Roxette LIVE – Travelling The World

by

I never thought I would buy something what is able to play a Blu-ray because of Roxette and not because of my fave actors. I also never thought I would buy it earlier than an LP player… But it just happened. And it was all worth it. Actually, the long long long long long waiting for the DVD / Blu-ray / CD was worth it, too.

As per the Blu-ray, I like how it looks like. I mean not the front cover, but how it is structured, the way the CD and the Blu-ray disc are placed in the case. Well, too bad that all the DVDs and Blu-rays seem to be produced in Germany (or at least most of them), since now we are all having this unnecessary and not too sexy stamp on the front cover. When I first saw it, I hoped it was a sticker which I could easily remove, but unfortunately, it’s printed as part of the design…

blu-ray_00_  blu-ray_01_

I started with watching the Gessle cam stuff & the guitar tech’s secret life from the Blu-ray as I thought most of the other 2 parts I already saw on TV last year.

The Gessle cam videos are still fun. What I like the most is that on the Blu-ray they, of course, have much higher quality than what we can see on Facebook. Even if you already saw most of them (yes, there ARE new ones), you can smile and laugh at what the guys & ladies are doing in the studio or backstage. Per was wrong when he corrected us that the ”So, Christoffer?” part is not 3 minutes, but 30. It’s really ”only” 3 minutes, but it’s a hilarious mix! 🙂

Then comes 12 minutes of ”Studio Work” from the recordings of ”Travelling”, the album. Scenes are from AGM and Atlantis studios with Clarence, Christoffer, Magnus, Pelle, Marie and Helena. Oh, and of course, Per. But you can mainly hear his voice and see him not too often. We got used to this during all these years.

The 3rd Gessle cam video, ”Travelling” is the longest, almost 30 minutes. It’s from several countries: backstage, soundcheck, food, some ”Jesus loves you!” and some more ”So, Christoffer?”, Clarence & Pelle & Magnus ice skating, band, Marie & Per, crew, etc.

The 4th extra is a 5-minute-long video of ”Mikael Nogueira-Svensson – The secret life of a guitar tech”. Micke N-S took care of the gear of Per, Pelle and Magnus during the tour. He’s talking about his job and shows interesting things backstage, like the Blue Swede Sex Machine is having problems all the time. He says he’s like a nanny for the musicians. 🙂 While talking, he is restringing a guitar.

Roxette_It_All_Begins_Where_It_Ends

 

 

After these videos I watched the documentary, ”It All Begins Where It Ends – The Incredible Story Of Roxette”. Most of it we could already see last year, but finally, Helena and Dea got their well-deserved part in the docu. Actually, this is the only difference I could notice. And it’s great as it is. No changes were needed besides the backing vocalists’ part. Oh, yes! Another important change is the subtitles. The English subtitles work well.

 

 

 

Roxette_COYH

 

”Roxette LIVE – Travelling The World” I saved for last. Chris did an awesome job with the live mix, but we already said that when we saw it on TV. At the same time, I still get dizzy from the constant cuts and I thought a year should have been enough to change them, but Favela kept them as we saw it in the TV cut of the live stuff. No clue why. Whatever. Crowd scenes are still mixed, but at least those confusing titles with mentioning cities and countries are gone. There are now more relevant scenes between the songs than what we saw on TV: backstage moments, fans running to the front row, the drum kit getting dressed for success, etc. Besides these, now it’s more like a real complete show. Awesome to see those 9 songs too, which were not in the TV cut, but made it to the DVD. This way we can enjoy e.g. Marie’s touching performance of ”Perfect Day”, some more of Per’s left leg dance in ”How Do You Do!” and their lovely moments in ”Things Will Never Be The Same”. Richard Gere and Julia Roberts are cut out from the final ”It Must Have Been Love” part, however, Marie and Per are still cut in from the video clip twice. But that’s fine. Getting this front row feeling and reliving the moments of the tour, one starts / continues longing for a new tour.

 

Last but not least, I love having the songs on a live CD, too. Some fans hear Marie from far away or have other problems with the sound on the CD, but my ears are not too sharp for that I assume, since I’m fine with the sound itself. One funny thing is that the preview pic of the live CD is not the final cover, but another sleeve we saw when we were guessing which the final design could be. If I have to choose between the physical release and the digital one, I go for the digital because of having ”Silver Blue” and ”Church Of Your Heart” as bonus tracks there.

