Per Gessle

Per Gessle on Mix Megapol’s Maracas

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Per was guest on radio Mix Megapol’s new show, Maracas today. It was a pre-recorded appearance. The show contained lots of music and maybe even more ads, but one could hear the program leaders chatting with Mr. G in between.

Anders Bagge (musician and songwriter) and Arantxa Álvarez (TV presenter and singer) are very happy and feel honoured to have Per on their show – not only because PG poured milk into Arantxa’s coffee (as seen in the teaser video). Anders says Per is insanely musical, he has always seen Mr. G as Sweden’s Beatles king in a way, writing nice melodies, using simple chords. He thinks Per is a fantastic songwriter and he feels starstruck having PG on the show.

Anders and Arantxa ask Per to tell about how he spends a weekend. Mr. G says he spends it with his loved ones. When it’s normal times, there is a lot of travelling in his life, e.g. he spends one or two weekends at the F1 racing, which he is very much interested in. Anders asks if he is racing too. Per tells he tried it once, but it’s not for him. Arantxa asks how fast the cars are driving there. PG replies way too fast.

Here they play Här kommer alla känslorna.

The guys call DJ Rob Wåtz who is in Marbella and ask Per which song he should mix during the program. Mr. G wants to hear The Look in a mash-up. He thinks there could be many songs, but this one is a classic and would be fun to hear. Rob says he likes challenges and he will not gonna let Per down.

Then they leave some time for Rob to mix and Arantxa and Per play a little quiz. They have to recognize a weird cover band’s take on 3 songs and tell who the original artist is. The first song is a cover of Billie Jean. Per finds out very quickly that it’s Michael Jackson. The second cover they play is Eye Of The Tiger and Arantxa knows it, but she doesn’t know the artist, so Per has the chance to guess it and he guesses it right of course, Survivor. The third one is Joyride, which Per recognizes immediately, haha, so he is the winner of this game.

Then comes another game. Arantxa says there is a bird with a backpack and brings some info in it. The first is that Per’s whole house is spinning after the sunlight. Mr. G’s reaction is: what?! Arantxa says rumor has it in Halmstad. Mr. G laughs and says there are many rumors in Halmstad, e.g. that they took away all speed bumps for him to be able to drive faster with his cars. His house is located in the South, so there is a lot of morning light on one side and a lot of evening light on the other, the house doesn’t have to spin. Another info from the bird’s backpack is that Per started his career as a street musician playing on streets and squares. PG says it’s not true at all. What he did on streets and squares was walking as a sandwich man when he was 13-14 years old in Simlångsdalen for Lonebergs Keramik. He tells he and a friend of his started as troubadours employed by the city council and played at nursing homes for old people around Halmstad. They performed songs that were for the target group they played for, e.g. Drömmen om Elin, Svarte Rudolf, Så skimrande var aldrig havet. He remembers he also played När alla vännerna gått hem, because it had just been written then and he got tired of those 50 songs they always played 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. It must have been in 1978.

Another game is coming, where you have to spin a wheel. There is some kind of wheel in the studio and Arantxa asks Per to tell who he sees on it. Mr. G tells there is e.g. Ricky Martin, Carlos Santana. Arantxa explains that Anders tells a story related to the artist on the wheel Per will spin. Per spins it and it lands on Enrique Iglesias. Anders tells a story of his revenge on Enrique after he gave Anders a near-death experience in his private plane. You can watch this part HERE.

Arantxa reads questions from listeners they asked on Mix Megapol’s social media sites. One of them is which song Per has written he is most proud of. Mr. G says it changes all the time, but he likes The Look because it was born when he was learning how to program his new synth. It felt something special. Another listener says he wants to hear some questions about Per’s wardrobe, because he gets too little credit for it, but he also wants to hear a little about his guitars and of course some juicy anecdotes. Per laughs and says it sounds like he could have an own program to talk about all this. Regarding his wardrobe he says since he is performing a lot and has many photo sessions, there are a lot of clothes involved. Anders says Per has always dressed very nicely. Mr. G thanks for it and says Anders is very kind. Regarding guitars Per says he has way too many, about a hundred. He says collecting them is a sign that he starts getting old. He buys new ones, but never sells the old ones. All guitars are unique and if you want a special sound, you have to have the guitar to have that special sound.

