Sven Lindström and Per Gessle were on air with the August episode of Nordic Rox to share their top 2000s songs from No. 20 to No. 16.

The guys kick off the show with Something Wicked by The Teenage Idols. Superb garage rock. Sven loves those one-chord tracks. He says, that’s basically what he can play. Haha.

Then comes Nicole Sabouné’s brand new single, Mirror On The Wall.

The next song is Sharpshooter by The Creeps from their Blue Tomato album in 1990. It was produced by Roxette producer Clarence Öfwerman. The Creeps were a special guest on a big tour for Roxette. They are a great band, Per loves them. The band is terrific, but especially the singer, Robert Jelinek. He was born in Czechoslovakia in 1965 and he came to Sweden with his father who was a designer for Ikea. He grew up in Älmhult in the south of Sweden.

[When Sven and Per recorded this show, the North American tour leg was still on the horizon, so they talked about it. /PP]

Sven asks Per what to expect on Roxette’s US tour. Per says there are 15 dates: 13 in the US and 2 in Canada. It’s basically the same show that they are doing in Europe and South America. It’s a greatest hits show and he has been able to collect the classic players in the band. Clarence Öfwerman, keyboard player and Jonas Isacsson, lead guitar player, are still with them. They have a new singer, the most amazing Lena Philipsson who is doing a fantastic job. Sven says she is a great stage personality. PG says it’s been a wonderful tour. Since they started off with Lena, they have done almost 60 shows. It’s just been awesome to play all these classic tracks again. Per is having a blast. Mr. G asks Sven if he is coming to see them in the US. Sven says he used to go to the South by Southwest Festival, but that’s in the spring, so he will see. Per says he can come by and sell some T-shirts. That’s a great offer, Sven admits. Haha.

Two songs from the Swedish ’60s are coming up. The one they play first is in Swedish. Per says most Swedish acts in the ’60s were singing in sort of English. Swenglish, as they used to call it. They were playing more easy listening music for Sven and Per’s parents’ generation, but there were a few exceptions who got big. Sven-Ingvars is one of those bands. The guys picked a song that was very big in 1965. Säg inte nej, säg kanske, which translates to don’t say no, say maybe. It’s a good title, Per thinks.

Then Wedding by the Hep Stars follows from 1966. You might recognize the organ sound, because that’s Benny Andersson, who later kicked off ABBA. He even wrote the song. He was the keyboard player in the Hep Stars, probably the biggest band in 1966/67. They were leading the pop craze wave in Sweden at the time. Per has this song as a seven-inch single. It was a major hit single when he was a little kid.

No. 20 on the Nordic list is With Every Heartbeat by Robyn, who is still going strong. She made this song in 2005 together with Kleerup.

The next track is a trip to Denmark. The guys play The Raveonettes a lot on Nordic Rox. They are a cool duo. Love In A Trashcan is one of their best songs, Per thinks. It’s from 2005. They were formed by Sune Rose Wagner and Sharon Foo back in the early noughties. They have a very special sound, basic and atmospheric. The album is called Pretty In Black, if you want to buy it.

Sven and Per are moving to Sweden for song No. 18 and play Hot Night Crash by the amazing Sahara Hotnights. It’s from the album Kiss & Tell. They had a couple of great tracks in there and this was the first single from the album in 2004.

Here comes one of Sven’s favourite bands, The Hellacopters, hard rock and roll from Stockholm. By The Grace Of God is a great track from 2002. It sounds perfectly like 2002.

A major hit, the breakthrough song for Peter Bjorn and John is coming up next on position No. 16. Young Folks is from 2006. It’s a fun thing what a whistle can do. Never underestimate a whistle, Per says. Roxette had that written on the vinyl inner track on the Joyride album: Was it really necessary to whistle? Someone said that when they did the Joyride track, because they didn’t like the whistle. So Roxette kept it and it became a major hit as well.

The guys play a Roxette song, something from the old days from the Joyride album from 1991. Things Will Never Be The Same they used to play live a lot. They don’t do that anymore, though. It’s one of the highlights for Per from that album.

Close To You by Velvet Beat is next. Then comes O.C.D.O.D. by The Hives and Darling, Go Home by Amanda Jenssen wraps up this episode of Nordic Rox.

