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Tag archives for Håkan Hellström

Watching sunbeams grow from dead

61 comments

A new version of Museum Of Bellas Artes lovely ‘Days Ahead‘ (a song first released last year on an EP by the same name) came out on Monday and with it this brand new video:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82znvkgZfOk

Not only is it a splendid little song, I also borrowed its opening line to sum up today’s theme of mine.
Which is spring, summer, sun.
Or things that make me think of.

Because to be honest it is all I can think of.

I realize you have heard this before but it is true: there is nothing like Swedish summer.

Nothing.

And on that note:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QkYK9nHBns
Let Go by jj from jj no 3, 2010

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3wcNi-3I30&feature=related
A Sweet Summer’s Night On Hammer Hill by Jens Lekman, 2005

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTPO6XM_IxM
Air France built their whole sound on summer really but I chose No Excuses (2009) because the video is so pretty. (Directed by Marcus Söderlund who also did the jj video above)

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi4_yoxn8W0&NR=1
Minnen Av Aprilhimlen – Håkan Hellström, 2002
(Yes, I’ll keep posting Håkan songs because one day you’ll get him and then you’ll thank me!)
Trivia: Lyrics borrowed from Pavement’s Gold Soundz. They are drunk in August in that song and in this one it’s April but the line “you’re the kind of girl i like, because you’re empty and I’m empty” is identical, only it’s in Swedish here.


El Perro Del Mar by Johanna Hedblom
No video for this but hear it on Spotify: Into The Sunshine by El Perro Del Mar

…and yet more from Gothenburg (makes sense, they’ve always been our balearic capital): Holiday by The Tough Alliance, 2004…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCVna3a0X58
…and one half of them, CEO with his rendition of Den Blomstertid Nu Kommer, 2010...

which is the hymn we sing in church on the last day of school before summer.
It doesn’t get much more summer-y than that.
(Min Stora Sorg recently gave that same hymn a go, with her interpretation, Blomstertid)

And since we (well you) are already lost in translation, some bonus tracks:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4McfPMcKsE
Bonus#1 Lill-Babs – Gröna Granna Sköna Sanna Sommar (and if not for the tune then for the awesome photos of her! God she was hot).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WKoEzxd9zQ
Bonus#2 I can’t think of many things more Swedish than this. It is the opening of Släpp Fångarne Loss Det Är Vår, a comedy from 1975, directed by Swedish 70′s comedy superstar Tage Danielsson, and a political comment on the then much debated liberalisation of Sweden’s correctional treatment. The title of the film (as well as the chorus) translates as “Let the prisoners go, spring is here!“)

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHbBqjPl-PM&feature=related
Bonus#3 ABBA Summer Night City, 1978. Maybe not their finest musical moment but still, what a stylist!
That literally foxy dress Frida is wearing…

Lisa Milberg

May 11, 2011

10 X LEGENDS

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Yesterday saw the unexpected return of one of Sweden’s once biggest stars. Go back some twentyish years and Laila El Khalifi, Leila K, was everywhere.

She was discovered in a rap contest in 1989 by duo Rob’n'Raz who were in the jury. They asked her to do the vocals for a few of their songs, one of which was ‘Got To Get’, pretty much the only song I remember dancing to – apart from Snap! of course – at our “school discos”. (Snap! must have had a pretty good run, three of the four singles they put out in 1990 I remember down to the last syllable).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4HZPMuj6-o

Since then she’s had a particularly rocky journey, going from superstar to scandal queen to homeless to, well, I don’t know because her activities for the last few years – apart from a random visit to Swedish gay club Mums Mums where she sang two songs – have been mostly speculations.

Anyways, along comes ‘Legendary‘, a track by Petter Wallenberg (one of the organizers behind above mentioned club night), featuring Leila K on vocals. The song opens (and continues) with the line “I’m legendary and you’re not”, taken from the cult-documentary Paris is Burning.

So, in tribute to that theme – not fire or Paris but legends – I thought I’d share with you some other Swedish musical legends, past and present.
As always this is a highly subjective list, just the tip of the iceberg and so I’ve taken the liberty to ignore some of our biggest musical exports.
Not all, mind you. There are still some very familiar faces…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTSaNsVkYTM
…like this one. One of the two A’s in ABBA: Anni-frid, also known as Frida, here solo with I See Red, in 1982. (Produced by Phil Collins!)

