Sven Lindström and Per Gessle are getting ready to sink their teeth into the neverending list of their top 2000s songs on the September episode of Nordic Rox. They are at position No. 15 to No. 11 and the tension is rising.
Before that, they go back to the early ’90s and check out one of the bands that Per was a bit involved in. Brainpool was signed to his publishing company way back. This track is the first song from their debut album and it’s outstanding according to Per. It’s called That’s My Charm from 1994. The band is featuring Per’s current guitar player, Christoffer Lundquist. He was the bass player in Brainpool.
The next song is Knife in the Heart by Lykke Li, a remix by The Magician. The guys are in the remix mood today. The Magician has been working with Lykke Li before, he did I Follow Rivers as well. A highly successful song.
Then comes the remix version of Roxette’s I Call Your Name from 1986, taken from the first album, Pearls of Passion. It’s a Frank Mono remix. It has always been tough to get on the radio and EMI in Europe had this recipe of using European remixers and DJs to do remixes of songs. So they wanted to make a remix of I Call Your Name, which was an album track from Pearls of Passion. Per doesn’t know who Frank Mono was, he never actually met him. Roxette had to wait a couple of more years for everything to kick off in the States. It was with the second album.
Coming up next is Whatever by a fantastic band called Thundermother, consisting of four girls from Växjö, Sven’s old hometown. That’s how tough they are in Växjö. Haha. Per asks Sven if he knows the girls. Sven replies that he thinks he left town some decades before they were born, haha.
The guys are ready to dive deep into the best of the noughties list. At position No. 15 they have a fantastic song called Do You Love Me? by the amazing Amanda Jenssen, who is an outstanding singer. This was her breakthrough song in Scandinavia, the first single from her debut album, Killing My Darlings in 2008. There is something about her personality that’s hooking on. She cuts through the radio. She is really good.
No. 14 is Kent, one of Sweden’s biggest bands in the noughties. They are singing in Swedish. They made an amazing album called Vapen & Ammunition, guns and ammunition, in 2002. That album included several hit singles, including Kärleken väntar (Love Awaits). Per thinks it’s a great track, great production and a really good song as well. Typical Kent sound. He likes it a lot. It’s sung by Jocke Berg in Kent.
No. 13 is Dream On by Atomic Swing. They got quite big when they came out in 1993 with their debut album. They don’t exist anymore, or if they do, they keep a really low profile, haha. Under the radar. This is a great track from their The Broken Habanas album in 2006. It’s a song that’s been covered by other artists as well. Sven loves that guitar solo just merging over into the organ solo. Per thinks it’s very cool.
No. 12 is Running out of Gaz by Pauline. She was born in Zimbabwe and her mother moved to Sweden with a Swedish man who adopted her, so she grew up in Sweden. This is her biggest hit, released in 2003. It’s just a brilliant pop track. Per really likes it.
No. 11 is a song by The Cardigans. It’s a single from their latest / last album from 2005. They are still active, some members of the band and the singer Nina Persson, but the main songwriter Peter Svensson moved to LA and is working out of LA as a writer. I Need Some Fine Wine and You, You Need to Be Nicer is a great track. The guys love that title. Nina Persson wrote the lyrics for The Cardigans and Peter Svensson wrote the music. That was the recipe of excellent teamwork.
The next artist is Merit Hemmingson. Sven doesn’t think they ever played her on Nordic Rox before. She is getting into her golden years, she is 86. She was really big in the ’70s, a fantastic keyboard player, Hammond organ player. Gammal jämtländsk brudmarsch was a smash hit in 1973 in Sweden, which is pretty rare because it’s an instrumental track and it’s a folk music tune. She made a specialty up by taking folk music, adapting it and modernizing it.
The next song is Death Defied by Will by Eagle-Eye Cherry. Then comes More! by Robin Bengtsson. God Knows by Mando Diao wraps up this month’s 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!