All in all, if you ask me what took a year to release this material after we could see most of it already in December 2012, I’m not sure I could tell you. Maybe choosing what to include in the extras from the tremendous amount of Gessle cam videos was a bit time-consuming or doing the subtitles. No clue. But it doesn’t really matter now that it’s in my hands and I could watch it and listen to it. I could do it 24/7. More than that, I want a Roxette tour! NOW!

 

A fan’s story of the ”Alla tiders Gyllene Tider” release party

by

Sandra Knospe was one of the lucky fans who got an invitation to the book release party. To the party being held on 10th December in Leif’s Lounge at Hotel Tylösand. She travelled there with 3 of her friends and they enjoyed the journey, the meetings, the talks and the party to the full. Here’s her complete story about the event, how she experienced it.

The “Alla tiders Gyllene Tider” book release party or a not so usual short trip to Halmstad…

© Justyna Bereza
© Justyna Bereza

It’s a week ago already, but I needed this time to realize that it hasn’t been just a dream what I experienced last Tuesday, that it really happened. Again… Who would have thought back in 1997, when I witnessed the first book release party in my life at Hotel Tylösand, also for a GT biography, also written by Jan-Owe Wikström, that 16 years later I would be there again, at the same place, for yet another GT book release party, for another great GT book, a road biography, written by exactly the same person, Jan-Owe Wikström, with outstanding pictures from Anders Roos, that really deliver the live feelings from the past GT tour and bring back soooo many fantastic and intense moments of the tour. I can tell, I was there on all 19 shows. Going through the book brings me back the memories and make them become alive again immediately and I can’t wait to find some time to finally read the whole book.

But back to where I started… When I got the invitation I knew that I wouldn’t say no. Even though it seemed to be impossible to realize. I knew I had to work a day after the date of the party, I knew I couldn’t take my precious GT car for the trip since it’s missing a proper set of winter tires and I knew that probably nobody of my friends could join me, because it all came so suddenly and seemed to be impossible to manage in just a week. And as if that wasn’t hard enough to solve, I smashed my thumb in the car door just a few days before the trip should be. But everyone who knows me also knows that this wouldn’t hold me back from going. And suddenly everything turned out just perfect. My parents offered me their little Ford Fiesta to be able to go, my thumb was at least not broken just hurting (something I can easily ignore when it comes to such events), and even 3 of my friends made it possible to join me on this adventure. Life is great sometimes, isn’t it?

Read more

Per Gessle’s cooperation with Hep Stars

by

Hep Stars was Sweden’s most successful band in the 60s. Benny Andersson (ABBA) was one of the members of the pop group back then. Actual members are: Svenne Hedlund, Bengan Arenblad, Totte Päivärinta, Todde Stoor and Joffe Enbom. One of their most popular song is ”Cadillac” (based on The Renegades’ ”Brand New Cadillac”). Cool song, isn’t it? Not sure if it’s the same baby and if the cadillac is big & black.

So, the guys are celebrating their 50th anniversary and for this reason, they are releasing an album in 2014 (4th week). Why am I writing about it? Because that album will contain a so far unpublished song written by Per Gessle. There will be 2 singles (”It´s Nice To Be Back”; ”I Wanna Be With You”), but I have no clue if any of these 2 songs is the one written by Mr G. Actually, there is a song with the title ”I Wanna Be With You” on The Lonely Boys album, but I guess it’s not the same, since they are talking about a so far unreleased song. UPDATE: As Per informs, it IS the song from The Lonely Boys… UPDATE (29th Jan 2014): here you can have a listen to it… Ehm… or maybe not if you don’t want to ruin what you have in your mind about this song.)

Per_Gessle

 

This is not the first time Per Gessle cooperated with Hep Stars. When EMI released their compilation album (Hep Stars: 1964-69!), it was Per who compiled those 30 songs the double LP contains. Not sure about the year, since some websites say it was in the early 80s, some others say it was in 1992. Would be cool to know the whole story behind it.

Google helped me to remember an old, fantastic SOAP interview (10/06/2006) with Per done by Jan Gradvall, where besides many many other interesting things he also mentioned that Hep Stars was his first favourite band.

Per said in that interview: “I liked them. I envied my parents that they could see Hep Stars on stage. I asked my mother about this just recently, but she couldn’t remember anything. She is 81.”

“I liked Hep Stars so much that I forced my friends to pretend that we were a band. We stood there with Carrom sticks as guitars and mimed to “Sunny Girl” from Hep Stars and “It’s My Life” from The Animals. But my friends were totally uninterested in music. They thought I was weird.”

