TV

Gyllene Tider’s story becomes a film!

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Nordic drama production company Nevis Productions has secured a deal with Sweden’s great music treasure, Gyllene Tider to make a feature film and a TV-series based on the band’s incredible journey to success.

Per Gessle and Mats Persson formed Gyllene Tider with Micke Andersson, Anders Herrlin and Göran Fritzon in the late 70’s. After taking Sweden by storm, they broke up in 1984. Per Gessle then formed Roxette with Marie Fredriksson and became successful all around the world.

The feature film about Gyllene Tider is developed in full collaboration with the band and will be a warm feelgood story about friendship and growing up in the spotlight. The script is written by Pernilla Oljelund (Miss Friman’s War, Wallander, The Restaurant) and the shooting will start in 2022. Producers at Nevis are Anni Faurbye Fernandez, Moa Westeson and Cindy Hanson.

The film tells the story of Per, an ambitious outsider who dreams of pop stardom and finds a brotherhood through music with MP, Micke, Anders and Göran. They experience the highs and lows, but despite all setbacks, being ridiculed and rejected, the band works hard and purposefully – and breaks through with their power pop, their effective choruses and joyous and affectionate lyrics about life in a small town.

The movie is a story about dreaming big and achieving something even bigger. Success is not only accompanied by joy and happiness, but also pressure, conflicts and tragic events that challenge the band and force them to grow up in unexpected ways. In the end, it’s the friendship and music that lead forward. The gang not only survives, but also becomes bigger than ever.

After their breakup, Gyllene Tider reunions and tours have taken them to heights that no one, least of all themselves, could have imagined. When the band celebrated their 25th anniversary with their first new album in 20 years, the tour in 2004 became the largest in Scandinavia ever and the third largest in Europe. For over 40 years, GT has maintained its popularity and been loved by generation after generation, who have grown up with their songs. Gyllene Tider reunited several times, most recently in 2019. At that time, they celebrated their 40th anniversary as a band and also released a studio album, Samma skrot och korn.

Per Gessle says:

The story of the guys in Gyllene Tider could be the story of any young small town person. The shaky possibilities after finishing school, the uncertain prospects of the future. However, inspired by the new wave and power pop scene of the era, bonding in our tiny rehearsal shack, we found a very unusual way to grow up. The early and crazy Gyllene Tider years changed our lives forever. And it seems we might have changed some other people’s lives as well along the way. The lads and I are all excited to be part of this production.

Producer Moa Westeson adds:

We have long dreamed of dramatizing the exceptional, inspirational story behind legendary Swedish pop band Gyllene Tider and are excited to bring the audience along on this fun, uplifting whirlwind celebration of music, friendship and coming of age that captures the zeitgeist of a bygone era.

Nevis is an independent production company with offices in Copenhagen, Stockholm and London. Nevis Productions was founded in 2020 by Anni Faurbye Fernandez, Cindy Hanson and Moa Westeson and is backed by London based production company NEVISION. Their mission is to create high quality storytelling that appeals to both the local Nordic market and to a wider, global audience. With passion and dedication, they aim to entertain, inspire and move audiences with a variety of creatively ambitious TV dramas.

PRESS RELEASE

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.

Roxette’s four US No.1s at Don’t Stop The Music gala on TV4

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There was a 2-hour-long live music gala on TV4 tonight, Don’t Stop The Music. The evening was arranged by the Swedish Music Foundation, which works to support everyone in the music industry who has been affected by the pandemic in various ways.

Among other artists, Peter Jöback, Tomas Ledin, Zara Larsson, Lars Winnerbäck and First Aid Kit performed at the fundraising gala.

Such an event in Sweden can’t happen without at least covering Roxette. This time it was 4 great Swedish ladies who performed Roxette’s four US No.1 hits in a medley. It started with Janice and Listen To Your Heart that turned into Frida Öhrn’s interpretation of The Look. Then came Mariette with Joyride and Loreen closed the medley with It Must Have Been Love. Click HERE to see their performance. Before the medley, there was an intro talk about Swedish US No. 1 successes. Four of the seven No.1s were Roxette songs.