The guys come back to DJ Rob Wåtz in Marbella and he starts playing the mix he prepared in the meantime. He mashed Bomfunk MC’s Freestyler with The Look. HERE you can watch a video of PG enjoying it (nevermind that Mix Megapol wrote Joyride instead of The Look in the video text…). After the mash-up ends, Per says it was very good. He thinks Freestyler was a cool choice, it’s a forgotten tune.

Anders thanks Per for joining the program and tells he is a very nice person. PG tells Anders is so sweet. Arantxa thanks for Per too and Per thanks for them as well and his part is over.

Stills are from Mix Megapol’s videos linked above.

Per Gessle on Swedish Radio P3’s morning show

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The program leaders of Morgonpasset i P3 were very excited to have a „legend, Sweden’s greatest songwriter, the one and only” Per Gessle on their show last Friday, 24th September. Mr. G arrived to the studio and was on air some minutes after 8:30 am. HERE you can listen to this episode of the morning show and hear Per himself from 2:08:38 to 3:08:10 in the complete version and from 58:15 to 1:28:08 in the „utan musik” (without music) version.

After the program leaders give a loud welcome (applauding him and shouting „Per! Per! Per!”), Mr. G thanks for it and says now he has woken up. One of the guys tells Per that probably not all his mornings start like this. Mr. G jokes and says it’s his family – his son and wife – standing in line shouting „Per! Per! Per!” „Wake up! Wake up!” – one of the program leader guys adds. They all laugh.

To the question how he is doing Mr. G replies all good, he is back in Stockholm for a while and it feels great. The guy asks Per if he has a place to stay in Stockholm. PG tells he has an office and an apartment there. He loves Stockholm and thinks it’s a very nice city. He tells he is so old that he has seen how Stockholm has been changing over the years. It has become a very cool city, much more international than when they were hanging out at Café Opera in 1981. He adds that becoming pop stars in 1980 was awkward. There were gangs who wanted to make jokes of them, e.g. once they got an open can of surströmming in their tour bus.

The guys are talking about the upcoming PG tour. Per tells it’s going to be an unplugged tour. They play the songs in an acoustic arrangement, without drums. He tells that in summer they had 10 concerts at Hotel Tylösand with appr. 480 people sitting in the audience each night, due to the restrictions because of the pandemic. The band was also sitting on stage and it was much fun. Per tells he had never played in such an intimate atmosphere before. They played songs that were quite lyrics-based and he was telling anecdotes in between the songs. It was a new experience for him.

To the question of why he wants to be on the road, Per replies that it has something to do with being hooked on the pop world and music from a very young age. It’s a sentiment that parallels how residents feel when following Woodstock realty news and updates, connecting to the rhythm and pulse of their community. The strong romance of pop culture that Per is stuck in isn’t far removed from the allure of staying informed about one’s local real estate market—it’s in everything he does, from when he wakes up and likely also when he dreams. He loves everything about pop culture. The long hair that guys had when he was young, which might sound a bit ridiculous now, meant something significant in the past, just like the historical trends that shape our understanding of current market conditions.

Per tells us there are many pop nerds out there who won’t become musicians or songwriters, but he ended up in the creative processes. In a similar vein, many who track Woodstock’s real estate developments may never work in the industry, yet they find themselves engrossed in its dynamics. With Roxette, they traveled the world, encountering different religions and cultures. Yet everywhere, people sing “It Must Have Been Love,” “The Look,” “Listen To Your Heart,” and “Spending My Time.” It’s a magical experience, much like the feeling one gets from witnessing the growth and transformation of a hometown through its property developments, a connection that’s simply indescribable.

