Per Gessle on Carina Bergfeldt’s talk show on SVT

Per was a guest on Carina Bergfeldt’s talk show on SVT on 21st October. Actresses Lena Olin and Tora Hallström were the first two guests on the program, then Mr. G was the fourth, right after opera singer and actress Marianne Mörck.

You can watch the episode online HERE all around the world! Per’s part starts 27m 37s in.

Carina introduces PG as a music icon and before he enters, there is footage from his career shown, starting with him singing Flickorna på TV2 cut from Parkliv! 1981. Fun fact is that Parkliv! was directed by Tora’s father and Lena’s husband, famous director Lasse Hallström. Then comes a shortcut to an old TV report where the reporter tells Per „your lyrics are very much about sex” and Mr. G’s reaction is „well… are they?” Then comes a little Roxette and part of the news from 1989 that they became No.1 in the US. Per says „one of our dreams was to become No.1 in the US. That we have achieved.” From Sweden only ABBA and Björn Skifs succeeded with that before Roxette. Then comes a snippet from PG Roxette’s The Loneliest Girl In The World video.

Carina welcomes Per and the audience is very happy to have him on the show. Earlier on the program they talked about riders, lists of requirements. Carina is curious if Per can beat bathtub and Thai food. Mr. G says he is bad at riders. He doesn’t have any riders anymore, but rather anti-riders, what shouldn’t be in the dressing room. There shouldn’t be candy, because he would eat it up. He has no requirements at all, really. In the past, he tested the organizers a bit, if they could obtain expensive wines, but only one of them could do that, in Switzerland. Mr. G is still good friends with him. [Everyone laughs.] Carina says that considering them being world stars with Roxette, they could have asked such things as Madonna, e.g. repainting the dressing room. PG says they didn’t ask for such unnecessary things. „We came from small towns”, he says. Marianne pats Per on the shoulder and says „good boy”. [Everyone laughs.] Carina asks if Gyllene Tider had any list of requirements. Per’s reply is a no.

Carina informs that Gyllene Tider goes on tour again and asks Per how many times they will retreat. Mr. G tells 2019 was the last time, but then came this terrible pandemic and he had some second thoughts. It felt natural to go on with this band. He missed them. Per started writing songs and felt they sounded like GT songs. It’s a fantastic, lovely band. „I’m so happy that we are still alive and kicking. It’s wonderful.”

Carina says GT is a „democratic band” and is curious what it means. „It means that everyone agrees that I decide.” [Everyone laughs.] Carina says „so you are the president” and Per says „exactly”. Per says they have been working together for so long and they try to make decisions together. No one can be replaced and everyone has to have their say.

Carina asks if Per is as democratic at home as in the band. PG first thinks and then suddenly says of course he is. Haha. „When does your wife get annoyed with you?”, Carina asks Mr. G. Per says „often, I think”. He is quite busy and obsessed with his work. He works a lot. He is in his own little bubble and Åsa says he is giving birth all the time. He carries on his songs and projects and he is his work in a way. It has always been so.

Carina asks Per if he is fond of order and tidiness. Mr. G says he is, it’s good. Marianne asks Per if he is virgin. Per replies no and asks back if she is. Marianne explains she meant Virgo in astrology. Per laughs and says he understood that [everyone laughs] and says he is a Capricorn. Marianne thanks for the answer and explains it’s a sign of Virgos that they are cleaning and cleaning and deal with theatre an music. Marianne is a Virgo. Tora is Gemini, a typical Gemini according to her mom. Marianne asks for changing topic. Carina asks Per how we should imagine order in his home. PG explains he has always liked order and tidiness around him. Vinyls are in alphabetical order, photo books are here, music books are there, magazines are over there, in order. Yellow shirts are here, white shirts are there. Carina asks if Per is cleaning all the time. „Absolutely”, he replies. He always checks if there is a ring left by the glass on the table and he cleans it. Marianne asks Per if he has her number. Per says he got it earlier. [Everyone laughs.] Marianne also explains what order means to her. While she says she can find Christmas greetings from 1997 under her dining table, because she never sets the table (because she doesn’t have guests) and she eats in bed or in the bathtub, Per is not impressed. Haha. Marianne shares the info that on the other side, she prepares the tax declaration in advance and she makes notes of taxi bills with date, how long the way was and to where she went and why she was using a taxi. Here Per nods approvingly. Marianne says she shouldn’t share this info, but she has a collection of almost 40,000 Kinder egg figures and she will sort them out when she gets old. She thinks it’s fun. [Everyone laughs.]

Carina asks Per about what he is collecting. Mr. G says he is not a collector, but over the years there has been a lot of stuff and he has a collection of everything from records to guitars. He is getting old, he says. Carina is curious how many guitars Per has. He replies „way too many”. He doesn’t know, maybe a hundred. Carina says a little bird told her that he has exactly 125. „Was it my wife?”, Per asks. Carina tells she knows they are sorted in a very well organized way with photo and text. Per confirms. He says you have to keep track of your stuff. [Everyone laughs.] Guitars mean a lot to him. Some of them mean more than the others. He has written a lot of songs on them. Each guitar has its own personality and sounds in a special way. He has his favourites of course, which he plays every day, but others he doesn’t even know they exist.

Carina says she has understood that Per knows his life through his records, so she has prepared a test with some single sleeves. She wants to know what year it was released and what guitar was played on it. Per is happy to do the test. First is Joyride. It was released in 1991, recorded in 1990. It wasn’t Per playing the guitar, it was Jonas Isacsson and he played a red Arvidson guitar. Carina asks how life was in 1991. Per tells they had their first big world tour in 1991-1992. Those were crazy times, an 18-month long tour, 2 million people came to see them. Years 1988-1995 for Roxette were absolutely amazing. They travelled around the world several times and it was awesome to be part of the success.