Dea Norberg was at the gala too and she provided backing vocals. She was also interviewed by TV4. She is a singer and backing vocalist and she has been touring for 25 years. She tells the music industry is in a difficult situation during this time. Dea says she wants to feel that she can contribute to the society with the skills she has. She hopes and believes that all on stage and backstage will survive this tough period. She represents thousands of those who we don’t see, but who created what we see.

HERE you can watch the complete program.

Stills are from the gala.

Per Gessle on Nyhetsmorgon

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Per Gessle was one of the guests on Nyhetsmorgon, TV4 this morning. He entered the studio after Jubël (Sebastian Atas and Victor Sjöström), a Swedish duo originating from Halmstad performed their song, Someone. Per mentions how good they are and shows thumbs up to them. Program leader Jenny Alversjö asks Mr. G if they worked together and Per tells that for example, in 2018 they wrote music together for Name You Beautiful, the official song for the World Table Tennis Championship in Halmstad.

Jenny asks Per about Christmas. PG says it was calm of course. It’s been a quite long, boring time for everyone, Per thinks. Then Jenny tells there was the Late Night Concert on TV4 in December and it came as a consolation in the darkness when we needed it most. Per tells it was fantastic. They’ve been sitting isolated for such a long time and couldn’t play and even if there was of course no audience for this event, it was fun to rehearse and meet the band. It was fun to play in an acoustic arrangement, he thinks it’s always special. It was like finding new ways for the songs and certain songs fit this intimate format, e.g. Tycker om när du tar på mig or Listen To Your Heart. He tried to pick songs from Roxette, Gyllene Tider and his solo career. It was exciting for him.

Jenny asks how it works not to strip down something that is the core of the song. Per says the core things in his songs are most often the lyrics and the melody, so this way one can even put these elements more into focus.

Here they show some parts of the concert and Jenny tells it was incredibly nice. She asks Per how he picked the songs for this event. For this concert Per says he tested 10-15 songs, maybe more and he simply chose the ones that felt best. One can feel it that some songs just don’t work in a toned-down version. The Look, for example, would have been quite meaningless to be played there.

Jenny tells Per has Billboard No. 1 songs and sold millions of albums and she is curious about Mr. G’s relationship to music today. Per says it’s quite unchanged. Music has always been his thing and he has never thought of music as his job.

Jenny asks Per about his plans whether he is thinking about new things or planning to work with his already existing catalogue in the way we could see him at the Late Night Concert. Mr. G says partly this and that. He thinks he has always had a very good setup: Gyllene Tider, which is a certain type of power pop, Roxette, which is a totally different style also productionwise, his solo stuff, which is more lyric-based, more of a singer songwriter style and Mono Mind, which is also a totally different music. He used to say there are different things on the same tree and it fits him very well, so he can do diverse things.

Jenny asks Per whether he had done everything he wanted to do or there is still something he dreams about. Mr. G says he has no special dream, he just wants to keep going with all what he is doing and wants to see what happens, be curious and test things.

Jenny asks how Per finds inspiration and where his creativity comes from. Per says it’s his way to express himself. He expresses his personality and creativity through music and texts, so it comes by itself in a way. Many think that he ”goes to work” at 9 and plays the piano and the guitar for 6 hours, but it doesn’t work for him like that. He writes down just what he must write down and it’s when he has something that must come out. It can be a melody or an idea or a text.

Jenny asks Per about the secret of being a hitmaker and if he feels it when he writes a song that it would become a hit. Per says it’s been long since the last time he wrote a hit. Pop music has changed so much and he sticks to his roots, so he is not a modern hitmaker anymore. He says there are so many things that have to work for a song to become a hit. It’s not just the song itself, but it’s also about timing, cooperations, luck and a thousand other things that should work at the same time. Regarding certain songs, e.g. The Look, when they recorded it in the studio in the 80’s it felt that it was very special, but that it would become No. 1 in 30 countries, you never know in advance. It Must Have Been Love was a very good ballad and then it became part of the movie, Pretty Woman and it became such a monster hit. Coincidence also plays a big role, Per says.

