The March show of Nordic Rox on Sirius XM was recorded in the very white and freezing Stockholm. During the program, Per tells that every year when the snow falls for the first time in Sweden, people are so surprised. Sven adds Stockholm is the capital of short memory. They laugh. PG says it’s just a nightmare going outside, everyone is so confused.

The first song Per picked on the show was Oh Mama by Lili & Sussie. It was No. 1 in Sweden in 1987. For some reason Mr. G just adores this song. He is very much into the 80’s, just as a lot of people these days. The 80’s are coming back, he says. There is the 80’s inspiration e.g. in The Weeknd’s music. Oh Mama is typical 80’s with that typical drum sound. It was written by Tim Norell who played in and wrote for the band Secret Service. It was an instant hit. Before and after this song Rick Astley was No. 1 on the charts.

Hate To Say I Told You So by The Hives is next. Per thinks it’s such a great band. The first time he heard about them was this particular song which reminded him of the MC5. Per thinks it’s an amazing punk song, it’s got this punk energy in there. Sven agrees, he thinks it’s a bit of garage, a bit of punk. According to Per, Howlin’ Pelle is one of the most amazing performers in the world. Sven saw them at the Malmö Festival and when they came out for the encore, Howlin’ Pelle just embraced the whole audience and said: ”Malmö, you have received The Hives.” Per says he is a character.

Paint by Roxette is the third song the guys play. Mr. G says it has always been a favourite in certain markets. E.g. in Brazil, Paint was always a showstopper when they toured there. So Per is delighted that Sven picked this song.

Lonesome is also played by Pale Honey.

The guys played two songs involving Ola Håkansson. Per thinks he is one of the main characters in Swedish music scene ever. He started out in a band called Ola & The Janglers in the 60’s. Per loved them. Then when that band collapsed, Ola started working as a producer and started another band called Secret Service and had their breakthrough in 1979 with Oh Susie. In the 70’s, Secret Service was the 2nd biggest music export of Sweden after ABBA. Per loves this Secret Service style of pop music. Sven says it’s sort of timeless even though it’s produced in 1979. Per likes its soft production, the soft drums. He says when the 80’s came, everything became more edgy, more digital. Come And Stay With Me is a cover of a Jackie DeShannon song. Sven tells when the 60’s were over, a lot of pop stars had trouble surviving, but Ola went into a dance band and then came out with a new career. Now he is a big record label boss, he is the head of TEN Music Group. Probably their biggest artist is Zara Larsson, but they signed Icona Pop as well. He’s still got a great ear for pop music, Per thinks, even thuogh he is even older than Mr. G. Haha.

Show ’em Good by Cocktail Slippers from Norway is next. A bit of garage pop, Sven says. They were signed by “Little Steven” on Wicked Cool Records. Per thinks it’s a great song.

Woman & A Child by Mikael Rickfors from 1991 came next. Mikael was in a Swedish band, Bamboo in the 60’s. The Hollies came to Sweden and Bamboo were their support. Later when Allan Clarke left The Hollies, Mikael got the job. He was with The Hollies for a couple of years, but he has also done some amazing solo albums over the years.

Per thinks Agnes is a great singer. She had a big hit some years ago, Release Me. Now they included Fingers Crossed which is the most played song on Swedish radio right now. It sounds really cool according to Per.

Burning Down The House by Tom Jones & The Cardigans is next. Per thinks it’s an amazing track. It’s a Talking Heads song. It was released on Tom Jones’ Reload album in 1999 and he was in Malmö to record with The Cardigans at the Tambourine Studios. Sven heard people say that they went down together to a meat restaurant in Malmö, where lunch guests could have spotted Tom Jones having a steak. Per laughs at the fact that Sven emphasizes it was a meat restaurant, because it’s not like Tom Jones is generating an ”I’m a meat-eater” image. Sven laughs and says he just did that connection with that testosterone bomb. Per says then Sven would never say that Tom Jones and The Cardigans went to eat at a vegetarian restaurant. Sven says no, it doesn’t work. Haha.

The Park by Sambassadeur was played. Per never heard that one before. According to Sven it’s a great pop track and he thinks he got the tip from her daughter who liked them. They are not that new, but Sven says it’s a bit tricky to pick up new songs. They grew up with the 60’s, 70’s, 80’s stuff, 90’s as well, but it’s a bit trickier to keep up these days. Per agrees. Sven asks him how he keeps up and how he gets new music. Mr. G says he wishes he would spend more time doing that. In the early 70’s, when he grew up, basically every record that was released you knew about. Maybe you haven’t heard it, but you knew about it. Back then Per read the New Music Express and Melody Maker from England. Now he read somewhere that nowadays 30-35,000 songs are released a day on Spotify. It’s impossible to keep it up. Per gets tips from people he knows, but otherwise he feels a bit handicapped when it comes to this.

Mr. G says he and Sven tried to blend things up, playing old stuff and new stuff for the listening pleasure. Sven tells there is a new song that wasn’t easy to pick up, now that they complained earlier that it’s not easy to pick up new music. It’s Mono Mind. Per tells this coming song is exclusively played on Sirius. It’s called All Over Your Body. Per thinks it’s really cool and is written by him. Haha. Sven tells Mono Mind is one of Per’s multiple projects that’s been going on for seven years now. Per tells the debut album was released in 2019, so it’s not that long ago. He says, ”Time flies, Sven, but not that fast. I like you anyway!” Haha. AOYB is sung by Helena Josefsson and Per is doing backing vocals. He just likes this style of music, like so many other styles of music. He is very versatile when it comes to his musical taste. He thinks it sounds great on the radio, but it’s not a commercial release yet.