Sven and Per thank the listeners for joining them and they say goodbye. The show ends with Cigarettes by Anita Lindblom, as usual.

Still is from the Bag Of Trix talks recorded by Anders Roos.

Thanks for your support, Sven!

Sven Lindström and Per Gessle presented their 550th Nordic Rox show in July. They shared their top 2000s songs from No. 25 to No. 21 in that episode.

The guys are ready to play the best sound from the Nordic countries and kick off with something really greasy, Grease Baby by Clutter, garage rock from Stockholm. A very cool song according to Per.

Then comes Mia Karlsson’s beautiful track, Breathe Now from 2024. PG loves this song and he thinks Mia has a great voice.

The next track is Let’s Go Parking Baby by Caesars from their Youth Is Wasted On The Young album from 1998. Excellent stuff, Sven thinks. He loves their sound.

The guys play two US No.1s in different versions. First of all, Björn Skifs who topped the US Billboard charts with Hooked On A Feeling. Per corrects Sven that he wasn’t called Björn Skifs those days, but Blue Swede and the song was a cover version of Hooked On A Feeling, the ooga chaka stuff in 1974. But the track they play is a Eurovision song from 1975, a big, big, big hit in Scandinavia: Michelangelo by Björn Skifs. It’s a cool song according to PG. It makes you smile.

Then there is an ABBA track in a different version by the group called Pale Honey, a cover version of Lay All Your Love On Me from the Super Trooper album 1980. The guys think it’s a great track and Pale Honey’s interpretation is an interesting, nice version.

No. 25 on the noughties list is a Danish song that travelled the world. It was the theme song for the TV series The Bridge. Hollow Talk by Choir Of Young Believers is a very special track. Per was pretty late watching the series. Everyone saw it around him, except him. He watched all the seasons, and then just before the three last episodes, they took it off Netflix or HBO, whatever it was. So PG hasn’t seen the ending yet and begs Sven not to tell him. Sven laughs and confirms no spoilers here.

Sven knows the next song is one of Per’s favourites. It’s by Lisa Miskovsky. Mr. G thinks she is a great singer, and this is one of her early hits, Driving One Of Your Cars. Per thinks it sounds amazing and he loves it. It’s an excellent track from 2001. It’s getting old. “Just like you”, Per turns to Sven. Haha.

No. 23 is a female singer called Titiyo. She broke through in 1989 with Talking To The Man In The Moon, but her biggest song is Come Along. It’s written by Peter Svensson from The Cardigans and Jocke Berg from Kent. Jocke wrote the lyrics. Kent was a massive band in Sweden, but has never broken through outside. Come Along has got a great sound, and it sounds a little bit like The Cardigans, Per thinks. It’s a very good song, and you can still hear it here and there.

Someone New by Eskobar feat. Heather Nova is next. It was a one-off collaboration between this band from Stockholm and Heather Nova from Bermuda in 2002. It was a big song in Europe, and it still sounds cool.

No. 21 is Wonderchild by Christian Walz, who is a great producer and writer, and he has been around for many years. This was a really big song for him. It’s from the album Paint By Numbers. He is also a very prolific writer for Swedish artist Veronica Maggio. He has written brilliant tracks for her in Swedish.

Sven introduces the next track, Bad Blood, as a song by the touring version of Roxette. Per says it’s not really a Roxette track. It’s sung by Per and Lena Philipsson, who is an amazing singer.

The next song played is Hey Princess by Popsicle. Then comes Fine by The Cardigans. It’s taken from The Cardigans’ second album, Live, which broke them big in Japan in 1995. Sven asks Per what he was doing in 1995. PG has to think about it. He came off a tour. If you can’t remember the ’90s, you weren’t there, Sven says. Per says they did a world tour with Roxette in 1994 and 1995. The Crash! Boom! Bang! tour, so they probably played some big shows in the summer of 1995. Then they recorded more music, because they made their first compilation album in 1996. Per says “it’s all coming back to me now”. Haha. Like Peter Sellers would say.

Sven and Per thank the listeners for joining them and they say goodbye. The show ends with Cigarettes by Anita Lindblom, as usual.

Still is from the Bag Of Trix talks recorded by Anders Roos.

Thanks for your support, Sven!