Jenny mentions Marie passed away more than a year ago and is curious how it is to play Roxette songs without Marie. Per says it’s terrible that Marie is not there anymore, but he feels that the music lives on and he sees that all around the world. He still wants to play these songs, they are such a big part of his life, more than 30 years of Roxette. He doesn’t want to close that door, but it will be different and he will never replace Marie. Jenny asks Per about griefing and missing Marie. Mr. G says it’s a constant feeling. You can never call her or talk to her again. Now Pelle Alsing, their drummer also passed away before Christmas and it also feels incomprehensible. It’s tough.

Jenny says she also knows Per is working in the studio now and is curious what the future brings. Mr. G says he is recording an English pop album and it sounds a bit like Roxette’s origins. It’s a bit difficult to write uptempo pop songs at his age even if he wrote so many of such songs before. He simply took the challange to write an awesome pop record. Jenny thinks it’s very exciting and Per agrees. He has no clue when the album is out, but he plans to release it this year. When it’s ready.

Stills are from the interview.

Top 2000: The Untold Stories – Roxette – It Must Have Been Love

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You surely remember the Dutch TV program, Top 2000 that interviewed Per Gessle on 19th November 2019 at Baggpipe Studios (the old EMI studio) in Stockholm. In December 2019 they broadcast the story of The Look and they shared it on their YouTube channel in February 2020. Later, in August 2020 they shared an acoustic version of It Must Have Been Love. Per played it the same day they recorded the program and now it turns out there was a story behind IMHBL they recorded as well. It was broadcast on Dutch TV yesterday. You can watch it HERE (if you are in the Netherlands or via VPN).

Per tells the whole idea with Roxette was that they wanted to go international. They had success in Sweden, Marie was a successful solo artist and Per was successful with his Swedih band. Marie’s career was climbing, but Per’s heydays were over. Marie and Per knew each other since the late 70’s and they always wanted to do something together. She had an amazing voice, Per could write songs for her and they shared the ambition. Per wrote different songs for Marie than what she could write herself. There is Soul Deep for instance. She is amazing in that song. She never really wrote material like that. After the success in Sweden with the first Roxette album they were a bit disappointed because they wanted to succeed abroad. So they talked to EMI in Germany and they said they should write a Christmas song, maybe then it’s easier for EMI Germany to get them on the radio. Per went home and wrote It Must Have Been Love (Christmas for the Broken Hearted).

Per is showing the demo to IMHBL where he is singing. He says it would have been Marie who would be whispering the line they hear (It’s a hard Christmas day, I dream away), to make it more intimate, but they gave it up, it was corny. Per explains this demo was before auto tuning, it’s really out of tune and he laughs. He says it’s a really bad demo actually. They recorded the song and released it in Sweden in 1987 and it became a hit. It was a big song for them, but Germany didn’t release it, EMI Electrola hated it.

Then they forgot about it. Per started writing the Look Sharp! album. They had all the success with it, with The Look and Listen To Your Heart. Then in 1989 they had a lunch with EMI in Los Angeles and they had the rights of a soundtrack to a movie called 3000. It was about a guy who hires a girl for the weekend for 3000 dollars. They said that they have David Bowie on board, Go West and Natalie Cole as well, all those EMI artists. They wanted Roxette to write a song for that movie, but Per said they had no time, they were travelling all around the planet to promote Look Sharp! But Mr. G said they have a Christmas song and he could very easily alter the lyrics to it. He got rid of Christmas day that became winter’s day. They sent it to them and they loved it. The title of the movie became Pretty Woman. Per remembers he was in this studio (the old EMI studio) when Garry Marshall, director of the movie called him to tell that he loves the song so much he had given it a great place in the movie and there is no dialogue over it, because it speaks for itself and it just gives the whole movie a certain character in that particualr scene. Per thanked and put down the phone. The movie became a blockbuster and they were surprised what happened there. IMHBL became this epic song it is today.

Thanx for the hint, Ludo van Denderen! (He also shared a screen recording of the program on his FB.)