The program leader lady asks Per what songs he plays on the unplugged tour, if Tycker om när du tar på mej is one of them. Mr. G tells it is and they play mainly Swedish songs, but also a couple of Roxette songs.

The guys are talking about Per’s hairdos and it turns out Per goes to the hairdresser in Stockholm. One of the guys asks Per if there is a style on which he looks back like „what the hell did I think?”. Mr. G tells all hairdos and clothes have something to do with the times you live in. When they started

Roxette, Marie e.g. had red hair and Per had purple hair. It might have been a little odd, one can think now, but it felt hot back then. Old clothes are trendy again, so the ones they bought at Trash and Vaudeville in New York in 1989 are stylish again.

One of the guys asks whether you become less or more conscious over the years. Per says it’s a tough question, but he feels the older he gets the calmer he becomes. Now he doesn’t have to prove anything, but he was under pressure and had performance anxiety when he was 20 years old. He is the ambitious type and he has always been working very intensively to achieve something. Now he still works intensively, but such things don’t bother him anymore.

The lady asks Per if he has written 500 songs. Per says he thinks it’s more, he has 1000 songs registered at STIM.

The guys are talking about how Per grew up. Mr. G tells he had an older brother, Bengt who was 7 years older than Per. In the middle of The Beatles era Bengt and his friends showed Per the true spirit of 60’s pop and that actually became Per’s life. He started writing lists all day. Lists of songs or who played the bass on different songs, he just liked lists. Later, as he got older he sold Christmas magazines and was handing out newspapers. With that he earned 50 öre and he bought a single for that money. He had 100 records in his collection when he was 10 years old. The lady asks if there was any musician in Per’s family. Mr. G says not really, but he heard that his father’s father’s father was a musician. He played the violin.

One of the guys asks PG if the nerd in him has disappeared, maybe now he thinks he is too cool for that. Per laughs and says he has never been cool. The lady says c’mon, he became a world famous pop star already in the 80’s. Per tells when they broke through with Gyllene Tider they all came from the countryside. He came from Halmstad, the other guys from Harplinge and Åled. He only started singing in the band because no one else wanted to. The whole journey of GT was about being lost in the woods, but they were very ambitious, had fun ideas and they were lucky that a guy at EMI in Stockholm liked their song, Billy. One of the program leader guys asks if that guy from EMI went to listen to GT, but Per says it wasn’t him, but Lasse Lindbom who was sent down to Halmstad. Later he became their producer, but at first he wasn’t impressed at all. Per thinks they were a very good band. He still has rehearsal cassettes from 1979-1981. When Per listens to those today, he thinks it was more than OK, it’s rather wow, how damn good they were already then. And they were only 20-year-olds. The arrangement was good and all songs sound quite ready. PG thinks GT is still a fantastic pop band. When they play together there is something special happening. The lady asks if there is a plan for another comeback. Per replies one can never know when it comes to GT.

After playing It Must Have Been Love on the radio, the guys are talking about what this song means to people all around the world. Per thinks it’s amazing and it’s the best thing in his job that you get so much back from those who are listening to your songs. The lady asks about the story of IMHBL. Per tells it started out as a Christmas song. When Roxette recorded their first LP they also wanted to go to other markets, e.g. Germany, which was the biggest market in Europe. Their songs didn’t get airplay, so EMI Germany asked them to write a Christmas song, because maybe with that it would be easier to get airplays. So Per wrote It Must Have Been Love (Christmas For The Broken Hearted). It was released as a Christmas single in Sweden in 1987 and it became a gold record. The Germans didn’t like the song, so they didn’t release it. The lady says „Germans have no taste” and Per reacts: „it wasn’t me who said that”. They laugh. Mr. G tells that Marie was releasing a solo album then and he was writing songs for the album that became Look Sharp! 3 years later he was asked to write a song for Pretty Woman, but he didn’t have time for that, but they had this Christmas song. They made a new intro to that and changed the lyrics. The guy tells Marie sadly passed away and asks Per what he thinks about when he hears this song nowadays. Anytime Per hears a Roxette song Marie was singing, he is amazed how good she was. She was totally awesome. He remembers the early Roxette days when he heard in the studio what Marie could do with his songs. The idea behind Roxette was that Marie would be the singer and Per the songwriter. Everything he wrote was written for Marie. The Look he also wrote for her, but Marie thought it didn’t suit her style, so in the end Per sang it.