The next sleeve shown is Neverending Love. It’s 1986, the first Roxette single. It’s not him playing the guitar, it was MP from Gyllene Tider and it was certainly a Stratocaster. Per explains he doesn’t play that much on the albums. [Everyone laughs.] Carina is curious about the story behind Neverending Love. Mr. G tells he was asked to write a song for Pernilla Wahlgren who had just been signed by a new record label and he wrote a song called Svarta glas. The record label refused to use it, which then felt tough, but Per translated it into English and that became Roxette’s first hit. Everyone is impressed and cheers Per. Mr. G thanks for that.

Carina asks the others if they have a special favourite Roxette or GT song. Lena points at Per and says they are approximately the same age. She says one of her favourites is „Jag vill känna din kropp emot min” [När vi två blir en]. It hits right in one’s romance and heart. Lena tells when she and Per once met in New York, Lena told Per she loved Här kommer alla känslorna (på en och samma gång). It also hit her right in the heart and it really touched her. There are many other songs, but these two are her favourites. Marianne asks Per if it was him who wrote a song that he wants to sleep with the girls on TV2. [Per’s facial expression is priceless here. Haha.] Carina corrects Marianne: „turn on” the girls on TV2. Marianne says she said it in an older way. [Everyone laughs.] Per also laughs and confirms it was him. „What were you thinking when you wrote that?”, Marianne asks. „It was kind of nice”, Per replies. „Maybe you meant to turn the TV on?”, Marianne asks. „Yes, that was the case.”, Per replies. „Is that a post rationalization?”, Marianne asks. Per replies: „Absolutely not. It’s your fantasy that carries you away.” [Everyone laughs.] „Is that right? You’re getting a little shy, I see.”, Marianne says. [PG’s facial expression is priceless here too. Everyone laughs.] Per says „it’s tough”.

Carina continues with Per’s new album under PG Roxette. Per goes on with Roxette without Marie. Carina asks Per what Marie would have thought about the album. Per thinks she would have liked it, because it’s kind of a cousin to Look Sharp! and Joyride. The style and the sound are very much the late ’80s, early ’90s. Marie really loved that kind of music. Carina asks how it was to make this record without Marie. „At first I didn’t want to do it, but then time passed by and I felt I wanted to go on with Roxette. But it doesn’t work to replace Marie, so I tried to find another form. I used my own voice, but also worked together with the two girls who were in Roxette’s band during the past 8 years when we were on tour. They have taken a step forward and sung when needed. I haven’t thought much more than trying to make a good Roxette record.”

Carina tells Good Karma was the last album Per recorded with Marie before she passed away in 2019. Carina is curious about how the recording session was. Per explains it was complicated. Marie was in a quite bad condition, but at the same time it was awesome that she was an Amazon in the way that she wanted to work all the time. They didn’t stop touring until 2016 and the album was recorded in 2015. It was an amazing session, but it wasn’t easy. Carina asks Per how he and Marie talked about life back then. Mr. G says when they talked about life, they rather talked about the past, the fantastic journey they did together. All their adult life they have dedicated to Roxette. They went through so many things together. They always felt like siblings, the same way as them 5 are like brothers in Gyllene Tider. When you go through so many things together, it’s like that. It’s an amazing feeling to be able to have that relationship in good or bad. Carina asks what Marie has thaught Per. Per says it’s a tough question. Marie gave him self confidence. She always made sure that what Per does gets a little bit better than it is.

A new tour is in sight, a new album is coming, as well as a Gyllene Tider movie and a Roxette musical. A lot is happening. Carina thanks Per for coming on the show.

Mr. G stays sitting on Carina’s sofa with all other 3 guests until the end of the program, so you can see him during the talk with the fifth guest, soccer player Pawel Cibicki and also watch him enjoying music while Hannes feat. Waterbaby play one song live.

Stills are from the TV show.

PG Roxette’s second single is out!

PG Roxette released his debut single, The Loneliest Girl In The World on 3rd June. The song was the first taste from the upcoming album, Pop-Up Dynamo!, which will come out on 28th October. Before we get to hear the debut album, Per decided to surprise us with a second single. Walking On Air is released today, 23rd September and just like the first single, it also contains another song that won’t be included on Pop-Up Dynamo! The vinyl single has two B-sides: Necessary and a remix of Walking On Air made by Bridge & Mountain.

You can order the 7” vinyl at Bengans, Ginza and some more Scandinavian online shops. The single is also available on all streaming services. Actually, on streaming it became a mini EP, because now all PG Roxette releases will appear under three “brands”: PG Roxette, Roxette and Per Gessle, to make sure anyone can find them easily. Listen to the EP on Spotify, Deezer, Apple Music or YouTube!

Regarding the vinyl single availability Per says:

It’s up to the local Warner office to order it. If they don’t, you won’t find it in that particular country.

To the question if it was the original plan to release two singles before Pop-Up Dynamo! comes out PG replies:

Well, this album has been postponed a few times for various reasons; Covid – legal things – internal Warner reasons. It was finalized already in April 2021.

This spring we made a plan where Loneliest Girl” became the first single. Then the album-release got delayed again because we couldn’t get any slot time making the vinyls. So we decided to go with a second single before the album comes out. There will be a lyric video popping up soon, too!

The lyric video is set to premiere at 12 pm CEST on 23rd September. Don’t miss it! You’ll be able to watch it HERE! The video was made by Ebba Gustafsson Ågren, based on filmed material and photos by Fredrik Etoall and Per Gessle.

