Roxette

South African press: Roxette still dressed for success

by

Roxette’s Per Gessle opens up about the band’s past, his life-long love of music, singer Marie Fredriksson’s near-fatal brain tumour, and writing hit records.

People love our songs, they seem to be part of people’s lives – which is just amazing. The songs I write are based on the music I listened to when I was very young – music from the ’60s, ’70s – so everything I do is basically melody oriented. I think also it has helped that we’re not American, we’re not English so we’ve always been a little bit offside. We’re a Swedish band with a Swedish manager, a Swedish producer, so we’ve done everything outside the global music industry and I think that’s really helped us out. There have been times when people have said: ‘You have to move to New York or LA, or at least move to London’, but we’ve never wanted to do that.

We always listen to our gut feeling. It was the same when I wrote the new album, ‘Charm School’. My ambition was not to write a best-selling album. I just wanted to write a great album for Marie – these are the songs I want her to sing. If it works commercially, then hallelujah. If it doesn’t, we’ve still done a great album.

When we perform, we’re one of those bands who don’t use computers, vocals on tape, or click tracks or whatever – it’s just 100 percent live, like when we started out. For us that’s so much more fun – sometimes a song goes too fast, sometimes it goes too slow – and every show is unique. We try to make it interesting and enjoyable for ourselves.

More at iafrica.com

World Tour 2011: Cape Town, South Africa – May 11 #21

by

This was concert #3 in Cape Town. Roxette is now moving on to Sun City for 4 concerts on 13th, 14th, 15th and 17th of May.

Don’t forget to check the full tour plan from time to time, maybe you find some city you may want to add to your personal tour!

Setlist

01. Dressed for Success
02. Sleeping In My Car
03. The Big L.
04. Wish I Could Fly
05. Only When I Dream
06. She’s Got Nothing On (But the Radio)
07. Perfect Day
08. Things Will Never Be the Same
09. It Must Have Been Love
10. Opportunity Nox
11. 7twenty7
12. Fading Like a Flower (Every Time You Leave)
13. Stars
14. How Do You Do!
15. Dangerous
Band presentation
16. Joyride (no traditional tune)

17. Watercolours in the Rain
18. Spending my Time
19. The Look

20. Way Out
21. Listen to Your Heart
22. Church of Your Heart

Photos

Photos have been added to Heidi’s Flickr.

Reviews

Roxette’s Marie on top of tour

Heidi wrote about the concert last night – same place but totally different concert!

Roxette once again performed to a sold out 7000 fans in attendance. The fans were treated to the usual set list this time “Silver Blue” replaced by “Stars” as on Sunday evening.

The band was beyond hot! This is probably, like Per said, the best band Roxette has ever had. Everyone plays their role in the band to create something so spectacular! Just thinking what Marie had to endure and what she is delivering on stage at the moment is beyond my comprehension. It is unreal unless you are in attendance at the concert. To explain to someone who had not attended one of these concerts would be an impossible task.

Newcomer to the Roxette band, Helena seems right at home at the moment in this Roxette ‘family’. She knows her part well and adds energy & magic to this whole live experience. The band is enjoying themselves on stage and is having the time of their lives. Truly happy people in an environment that fits them like a glove. Roxette you have yet again proved not only to South Africans, that you are among the best bands in the world, but also to planet earth. Rox on until next time we meet in Cape Town.

Per Gessle: I feel this is the best Roxette band our fans have ever seen

by

Clayton Morar, SA’s celeb expert & autograph hunter, posted a blog entry from the Monday press meeting in Cape Town. Read some extracts from what he noticed during the interview:

I feel this is the best Roxette band our fans have ever seen. We’re enjoying touring around the world and we’ll continue to sing and produce hits as long as Marie’s comfortable with how we do things and as long as the fans keep supporting us. All we’d like to do is to continue to make good music!

I love SA wine and I’ve previously brought my family out for a visit a few years ago, and we took a tour to all the wine farms outside Cape Town. While there I met up with Ernie Els (SA golfer) and Bjorn Bjorg (Swedish tennis star) and had a great time. I also love the food here and the great sights of Cape Town.

Check Clayton Morar’s blog out for more pictures and stories.