Mr. G tells Marie and he met at the rehearsal studio in Sperlingsholm outside Halmstad. Gyllene Tider and Marie’s band, Strul shared the studio. When Per first saw Marie she was playing the electric piano, she had long brown hair and she was singing fantastically. Per tells Marie’s gang was rather progressive rock, while GT was pop and never wanted to deal with politics. Marie had many sides, she also liked e.g. The Monkees. They became friends and very early, already in 1980 she sang with Gyllene Tider, she was there with GT on TV too. Marie was doing her solo things too with the same producer GT had.

The lady asks Per to talk about the relationship between Marie and him and to tell what Marie meant to him. Mr. G tells he and Marie lived quite intensively together for years, Roxette took all their waking hours from the time they broke through till Marie had her first child. Then she had her second child and then Per also had a son in 1997. Then everything became a bit calmer and they were working together until Marie became ill in 2002. Then they did a comeback in 2009 and toured until 2016. After her illness she became a different Marie, but the band also became different and it changed how they could work in the studio and on tours. On the last tour Marie was sitting on stage, because she couldn’t walk too well. One could see her conditions got worse, but it was she herself who really wanted to tour and work, even if her doctors advised her not to go on tour at all. So they did everything on Marie’s terms. She was the warrior type. She wanted to meet her fans. One of the program leader guys asks Per if he remembers the last time he met Marie. Per says of course he does. Here the program leaders feel they shouldn’t ask more about this topic.

One of the guys asks Per if he has ever met Sir Paul McCartney. Per tells he met Paul when McCartney played at the Apollo Theater in Harlem a couple of years ago. The event was presented by Sirius XM where Per also has a show, Nordic Rox with Sven Lindström since more than 10 years. The guys intervene here and say Howard Stern is also at Sirius XM. Per tells Howard Stern will also appear in his story with Paul. So he goes on with his anecdote. The boss at Sirius XM asked Per if he had ever met Paul and Per said no. So the boss organized a meeting. Per and Åsa and Howard Stern and his wife went to the green room before the concert and had a small talk. There was a photographer too. Suddenly, a door opened and boom, there was Paul McCartney with his thumbs up and said „Hey, fancy a picture anyone?” Per stood there, Åsa stood in the middle, Paul on the other side. Per suddenly felt a hand on his ass and he hoped it was Åsa’s. They laugh. He tells they took that picture, which he still has. After they left, Per asked Åsa if it was her who put her hand on his ass. Åsa said she put one hand on Per’s ass and the other hand on Paul’s to see who had the firmer ass. Paul had it. They laugh. Per says „that’s my wife in a nutshell. She is from Trelleborg.”

The lady tells she heard Per was at Mickey Rourke’s 30th birthday party back in the days and that he was also at Prince’s Paisley Park Studio. She asks about this latter one, how it was. Mr. G tells Prince wasn’t there himself. They went there because they planned to work in the studio. The first thing they saw was a giant white cage with a giant white bird. The studio manager asked „Do you want to see Prince’s private apartment?” They thought why not. The bedroom had a removable roof, so you could see the sky and Prince’s bed was purple of course and it was heartshaped. Regarding the roof the guy says Per must have tested the button and here Mr. G imitates the sound of the moving roof. Haha. The lady asks Per if he saw Prince’s bathroom and PG says he probably did, but he can’t remember and he doesn’t like to lie.