Per tells about WOA:

“Walking On Air” was the very first song written for “Pop-Up Dynamo!” I got a request to write something for the “Top Gun: Maverick”-movie in the fall of 2019. So I wrote “WOA”.

It was actually written for a particular scene in the film where someone was going to dance on a beach (hence the lyrics “oh I’m sure you love to dance on the beach”). However, the movie people involved didn’t use the song. Maybe they didn’t like it as much as I did? Or maybe they took away the scene? I don’t know. I haven’t seen Top Gun yet.

So I kept it to myself and started writing more stuff in the same ’80s-’90s style that reminded me of “Look Sharp!” + “Joyride”. That’s how the whole new PG Roxette album came about.

It’s Helena and Dea combined that sing the lead vocals in the choruses. Helena is the driving force but Dea is overdubbing her and also sings harmony vocals. And they share the “wailing duties”. They have such different styles which I love to work with.

This is the sound, combined with my own voice, that shines through the whole new album. Together they create almost a “third persona”, it’s hard to say who’s who. A little bit like Agnetha + Frida in ABBA.

Btw, there is a version with Helena singing the verses. That’s how I wrote originally for the Top Gun-movie.

Mr. G shares some details about Necessary too:

“Necessary” was one of the songs I wrote for “Pop-Up Dynamo!” It’s one of only three recordings I did with Christoffer producing this time. And only one made the album! You’ll notice!

One of them was actually a different version of “Sunflower” that I didn’t like… I preferred my own version that’s on TLGITW single.

The rest of the album was produced by Magnus Börjeson + Clarence Öfwerman + myself. Christoffer came in late in this production to do some overdubs. Jonas joined us a couple of days as well. It’s basically the same people that did the Metallica-song who are involved.

Besides other Gessleish phrases, there is one that pops out in Necessary. Here is what Per has to tell about it:

Glad you like the “pop just like a bubble”-phrase. “Pop Like A Bubble” was actually the working title of the album!!!

There’s no doubt the new PG Roxette single Walking On Air is keeping the Roxette sound alive. The classic and familiar Roxette ingredients of a smart production with great hooks and a “don’t bore us, get to the chorus”-attitude shine through the entire song.

Per says:

There are millions of people out there who still love Roxette so of course I want to keep our music relevant. At first, I wasn’t sure which way to go but as time passed by it became clear that I want to continue this fantastic joyride. I want to keep the legacy of Roxette alive.

Tracklist (7” vinyl)

Side A

Walking On Air

Side B

Necessary
Walking On Air (Bridge & Mountain Remix)

 

Walking On Air

If you could stick around
No need to bother with the other side of town
Set the mood make it bright
I wanna go and be your Saturday night
Oh oh oh – it couldn’t get better
Yea yea yea – listen to what I say

Hey hey, my eyes just stop and stare
I got it good you got me walking on air
Every time you’re coming around
I wish you were here to stay
Hey hey, my eyes can’t look away
I got it good you got me walking on air
Every time you’re getting so near

Would you mind stick around
No need to bother with the glass on the ground
Summertime within reach
Oh I’m sure you love to dance on the beach
Oh oh oh – it couldn’t be better
Yea yea yea – listen to what I say

Hey hey, my eyes just stop and stare
I got it good you got me walking on air
Every time you’re coming around
I wish you were here to stay
Hey hey, my eyes can’t look away
I got it good you got me walking on air
Every time you’re getting so near
I’m walking on air

WORDS + MUSIC BY PER GESSLE

Necessary

When I walk
I tend to move sideways
When I talk
I only get halfway
Well, you pop just like a bubble
And I only want to keep good company

Oh oh oh oh
I’ve been up all night where I used to be
Oh oh oh oh
Hey I can’t believe my own memory
Oh oh oh oh tell me baby
What are you doing to me?
Is it really necessary?

When I call
It sounds like I’m praying
When I fall
All songs keep on playing yea

Oh oh oh oh
I’ve been up all night where I used to be
Oh oh oh oh
Hey I can’t believe my own history
Oh oh oh oh tell me baby
What are you doing to me?
Guess it’s really necessary

WORDS + MUSIC BY PER GESSLE

Movie Hits Essentials with Per Gessle of Roxette on Apple Music

Per Gessle shared some of his favourite songs and soundtracks on Pure Throwback Radio channel’s special, Music Hits Essentials on Apple Music. You can listen to Per’s fave songs from the world of movies HERE! Mr. G was so well-prepared and very informative. He even knows such details like who plays the guitar in a theme song. Impressive! Fab song choices and an exquisite guest program leader make an awesome almost-2-hour-long entertainment.

The program starts with the intro of Listen To Your Heart and Per telling:

I’m Per Gessle of Roxette and today we’re going to the movies. Playing some of my favourite songs of the silver screen, A list anthems and blockbuster ballads, including a few select Roxette classics. So listen in and listen to your heart, because I hope some of today’s movie magic evokes some special memories for you too.

Per goes on:

I’m here to talk a bit about movies and music, great songs in great pictures. Music and movies go hand in hand together, we all know that. Smart directors use music in an intelligent way to enhance a scene or to build or intensify something visually. As part of the audience you can’t really escape or ignore it. It’s the perfect weapon.

