one title in Swedish from that new album, but PG doesn’t share any titles, because there are so many Swedish people listening to this show. He doesn’t reveal anything, but the first single will come out at the end of February.

Finishing the interview, Alan says it’s always fun to catch up with Per and thanks him for stopping by. Per says it’s always nice to meet Alan.

As the last Roxette song, they play Dressed For Success.