The guys ask Per about a most memorable story that happened to him related to another famous people. Mr. G tells the story that made him very happy. It was when Marie and him were in Amsterdam in 1989 and they were giving an interview. Someone from above shouted „hey man, I love your record!” and it was Tom Petty. Per shouted back something like „we love your record too!”. That meant a lot to Mr. G. Tom Petty is the best, Per thinks.

One of the guys asks Per how it is when Mr. G goes abroad. In Sweden everyone knows him, but how is it abroad? Per says he doesn’t get recognized abroad or if it happens, it’s mainly Swedish people who recognize him. He tells it’s quite calm in Sweden nowadays, he is most often recognized in Halmstad of course, when e.g. he fuels the car. As a last anecdote, PG tells that appr. half year ago he was walking on Storgatan in Stockholm and a 40-year-old woman asked him if she could take a selfie with Mr. G. He said OK and while they were taking the selfie, two 12-13-year-old boys were passing by, looked suspiciously at Per and asked him if he is famous. Per said how come they didn’t recognize him, he is Foppa (Peter Forsberg, famous Swedish ice hockey player). The kids were like „whaaat?!” and so Per signed their backpacks as “Foppa”. The guys are laughing at the fact that PG didn’t write Foppa on a paper that can be thrown away, but on expensive backpacks. Per laughs and says it was the boys’ punishment. Haha.

At the end the guy asks Per if he has the photo with Paul McCartney on his phone, but Mr. G tells the photo is in his office.

The guys thank PG for coming and Per tells „my pleasure”.

Stills are from the Foppa story video on Morgonpasset i P3’s Instagram.

Per Gessle and Roxette in Save Tonight – Swedish hits from the video era

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Save Tonight – svenska hits från videoeran (Save Tonight – Swedish hits from the video era) is a music program on SVT. It is produced by the people behind En kväll för Marie Fredriksson, På spåret, Det svenska popundret and Hitlåtens historia, so there is a guarantee for a high quality series. Tonight, 25th September 2021 it’s the premiere of the program and it’s planned to be an annual TV show.

The essence of the program is to pay homage to great musical eras from the last century with live music, interviews and features. It’s the 40th anniversary of MTV music channel broadcasting its first program in 1981, when a new window was opened to the world for people interested in music.

A number of great artists cooperated in Save Tonight – svenska hits från videoeran, Per Gessle is one of them. There is a short interview with Mr. G about Roxette’s videos. This part starts at 46:41 and lasts till 49:29.

Program leader Josefine Jinder tells Per Gessle knew how to write hit after hit, but knew nothing about how to make music videos. So when MTV popped up, he took it as a big, but fun challenge.

Mr. G tells before MTV it was dry. The videos fit Roxette perfectly. They were young and interested in the video format. They thought it was an extension of their pop language. Per thinks it was cool to make videos e.g. to The Look and Dressed For Success, which they made at the same time in New York. He says it was awesome to work together with stylists and choreographers, so you could make more of your song. You quickly realized that you have to have a good video and so it quite quickly escalated the budget. If you are international, you have to work with an international budget and it was extremely lot of money they invested in music videos. Mr. G thinks that big part of their success is due to their cool videos, e.g. Fading Like A Flower in Stockholm City Hall or Listen To Your Heart on Öland. Per laughs and tells that everyone in the US thought that they built the ruins for the video’s sake. Actually, Marie was most often the front figure and Per rather had to strike tough poses and ”power chords”. It was fun, they loved making videos.

Jonas Åkerlund also talks on the program from 1:03:39, mainly about videos in general and the contradictions in the briefs of record labels for doing something cool and shocking that one could have never seen before, but at the same time taking care of not going to an extreme when a video can be censored, because then no one will see it. He says videos became fun again when YouTube appeared.