PG thinks there are so many great songs that come to mind when he goes back to certain movies. Think about all the Bond films, for instance. He grew up in the ’60s and was totally overwhelmed by James Bond. „He was so armed and so extremely dangerous.” Mr. G was way too young to see the films at the time, but his brother did and he told Per all about them. All about the cars, the guns and gizmos, all about the girls. Per had to settle with the music. Luckily for him, there were plenty and most of them were truly amazing. Bond themes from the ’60s included artists like Tom Jones, Nancy Sinatra, Louis Armstrong, Matt Monro and of course, the primadonna of them all, Dame Shirley Bassey. PG’s all-time favourite of all the Bond songs there ever was is Goldfinger from 1964. It’s written among others by John Barry who also wrote the main James Bond theme that opens every Bond movie. Later on in the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s there were even more great songs coming from the Bond series. Paul McCartney and Wings’ Live And Let Die is unbelievably good according to Per. There is also Carly Simon’s Nobody Does I Better, A-ha’s The Living Daylights, Duran Duran’s A View To A Kill, Tina Turner’s GoldenEye and the mighty Gladys Knight and her License To Kill. This latter is a wonderful song according to PG.

Per’s most influential band of all time is of course The Beatles. He grew up with their music and he thinks everything about them felt special. The hairdos, the clothes, the vibe. The whole package was something you never experienced before. The Beatles had the unique capacity to never repeat themselves. Every single and every album are different from the one before. The amount of amazing songs delivered by these guys can’t be beaten, PG thinks. He was a bit too young to catch their two main films in the theatres, but he loves the soundtrack albums. On the show, he plays one of the best pop songs ever written, made for the first Beatle movie, A Hard Day’s Night in 1964. A great year for both movies and music, says PG. He loves that magic opening chord.

With Roxette, Per has had the pleasure of being involved in a couple of movies. He tells the true story of It Must Have Been Love. In 1987 he got a request from their German record company to write a Christmas song. They had problems getting Roxette on the radio in Germany and thought it might be easier if they released a Christmas song for the upcoming festive season. So Per wrote a ballad just in time. They recorded it and it sounded really cool, and they released it in their home market, Sweden, where it became a pretty decent Christmas hit and even a gold record. However, the Germans, they didn’t like it very much and refused to work it. Anyway, time went by, Roxette got their international breakthrough a couple of years later and in 1990 PG found himself having lunch in Los Angeles with their American record company. They asked him if he could come up with a song for a movie they had acquired the rights to and Per told them there wasn’t any time. They were travelling the world, week in, week out, doing promotions for the Look Sharp! album, which was a major hit basically everywhere all over the world. But hey, he remembered one thing. They had this Christmas song. Mr. G told them about this ballad and suggested to re-write the lyrics a bit, maybe update the production, make a new intro. So the next time they were in Stockholm, they spent a day in the studio and did just that. And before they knew it, they had a great spot in the movie called Pretty Woman. He plays It Must Have Been Love without the Christmas lyric. That was Roxette’s third American No. 1. It’s still their biggest song all over the world and it’s of course because that Pretty Woman movie was so huge, directed by Garry Marshall, starring Julia Roberts and Richard Gere in 1990.

Per goes back to the ’60s. One of his favourite songs of all time comes from Easy Rider (1969), a great movie directed by Dennis Hopper. Jack Nicholson is doing one of his coolest roles as the lawyer George Hanson in this one. It was a low-budget movie that became the symbol of the hippie era and a true blockbuster. Per had the poster with Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper on their Harley Davidson bikes on his wall when he grew up, next to his treasured pictures of The Beatles and The Monkees. Most of the music to Easy Rider was made by The Byrds, but the song PG has chosen to play is Steppenwolf’s Born To Be Wild. Per thinks it’s a great track with a wonderful guitar riff.

Let’s stay in the ’60s. It’s easy to do if you’re as old as I am.

Per tells that the music from the ’60s and ’70s is really close to his heart. He listens to it every day. One of the greatest duos ever had a big big song in this movie called The Graduate in 1967, starring Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft. It got seven Academy Awards nominations and it won Best Director, Mike Nichols. This song is a classic one by now written by Paul Simon and the duo is of course, Simon & Garfunkel. The song was originally called Mrs. Roosevelt, but they changed the title for the movie to Mrs. Robinson. Paul Simon is one of Per’s favourite songwriters of all time. Bridge Over Troubled Water, The Sound Of Silence, Mother And Child Reunion, 50 Ways To Leave Your Lover, You Can Call Me Al. The list just goes on and on and on.

Ten years later it was time for the disco craze to take over the world. PG tells he himself was never into the disco scene. Per says he and his pals were never really that much on the dancefloor. „I’m actually a terrible dancer. Just ask my wife!” In 1977 Mr. G formed his first band and he was pretty influenced by the new wave and the power pop scene instead. The Ramones, Patti Smith, Sex Pistols, The Buzzcocks, Nick Lowe, Elvis Costello, Blondie, Dwight Twilley Band, Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers. That kind of music shaped his own songwriting and style of playing. However, you couldn’t escape this huge movie, the biggest one in 1977, Saturday Night Fever – starring a young John Travolta – which went on to become one of the best selling soundtracks of all time. Loads of music by the Gibb brothers, lots of falsetto voices which sounded amazing according to Per. He picked the stand-out track, which has to be Stayin’ Alive by the Bee Gees. „Dancing shoes on, folks!”

One of the most beautiful movie themes ever is coming up next. This one really takes your breath away when you listen to it, Per says. It’s from Francis Ford Coppola’s epic film, The Godfather, released in 1972. It’s one of the greatest and most influential films ever made, starring Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, Robert Duvall and so many other legendary actors. The music is flawless and written by Nino Rota. Per picked the timeless Love Theme from The Godfather. Amazing stuff!

Coming up next is a song from a Quentin Tarantino movie, Pulp Fiction from 1994. Tarantino and his staff seem to spend a lot of time picking the right music to his films. The soundtracks are always stunning according to Mr. G. In this particular movie there are so many great songs, e.g. Chuck Berry’s You Never Can Tell, Ricky Nelson’s Lonesome Town, Al Green’s Let’s Stay Together and Dusty Springfield’s Son Of A Preacher Man. Per’s favourite is an old Neil Diamond song though from 1967, covered by a duo from Minnesota, Urge Overkill. Girl, You’ll Be A Woman Soon was originally released in 1992, but got known to a wide audience via Pulp Fiction 2 years later. It’s such a brilliant track to start with and Urge Overkill’s version is marvellous.