 

 

MP_by_Hep_Stars

 

 

Another interesting information is that the upcoming Hep Stars album was produced by Mats MP Persson.

MP played and worked together with Svenne several times in the past. You can find some pics of MP and his studio from the past HERE and some new ones HERE. Don’t forget to check the walls! 😉

BBC Four will broadcast a documentary with Svenne and MP in it on 27th Dec.

 

 

 

 

 

Pic of Per is from ”Gyllene Tider sommaren 2013” docu, pic of MP is from Hep Stars / Hep House Records FB site.

Contest! Win a copy of Roxette’s blu-ray “Live – Travelling the World”

by

Year 2013 has been a fantastic year for Roxers, Marie fans and GT fans, it’s been fully packed with surprises: GT’s album and tour, Marie’s album and announcement of 2014 tour, to mention just a few. And last but not least, the very first live DVD/blu-ray released by Roxette… so we thought the best way to end this year would be with a contest!

In cooperation with D&D Management and Parlophone, we are giving away 2 copies of Roxette’s blu-ray “Roxette Live – Travelling the World”, which will be out next week (the DVD+CD is out since early December).

In order to participate in the contest simply answer this question:

As you know, there are two versions of the live recording: DVD and blu-ray. Both come with a live CD but the are some extras on the blu-ray that you will not find on the DVD.
Name one of these extras!

Send an email with your name, home address (so we can send the blu-ray) and the answer to the question to judith@roxetteblog.com until December 31st 23:59 CET. The 2 lucky winners will be announced the first week of 2014.

Good luck!

Update January 9th: The winners are Rodica Luntraru (Romania) and Andreea Seferian (France). Congratulations!


And here is the small letter, contest terms and conditions
– In order to participate, you have to send an email to judith@roxetteblog.com with name, address and answer to the question. We will consider all emails we receive until the 31st of December 2013, 23:59 CET time.
– 2 winners will be picked up randomly among those who have participated and sent the correct answer.
– As it is usual, you can only participate once, any attempt to participate twice will lead to your disqualification.
– Prizes won’t be paid out in cash. Prizes will be sent by standard mail only once (so basically, if the envelope gets lost.. we won’t be able to send a replacement) by Roxetteblog.
– Winners will be announced on this website and will also be notified per email. You’ll be required to answer to the email confirming your address.
– Roxetteblog.com will not enter into any correspondence regarding the result of the contest and is not liable for any damages, loss or expenses that may result in connection to the prize
– All submitted data will only be used for the purpose of the contest and, in case you are one of the lucky winners, to send you the prize.

Tack för musiken, Marie Fredriksson

by

SVT broadcasted the show ”Tack för musiken”, for which the recordings with Marie Fredriksson were on 27th August. Click HERE to watch it!

It begins with Niklas Strömstedt and the band performing ”Tro” live. Niklas welcomes Ms Effe only after this. They are sitting and talking about Marie’s career (solo, earlier bands, Roxette, Per Gessle), illness (she’s healthy now and grateful to be there) and her family. Marie’s husband, Micke Bolyos was sitting in the band, playing the keyboards during the show.

You can see how much Marie enjoyed being there and how fine she is. She was very relaxed, smiling and laughing all the time. Tears appeared in her eyes when Niklas was talking about her album ”Den ständiga resan” that there are 13 songs about darkness, but the last song, ”Till sist” is different. He read up the first lines of the song and asked who these lines are about. Marie pointed at Micke and told it’s about him. They looked at each other with so much love during the whole show.

MF_Tack_för_musiken_01  MF_Tack_för_musiken_02

Marie started singing when she was a little child. She started the day with singing at 7 am, when everyone else would have loved to sleep. Later, at the age of 17 she wanted to be an actress. It was her dream. She was talking about how she loves writing songs, but after her illness it’s not that easy anymore. She talked about Lasse Lindbom, how much he means to her. They had a fantastic time and were writing a lot of songs together.

In the audience there were many familiar faces and at one point Niklas started talking about Argentina and the fans. Marie realized there were fans in the audience from Argentina, too and said that a lot of Roxette fans are here and they are fantastic. The fans are always by their side, following them and they are even here at this show. Marie told the fans know all the lyrics regardless of where they are coming from or which language the songs are in.

Niklas was joking about Marie’s name, Gun-Marie and pronounced it the English way: Gun-Marie from Roxette. Everyone was laughing.

Read more