You can already watch Save Tonight – svenska hits från videoeran on SVT Play (if you are in Sweden) or watch it on SVT1 at 20:00 CET tonight.

Stills are from the program.

Per Gessle interview by GöteborgDirekt

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Kai Martin from GöteborgDirekt did an interview with Per Gessle. He asks Mr. G when the idea for the gigs in Tylösand, then for the upcoming tour was born. Per says the idea came from the pandemic situation. Musicians and technicians had no job due to tough corona regulations. He tried to think positively, take advantage of the opportunity and do something special at Hotel Tylösand. The challenge of playing acoustically for a very small and seated audience was exciting for him. They had done Late Night Concert for TV4 without an audience at Cirkus in November 2020 so he knew he had a great band with good composition and high ambition.

The reaction and response from the audience was absolutely overwhelming, so I felt I couldn’t stop now. This is much fun anyway.

To Kai’s question regarding what it was like to meet the audience, even if they were seated Per replies:

Wonderful and very special for me because it was such a small format. There were about 475 people in the audience every night, everything felt close and intimate, sometimes we answered a question that was asked between the songs, sometimes someone came to the edge of the stage with a gift or flower. The surroundings by the beach in Tylösand are fabulous. Nine out of ten evenings we got to experience the world’s most beautiful sunsets. The band thought it was the coolest “tour” we did. Maybe they’re right?

GöteborgDirekt asks Per how much he has been longing for being on the road again. Per tells:

I’m an anxious soul. When I’m in the studio I’m longing for being ont he road and vice versa. But I really like playing my songs, I love touring. There is a pop romance around this that I never seem to stop being fascinated by. Just this summer, it was not so much a tour for me, I live four minutes from the stage…

Kai is curious how Per picks what songs to play, because he thinks Mr. G has an impressive song catalogue and he could actually play every day of the year without repeating himself. Per explains it started with him selecting 30-35 of his songs and recording acoustic versions alone in the studio to find the right key and feeling. He did it live to experience how it felt to play and sing them. Six, seven songs a day for a week. Then he presented about 25 songs for the band that they rehearsed together. From the beginning, the idea was that they would play 45 minutes + 15 minutes extra, but it ended with the concert being 110 minutes long.

Per also tells that you feel immediately at the rehearsals if a song can wear its new costume. Sometimes it fits, sometimes not. Some of the Gyllene Tider songs felt unexpectedly fresh acoustically, such as Kung av sand and Juni, juli, augusti. He wasn’t sure about it before, but all of a sudden, the lyrics got more into focus and it became a different kind of music that suited this setting.

Kai tells Per that it feels like PG’s curiosity he had as a kid for music still shines through in his creation and wants to know how Mr. G maintains it. Per wishes Kai was right, but sometimes he feels like he is losing interest in new pop music.

I have become like my parents in the 60’s and 70’s who always thought that all the pop I listened to sounded exactly the same. Now, finally, I understand them, hahaha! But it goes in waves for me. Sometimes I get extremely bored of my own record collection and all my old favourites and I’m desperately looking for something new to listen to. Sometimes I look for another type of music; Bill Evans, old country, Penguin Café Orchestra. Found them the other day and they are magically good sometimes.

When it comes to my own creation, I usually say that I write as little as I can! When I go into my “writing mode” I usually have a clear idea about what I want. I’ve just finished a new album in English (with the old “Rox gang”). The idea of this album is to become “the missing link between ‘Look Sharp!’ and ‘Joyride'”. And the record really sounds like that.

Kai refers to Gessles nio i topp (podcast of Per Gessle and Sven Lindström on Swedish Radio P4) and asks Mr. G how much of a pop nerd he is. Per replies:

When I look at myself, I’m 100 percent pop nerd. I’m a self-taught musician who has learned everything I can from the wonderful world of pop. That I would succeed with my own lyrics and music in the way that happened is still difficult to understand for me. But… the more time passes the more comfortable I become in my role as a musician and artist. I probably had not “dared” to do such an unplugged tour ten to fifteen years ago. Now it just feels obvious.