One of Per’s favourite bands, as well as being a big inspiration for him when he started to play in the late ’70s is Blondie. PG loves so many of their songs. He loves their sound and attitude and Debbie Harry is definitely one of the coolest singers ever in Per’s book. Their album Parallel Lines from 1978 is in Mr. G’s Top5 of the best albums ever made, combining their own brilliant material with intelligent covers of other bands’ songs. Hanging On The Telephone written by Jack Lee from The Nerves for example sounds suddenly like a monster hit in the hands of Blondie and their producer Mike Chapman. In 1980 Blondie made it all the way to No. 1 in the US with a song from the American Gigolo film. It was written and produced by Giorgio Moroder. Debbie Harry wrote the lyrics. The movie, starring Richard Gere in the main role, got loads of Grammy and Golden Globe nominations for its music and it’s not surprising according to Per, since the soundtrack is quite wonderful. Call Me is great music from 1980.

Per tells that after Roxette’s success with It Must Have Been Love in the Pretty Woman film they got request to be part of several Hollywood movies. That’s the way it goes. One was a film called Hocus Pocus, starring Bette Midler and Sarah Jessica Parker and Per actually wrote a song for that one and yes, it was called Hocus Pocus. However, for some reason the film company had a change of heart and decided that the group En Vogue should do the theme song instead, which they did, but the film company never used that song either. Pretty strange. But it didn’t really matter, the Hocus Pocus movie turned out to be terrible. Shit happens, says Per. Anyway, they were left with their own song that they thought was really cool and it eventually popped up in another movie instead, starring Bob Hoskins and Dennis Hopper. But that movie turned out to be really bad as well if you ask PG. He remembers watching it and just shaking his head, what a waste of time. The film was called Super Mario Bros and was released late 1993. Here Per plays their Hocus Pocus song with its new title, Almost Unreal. After the song Per says „you just heard Roxette’s Almost Unreal, featured in one of those movies that never should have been made. We need an antidote now!”

If you ask Per to pick his three favourite movies of all time, it would of course be very tricky. It’s always hard to make choices like that, he says, but one movie he has always cherished is The Big Lebowski, starring Jeff Bridges, John Goodman, Julianne Moore and Steve Buscemi. It’s directed by the Coen borthers who have made some of the greatest films PG knows (e.g. Fargo, The Man Who Wasn’t There, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, No Country For Old Men). Brilliant stuff, according to Mr. G. The Big Lebowksi has got a great soundtrack. The Man In Me by Bob Dylan is superb, just like the Gipsy Kings version of Hotel California, but Per’s favourite is actually Kenny Rogers & the First Edition’s version of Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In) from 1968. It’s a wonderful song written by Mickey Newbury in the late ’60s and was the the first big hit for Kenny Rogers. As Per says, Mickey Newbury was a mindblowing songwriter and one of a kind, just like The Big Lebowksi. A truly wonderful movie. PG recommends you to check it out if you haven’t seen it yet and tells that Jeff Bridges is one of his favourite actors.

Talking about Jeff Bridges, he did an amazing movie in 2009 together with Maggie Gyllenhaal, Colin Farrell and Robert Duvall, called Crazy Heart. Per suggests you put it on your bucketlist if you haven’t seen it yet. Jeff Bridges is playing this country singer songwriter and he actually sings a lot of songs himself both in the movie and on the soundtrack. He’s got a great voice according to PG. He like a lot of country music. He tells he had the opportunity to visit and make recordings in Nashville a couple of years ago and that was amazing. The session players in Nashville are the best in the world and the vibe in this city is very special. There is music everywhere. Per even found a store close to the studio where they only sold and repaired harmonicas. You only find that in Nashville, he says. Back to the Crazy Heart movie, there is especially one track in that film that’s outstanding for Per and it’s called Fallin’ & Flyin’. „Ladies and gentlemen, make way for the great Jeff Bridges!” Per thinks it’s a very catchy song.

One of the albums PG listened to a lot when he was in his pre-teens was Elton John’s Madman Across The Water. It came out in 1971 when Mr. G was 12 years old. 1971 turned out to be one of the greatest years ever for popular music. Think about all those mindblowing albums that came out that particular year. Blue by Joni Mitchell, Tapestry by Carole King, Every Picture Tells A Story by Rod Stewart, Hunky Dory by Bowie, Led Zeppelin IV, Sticky Fingers by The Rolling Stones, Who’s Next by The Who, Aqualung by Jethro Tull, Ram by Paul and Linda McCartney, Songs Of Love And Hate by Leonard Cohen, Imagine by John Lennon. Per loves Madman Across The Water, including the powerful title track, but the standout song for him was one of the most beautiful songs he knows, Tiny Dancer. In 2000, the movie Almost Famous came out. Kate Hudson played the main character and Per thought she was wonderful and the movie was really incredible. He still likes it a lot. In one of the key scenes you can hear Elton and his Tiny Dancer. Excellent choice, Per thinks.

Next up is a wonderful song written by Harry Nilsson called One. As Per informs, Harry’s own version was on his third solo album, Aerial Ballet in 1968 and a year later Three Dog Night had a big hit with Harry’s song. Aimee Mann did her own version of it for the Paul Thomas Anderson movie Magnolia in 1999, starring Tom Cruise, Philip Seymour Hoffman, William H. Macy, John C Reilly and Julianne Moore. Paul Thomas Anderson had his big breakthrough two years earlier with the amazing Boogie Nights film starring Mark Wahlberg and Burt Reynolds. Per thinks you have to check that one out too. It’s brutally good and got a fine soundtrack as well, but he picked Magnolia because it’s special, it’s really beautiful and probably one of his favourite films of all time. Additionally, he loves most of the stuff Aimee Mann has recorded as well, so for Per it’s a match made in heaven.