Again, Anita Lindblom’s Cigarettes is closing the program.

Still is from the Bag of Trix comment videos recorded by Anders Roos.

Thanks for the technical support to János Tóth!

The February show of Nordic Rox on Sirius XM is No. 494 in the program’s history. Wow!

Per tells there are songs in Swedish and in English on the list for this show, but he couldn’t find any Danish songs. He tells American people think if you are Swedish or Danish, you can understand each other’s language, but Mr. G has a problem understanding Danish, even if he is from the South of Sweden. He tells these are very different languages and understanding Danish is like trying to understand French. The guys laugh.

The first song, Blow My Cool is from one of Per’s favourite Swedish bands ever, The Soundtrack of Our Lives. He thinks they are amazing.

The guys also played Black Car by Miriam Bryant, Yours To Keep from Teddybears and Miss Mac Baren by Tages. Per tells he still has this Tages single and he got it as a Christmas present when he was maybe 7 or 8 years old. Sven adds some say Tages were the best dressed and most talented Swedish band in the ’60s. Per tells they were actually called the Swedish Beatles and they were produced by Anders Henriksson. All their singles sound amazing still.

The next song is Intermezzo No. 1 from ABBA. It’s an early instrumental track and it’s very special according to Sven. Per says Benny had a lot of strange spices in his lunch when he wrote this one. The guys are laughing. It’s on the ABBA album (1975) which was a lightweight record according to Per and he adds that Christoffer Lundquist loves this track and plays it regularly, which is sort of weird. Sven pictures Benny dressed up as a young Mozart when they recorded this one.

Young Folks by Peter Bjorn and John is also played from 2006. When it was released it didn’t make the charts in Sweden. It charted in England first and then it became a big song and spreaded like wildfire. Per thinks it still sounds great.

Sucker Punch from Sigrid (Norway) is played too. Per thinks this is her best song. I’m in the Band from The Hellacopters was on the show as well.

Then comes a song in Swedish from the band November. They were a Swedish equivalent to Cream, a British rock band formed by Jack Bruce, Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker. The guys play the first track from the first album of November, Mount Everest from En ny tid är här… (1970). Per’s brother had this album and Mr. G always loved it. It’s very bluesy and it sounds great. Sven adds guitarist Richard Rolf was very much inspired by Eric Clapton and the singer and bassist Christer Stålbrandt was also the songwriter in the band, Per tells. Even if you don’t understand the lyrics of Mount Everest, it sort of translates, Per thinks.

Edith Backlund’s Black Hole was played. Mr. G thinks it’s a lovely song. Sven adds it’s a great pop track and it has a beautiful melody.

Christof Jeppsson’s cover of Roxette’s I Call Your Name was played on the show as well. Per tells he is a guy from his hometown, Halmstad. He plays a lot of acoustic stuff and he is very talented, he’s got a great voice and is very focused. Mr. G thinks Christof did a great job on this song and Per is very pleased about that.

Milk and Toast and Honey by Roxette was played. Per says it’s a beautiful track, Marie is singing it so well. [The program was recorded probably i November last year. /PP] Sven says it’s almost a year since Marie passed away. He asks Per if he still thinks about Marie. Mr. G says of course he does. You do when you lose someone so close to you. So he thinks about Marie a lot. They had this wonderful relationship. And even if he doesn’t think about her, she pops up when he hears a Roxette song. Per tells he loves MATAH, for him it’s his favourite track off the album. Sven says it’s a nice sounding album, it has a warm sound.

Ride or Die by Sindy, Not Forever by Popsicle, a Swedish band from Piteå and Say Lou Lou’s Julian were played too. The mother of the sisters in Say Lou Lou played in a Swedish punk band, Pink Champagne and their father is from an Australian band, The Church.

My Favourite Game by The Cardigans is one of the last songs played on the show. They had a global breakthrough at the time, Sven says. Per remembers the amazing video to this song, directed by Jonas Åkerlund. Sven laughs and says he finds it interesting that they are sitting there on a radio show talking about watching videos.

Jo-Anna Says from Per’s Son of a Plumber album was on air too. Per tells it was released in 2005 and it was a liberation to use another name back then. They were spending many months in the studio. Per just decided that if he does the record under a different name, it will be his debut album. Sven adds it probably gave liberty to Per to do whatever he wanted. Per agrees and says he then thought let’s do a double album, because he always loved the idea that if you do a debut album it becomes a double album. He thinks that’s really cool. In 2005 you were still thinking in albums, he says. It doesn’t work like that anymore. However, Per in his mind will always do that. Mr. G thinks SOAP is one of his greatest recordings. Sven tells it’s really fun listening to. It was recorded during the iPod era and Per was transferring a lot of music to his iPod. Doing that he recognized so many songs that he forgot about. That was the inspiration for this album.

Until they „are back to make the airwaves glowing again”, the guys say goodbye and Per tells Sven he is proud to be on this show. Anita Lindblom’s Cigarettes is closing the program.

Still is from the Bag of Trix comment videos recorded by Anders Roos.

Thanks for the technical support to János Tóth!