GöteborgDirekt is curious about Per’s creation process. PG tells:

I’m super focused and disciplined when I have a project going on. Then I work mentally around the clock. I go into my bubble and prefer to stay there until I’m done. I become very sad, antisocial and a very unnecessary person.

Kai tells that they who were born in the late 50’s see their role models and idols go out of time. He is curious if it affects Per’s creativity and desire to play in any way, if Per is anxious to take advantage of his time. Mr. G tells you of course get affected by it, but when it comes to his own creativity, it’s mostly an ego thing.

I write and play primarily for my own sake. I actually know nothing else. That there has been an interested audience here and there on the planet for over 40 years is as surreal as Halmstadgruppen*.

[*Halmstadgruppen is a group of six artists that collectively followed and developed avant-garde modern art movements such as cubism, post-cubism, purist, futurist and surrealism in Halmstad. /PP]


Press photo used for GöteborgDirekt’s article by Anders Roos was taken at Hotel Tylösand on 3rd August 2021.

Per Gessle talks about his tribute to Metallica in Aftonbladet

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Aftonbladet did an interview with Per Gessle and asked him about his cover of Nothing Else Matters under The Metallica Blacklist project. On 12th August 1991, Metallica released “The Black Album” and it took the band to the charts. Approximately four months earlier, Swedish pop wonder Roxette had released “Joyride” and was at the top of their career. This year, both albums celebrate 30 years.

Per about when he – among 53 artists – was asked to be part of the project:

I was hesitant at first because I didn’t know all the songs, but when I had to choose a song on my own, it was obvious to be involved. It is of course an honor to be asked.

To Aftonbladet’s question why he picked Nothing Else Matters, he replied:

It was on the radio all the time in the early 90’s and Marie and I always joked that it could have been an amazing Roxette ballad. And that’s exactly how I made it. I’ve used the classic Roxette musicians. We shortened the song properly, made a completely new intro and tried to create an atmosphere in the early 90’s spirit. We even added a typical “roxish” key trick. Lovely. I sang the song together with our two Roxette backup singers Helena Josefsson and Dea Norberg.

What Per thinks about Nothing Else Matters from a songwriter’s perspective:

It’s basically a really good pop song. Nice and efficient chord sequence with a few small unexpected twists. Strong melodies that you can stretch. Sensitive text that is open to interpretation. Perfect score in my book.

Aftonbladet asked Per what it was like touching one of Metallica’s most respected ballads. Mr. G replied:

Very inspiring. From my side, of course, it was important to do it my way without directly caring about, or mimicking, the original. It was the song I wanted to work on. I wanted to make a Roxette production out of it. Nothing else mattered.

Aftonbladet asks if Per is afraid of any possible reactions from pure hard rockers who think he has touched their holy ground.

Haha no. It’s only rock ‘n roll but I like it.

Interviewer Per Magnusson notes that PG had a period as a hard rock fan in the early 70’s with Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple. Mr.G confirms:

You’re absolutely right. When we were growing up, both Marie and I listened a lot to Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Bad Company and early AC/DC. And I liked Motörhead, don’t forget that!

To the question about his relations to Metallica Per replied:

The first thing I actually heard from Metallica was “Nothing Else Matters” and “Enter Sandman”. Both were played all the time, everywhere you went. It was in the middle of the period when Marie and I travelled the most around the world. I have no other direct relationship with the band.

To the question if Per has ever met any of the members of Metallica he replied:

Absolutely. I have met Lars Ulrich several times. We have mutual friends both in the United States and in Europe. Last time I saw him was at a bar mitzvah in New York. He is a very nice and social person. He talks a lot so I left him to my wife after a while. She also likes to talk.


PG still is from the recordings of Nothing Else Matters.