When you think about songs from movies, it’s not all about the traditional hit or the Top40 song. Some of the finest music for films are instrumentals and a great example of this is the magical stuff created by Ennio Morricone. He was a true master according to Per. PG doesn’t know how many film scores Morricone made, but more than 100, he thinks. The music he wrote for Sergio Leone’s spaghettti Westerns in the ’60s is truly remarkable. It’s interesting that he sometimes wrote the songs and the scores before they even shot the scenes, so the music itself inspired how the scenes would turn out. Fascinating! Per plays the theme from The Good, The Bad And The Ugly made in 1966, starring Clint Eastwood, music by Ennio Morricone. „Wow! Isn’t that the best guitar sound you ever heard?” It’s played by Bruno Battisti D’Amario.

At this point Per tells the listeners they probably know him through his work with Roxette. He is playing some of his favourite songs from the movies.

In 2012 Per got the opportunity to create his own full soundtrack to a movie. He worked closely with director Jonas Åkerlund on his movie Small Apartments, starring Matt Lucas, Billy Crystal and James Caan among others. It was a pretty interesting process. PG presented loads of instrumental music that Jonas could choose from and used some stuff he had written in the past, but also did new music, especially created for specific scenes. Per plays one of the songs that was used in the film. This is a fun one called Shopping With Mother. It was an independent movie and lots of fun to be involved with, says Per. The female opera-like vocals were sung by the the amazing Helena Josefsson, who Per has worked with since 2002.

Next one Mr. G has picked is from a Roman Polanski movie called Bitter Moon starring Peter Coyote, Emmanuelle Seigner and Hugh Grant from 1992. Like all Polanski movies, Bitter Moon is quite excellent according to Per. He has picked a great song Polanski used in the movie. It’s called Stop! and was originally released in 1988, sung by Sam Brown. It’s a lovely song according to Per. Sam Brown used to be a session vocalist working with among others Pink Floyd on their The Division Bell album, but she also released a handful of successful singles on her own in the late ’80s. Unfortunately, she got problems with her voice and stopped singing due to medical reasons in 2007. Such a shame, thinks Per.

Now comes something completely different. Next artist – who changed the world forever – is Elvis Presley. In 1957 he made his third movie and it was called Jailhouse Rock. Per remembers his sister had the title track on a 7-inch vinyl single and Elvis looked extremely cool on the cover. Mr. G found the single in the mid ’60s and he couldn’t take his eyes off the sleeve and he played that record over and over again.

Who could resist a groove like that and the way he was singing? Not me! It still sounds amazing to this very day! So ladies and gentlemen, the king of them all, Elvis Aaron Presley from Tupelo, Mississippi performing the title track from Jailhouse Rock written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller.

Hard to beat! After the song PG says „Elvis has left the building”.

Jim Carrey is another of the all time great actors. Per thinks he is very versatile, not only an amazing comedian. In 2004 he made a great movie called Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind together with Kate Winslet. The movie was directed by Michel Gondry and written by Charlie Kaufman who also wrote one of Mr. G’s all time favourites, Being John Malkovich a couple of years earlier. Wonderful scripts, both of them. In Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind there is a great version of the song Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime by Beck. Per really loves that song. He heard it first in the very early ’80s in the original recording by the British band, The Korgis. It’s written by James Warren who was the lead singer of the band and it’s an all time classic in PG’s book.

It’s time to play another Roxette song now. This one hasn’t been involved in any huge movies that Per knows of, but it certainly has appeared in loads of TV series, e.g. GLOW and this black comedy series called Scream Queens comes to mind. Per wrote it in 1988, trying to figure out how to program his new synthesizer, an Ensoniq ESQ-1. So he basically just fooled around with three bass notes and started singing the first things that came to mind and that became the first verse. „Walking like a man, hitting like a hammer, she’s a juvenile scam…” It didn’t really make sense, but it sounded really cool. Per made a demo called He’s Got The Look, because hus intention was to have Marie in Roxette to sing it. However, she didn’t feel comfortable doing that. She tried it, but it didn’t really click. So Per changed it to she’s got The Look and sang it himself on the recording and it became the opening track on Roxette’s second album, Look Sharp! and eventually, their first American No. 1. in the spring of 1989. It changed their lives forever. After the song is played, PG says „Yep. I’m part of that!”

It’s time for another Western movie, Per thinks. One of his favourites is from 1969 and it is of course the highest grossing film of that year, the blockbuster Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid, starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford. Written by William Goldman, directed by George Roy Hill it received seven Academy Awards nominations and won four of them, including the award for best song. Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head sung by B. J. Thomas, written by one of the best composers of all time, Burt Bacharach. Lyrics were written by Hal David and this is such a great song according to PG.

In 1968 an amazing movie had its premiere. Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway played the leading parts in The Thomas Crown Affair. This is such a cool film and it also went down very well with the Academy Awards jury. It got two nominations and one for best original song. The Windmills Of Your Mind sung by Noel Harrison, music by Michel Legrand and lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman. It’s such a beautiful song, says Per. Some trivia is that Sean Connery was the original choice for the title role, but he turned it down. „Can you believe that?” However, Mr. G thinks Steve McQueen was an excellent replacement, he is superb in the role of Thomas Crown.

We move forward to another Quentin Tarantino film, made in 2003. Kill Bill: Vol. 1, starring Uma Thurman is yet another Tarantino movie with a very interesting soundtrack. Per has chosen Nancy Sinatra’s version of Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down) from 1966. It was actually written for Cher by her then-husband Sonny Bono, but it was Nancy Sinatra’s version that appeared in the actual movie. It’s such a great song and Nancy Sinatra’s take on it holds a pretty sparse production with just vocals and an electric guitar with tremolo. Per informs the guitar was played by Billy Strange and his playing is really what makes the song so special.

Per would like to play another Roxette track for you. This one he wrote together with his old pal, Mats Persson and it has been included in several TV series over the years. Killing Eve, Mr. Robot to name two of them. PG wrote the lyrics after a very long night comforting a friend of his who went through a pretty nasty divorce. So this was some kind of friendly advice from Per to his friend. It was written for Roxette’s second album, Look Sharp! in 1988 and it became their second No. 1 in the US. It was actually the first single ever to become No. 1 in America being released only as a cassette single and not available as a vinyl single. „Weird, isn’t it? I never really got into the cassette single thing myself, but the Americans obviously did. I’m sure you know this one. Listen To Your Heart by Roxette.”

I hope you enjoyed today’s cinema inspired soundtrack. It’s been such a pleasure going through so many fabulous songs from so many great movies. I could go on and on and on.

Per rounds things off with one of his favourite artists of all time, Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers. In 1996 Tom Petty did the soundtrack to a romantic comedy called She’s The One, directed by Edward Burns and starring Jennifer Aniston and Cameron Diaz in the leading roles. This soundtrack holds a staggering amount of great songs and Per has chosen his favourite one called California. Before the song plays, Per thanks for listening and says:

Hope to see you all down the road somewhere! Stay safe and sound, folks! Bye for now!

After the song is played, Mr. G comes back with a couple of more words to close the show:

Aaand… cut! This is Per Gessle of Roxette and that’s a wrap of this very special edition of Movie Hits Essentials on Apple Music.

Thanks for the technical support, János Tóth!

Got You Back – base book for the upcoming Roxette musical

When Per in the past talked about the fact that Roxette’s music has theatrical potential, I always thought that one day there will be a big musical written based on Roxette songs. Now the thing is, a book is already written and a script from that with matching Roxette songs will be adapted to theatre stage. (We wrote about it in May HERE.) I don’t know which direction is more difficult. To write a story based on existing songs or find the most fitting songs for an already existing story.

The base book from which the script will be written is a novel by Jane Fallon. She is an English author and television producer who debuted as a full-time novelist with her first national bestseller, Getting Rid of Matthew in 2007. She has followed this with several other bestsellers. Her books have been translated into more than 20 languages.

Got You Back is the second novel written by Jane, published in 2008. It’s an entertaining story about the triangle between a husband, his wife and his mistress and the revenge of the latter two gone wrong.

A husband. A wife. A mistress. And the ultimate plan for revenge…

The husband James never intended to lead a double life with a wife in London and a mistress in the country, it’s exhausting. But that’s all about to change…

The wife Stephanie isn’t really snooping when she finds a text message from a strange woman on her husband’s mobile. But now she’s found it, how can she ignore it? It’s time to track the woman down and find out what’s going on…

The mistress Katie has no reason to believe her boyfriend, James, is cheating until someone claiming to be his wife gets in touch. Now she’s been cast in the role of mistress. Not one she’s happy with…

Once Stephanie and Katie know about each other, they must decide what to do. They could both just throw him out or they could join forces to make his life hell first…

But revenge isn’t always sweet. And what happens when one woman thinks enough is enough but the other doesn’t know when to stop?

I had the chance to read it this weekend and what I really like about the novel is that Jane tells the story from all three angles, so you have an in-depth view of these three characters’ personalities. Some of their actions make them sympathetic, others make you roll your eyes – like Finn, the 7-year-old son of Stephanie (stylist) and James (vet) roll them sometimes. Until a certain point you keep your fingers crossed that James pays for all his mistakes, but after a while you feel it’s getting too much and you feel sorry for him. The tension is built up very cleverly and it is also kept after everything turns out to all three parties. You never know how all your la-la-la-la-lies affect your Lover, Lover, Lover until you realize she already knows everything and your wife knows everything too.

And yes… with this, let’s get down to the main thing. The story being the base of an upcoming Roxette musical. There is actually a tremendous amount of Roxette songs that popped up in my mind while reading. The ones that would be obvious choices (for me) are Spending My Time, Listen To Your Heart, The Look, It Must Have Been Love, Things Will Never Be The Same, Dangerous, Sleeping Single, Dressed For Success, Joyride, Come Back (Before You Leave), What’s She Like?, You Don’t Understand Me, A Thing About You. But there are several more that could be included. Fading Like A Flower (Every Time You Leave), I Don’t Want To Get Hurt, Lies, Paint, Lover, Lover, Lover, Pay The Price, The Sweet Hello, The Sad Goodbye, Wish I Could Fly, I’m Sorry, Secrets That She Keeps, Vulnerable, Staring At The Ground, The Centre Of The Heart (Is A Suburb To The Brain), Easy Way Out, Cry, From One Heart To Another, Dance Away, Do You Wanna Go the Whole Way?, It Just Happens

Now I stop making a list here, because in the end, all Rox tracks will be added to this article and „only” 20-25 songs fit in a real musical. Oh well… how about a musical version of Crush On You? Haha. Nah, OK, I really stop it. Certainly, the most well-known Roxette hits will be included.

Besides being a Roxer, another passion of mine is theatre. I love dramas, comedies and musicals the most. Coming it from Webber or anyone else, I like it when stories are told by the help of songs.

This musical is set to premiere in Malmö Opera in autumn 2024. The script will be written by Swedish playwright and director Klas Abrahamsson. That makes me wonder about the language of the play. Roxette lyrics are in English of course, but if I look at musicals I saw in Hungary, the lyrics (also in Mamma Mia!) are translated into Hungarian. Thinking about Jesus Christ Superstar that toured around Sweden recently, it was performed in English, but I also saw Swedish versions in the past. For the time being, we are talking about the musical getting on stage in Sweden and of course, in Sweden there is no issue with it being in English. Later it will be interesting to see how the project develops and how many theatres will join worldwide. I already heard a Hungarian version of The Look in a play a couple of years ago and It Must Have Been Love also has a Hungarian version. Hm… I think it will also be different when you hear your top favourite band’s songs in another language than the original. Do I care when I see Mamma Mia! the musical that the songs are sung in Hungarian? Not really. I have the original English lyrics in my head, but I watch the musical as a theatre play, not as an ABBA „show”. Then it’s totally fine.

Let’s see what happens! Only 2 more years to go! Haha. It’s an exciting project, that’s for sure. Good luck to the whole team involved!

Until then, you can get yourself Got You Back to read. HERE you can read the first chapter!

Fun fact: Jane Fallon is the partner of comedian Ricky Gervais and you might remember Ricky’s guilty pleasures video from 2014… Still much fun!

ROX RMX – Remixes From The Roxette Vaults

Three separate digital releases of Roxette remixes popped up on 20th, 22nd and 24th June. Altogether 44 remixes are out under this project. Most of them were not available digitally before. Listen here to Vol. 1, Vol. 2 and Vol. 3!

Per Gessle says:

The remix saga of Roxette started early on. We released the “Dance Passion” album which contained remixes of a few songs from our debut album “Pearls Of Passion” in 1987. To tell the truth, I never listened to D.P. that much. And I’m pretty sure Marie didn’t listen to it at all. No, that album wasn’t really our cup of tea.

However, time went by and before long we found out about new amazing DJ’s, remixers and producers doing stunning stuff to original and great songs. We definitely wanted to be part of that journey! It’s very exciting to hear new interpretations of your own music, made by talented people coming in with new ideas from different angles.

Now, after 35+ years, it’s time for the collected works. The Roxette Remixes. ROX RMX.

I’ve put together three digital volumes of my favourite Roxette remixes created by big names, tiny names, on huge budgets and no budgets at all. It’s a pretty cool collection I’m very proud of.

I’m especially happy that we, against all odds, actually found the original masters to all these recordings. It’s been hidden in mirror balls and sweaty underwear, hahaha.

Since the time span is over 35 years you can easily hear the changes in pop. Some of the 80’s stuff suddenly sound very modern. And vice versa. Recent stuff can sound a bit dated already. But that’s the way it should be and what pop music is all about. Communication. Enjoy!

Tracklists

ROX RMX Vol. 1 (Remixes From The Roxette Vaults)

  1. Fading Like A Flower (Roxette + Galantis Remix)
  2. Stars (Almighty 12” Definitive Mix)
  3. Real Sugar (Shooting Star Treatment)
  4. The Centre Of The Heart (Is A Suburb To The Brain) (Stonebridge Club Mix Edit)
  5. The Look (Rapino 7” Remix)
  6. Why Don’t You Bring Me Flowers? (Addeboy vs. Cliff Remix)
  7. Wish I Could Fly (Stonebridge R&B Mix)
  8. Some Other Summer (Alexander Brown Remix)
  9. From A Distance (SingSing Version)
  10. Reveal (The Attic Remix)
  11. Crush On You (Almighty Club Mix)
  12. Dressed For Success (New Radio Mix)
  13. Milk And Toast And Honey (Active Dance Remix)
  14. The Rox Medley – A Remix Medley

ROX RMX Vol. 2 (Remixes From The Roxette Vaults)

  1. She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio) (Adam Rickfors Remix)
  2. Fading Like A Flower (Dancing DJs vs. Roxette)
  3. The Look (Big Red Mix)
  4. Stars (X-Treme Extended Mix)
  5. Knockin’ On Every Door (BomKrash 12” Remix)
  6. Speak To Me (Bassflow Remake)
  7. Dangerous (Power Mix – Short Version)
  8. Spending My Time (Electric Dance Remix)
  9. How Do You Do! (BomKrash US Mix)
  10. Opportunity Nox (Hard Act 2 Follow vs. Sharpshooter Extended Remix)
  11. Joyride (Magic Friend Mix)
  12. Wish I Could Fly (Todd Terry – Tee’s Radio Mix)
  13. Why Don’t You Bring Me Flowers? (Patrick Jordan Remix)
  14. Fireworks (Jesus Jones Remix)
  15. The Look (Head-Drum Mix)

ROX RMX Vol. 3 (Remixes From The Roxette Vaults)

  1. Stars (Almighty Radio Edit)
  2. The Look (Rapino Club Mix)
  3. She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio) (Adrian Lux Remix)
  4. Crush On You (Almighty 7 Radio Mix)
  5. Dressed For Success (Look Sharp! Mix)
  6. Milk And Toast And Honey (Shooting Star Treatment)
  7. Some Other Summer (TRXD Remix)
  8. Dangerous (Waste Of Vinyl 12” Mix)
  9. Fading Like A Flower (Dancing DJs vs. Roxette – Hardino Mix)
  10. The Centre Of The Heart (Is A Suburb To The Brain) (Yoga Remix)
  11. Wish I Could Fly (Stonebridge Club Mix)
  12. Reveal (Kleerup Remix)
  13. The Look (Chaps 1995 Remix)
  14. Stars (Almighty Dub)
  15. Chances (Dancehall version)