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gE-HNEb66Z8
..and the other A too of course: Agnetha with Wrap Your Arms Around Me, one year later.
(Those pants really don’t do her hips any favours eh?).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pub7NUdZMs0
I am a big fan of Karin Dreijer Andersson (of The Knife and Fever Ray) and this is her old band Honey Is Cool and their single Nach Heart, 1997. They also had Håkan Hellström on drums. Håkan is a long story but in short…

…he also played (drums then bass) in Gothenburg’s finest, Broder Daniel, here Underground (1998) accompanying the closing scene of Lukas Moodysson’s brilliant Show Me Love (which, by the way, has a young Robyn singing over the end credits)…
(Note: HUGE spoiler alert in case you still haven’t come round to watching this film)

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6nu8-sQ1nw&feature=related
…and one of Sweden’s biggest treasures, in my book. Jag är Kär i En Ängel, 2008.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEMhRkxcfwk
Then there is pop legend, Mauro Scocco, here with his biggest hit, Sarah from 1988 (with much quoted chorus: “Sarah come out tonight, I’ll wait on the corner by 7 Eleven“).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k–rDYm79jE
…and the guy on the vespa in the opening of that video is Thomas Eriksson, better known as Orup. (Är Du Redo, 1987, above may not be his finest moment, I think this is, but it’s just such a ridiculously eighties video I couldn’t help myself).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6m9FDyLemI
and the last pop man I’ll mention is this guy, the two hit wonder that is Jakob Hellman. Vara Vänner, 1989.
(Best comment on youtube: “Harry Potter can sing”).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWsRz3TJDEY&feature=related
Over to Neneh who surely needs no further introduction? Love her. Buffalo Stance, 1989.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1E5iY6n1xk
…and I’ll end on a neat 10 with the one and only Monica Zetterlund.

Trust me, it’s worth learning Swedish for the lyrics to this, Trubbel (1968), alone.

xx

Lisa Milberg

May 5, 2011

May Day!

32 comments

In honour of yesterday’s May Day, I thought I’d share with you a few examples of Swedish political songs and bands.

The very first song that entered my mind was Ebba Grön‘s very famous Staten & Kapitalet (really a cover version but that was never the case in my young mind), about “how the government (staten) and the privately owned corporations (kapitalet) control and enslave the working classes” (I couldn’t put it any simpler than Wikipedia had).

Ebba, formed in -77, was one of Sweden’s seminal punk bands and one of my favourite groups when I was a teenager (in the 90s). I used to sit in Humlegården, a park in central Stockholm, with my best friend (and future bandmate) Maria, when we were maybe 14, and we’d listen to her brother’s old discarded Ebba Grön cassettes on a tape recorder and smoke cigarettes.
It was wonderful.

Anyways, I asked my Twitter followers to get involved in this too and they were so helpful that I’ve been stuck on youtube pretty much since, wading through old songs and new, good and terrible, stuff I hadn’t heard before and songs I grew up listening to.

There is a lot of political music.
As Marie Bergman once put it “ingen kommer undan politiken“.
No one escapes politics.

In my search I quickly noticed that as for lyrically and party-political songs – the placard ones if you will – 99% of them (that I found or thought of) were by men. The very political 70s “progg” movement for example was pretty male-dominated and even the album Sånger Om Kvinnor (=songs about women), a compilation of battle songs for the Women’s Movement and sung by women, were written by men and all the musicians on the album were male.

So on this list I felt I also wanted to include some of my favourite bands and artists who I find political in other senses, in how they operate, in their beliefs, in which fights they fight – or don’t fight.

Karin Dreijer of Fever Ray and The Knife is a perfect example – with their music they constantly play with gender roles, they run their own label and on their website now The Knife urge people to get involved against the discrimination of Romani people in Europe. But as for writing political lyrics they said (back in 2006) that they felt it didn’t lead to anything, it just made certain opinions trendy for a while. (sorry, source here in Swedish).

So, phew, on that explanatory note – below are a few musical highlights, the tip of a pretty overwhelming iceberg.

And, sadly I must say that in my lifetime I can not remember a time when it’s felt more important to take a stand than it does right now.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTAvm_Fk09M
Den ena handen vet vad den andra gör, Blå Tåget 1972…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ya6z54IHdu0
…later covered and renamed Staten & Kapitalet by Ebba Grön in 1980

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PEHgzdZA4M
The New Improved Hypocrisy, The Radio Dept, 2010

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-TDh-8Ub4w
Barn Av Vår Tid, Nationalteatern 1977

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VLnLs_-Ez4
Pass This On, The Knife, 2003

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZozfFXcr9U
Stockholm Snett Uppifrån, Vapnet, 2008

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RWEF_xbGfM&feature=related
I’ve Got U Under My Skin, Neneh Cherry, 1990

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLHMX5o5fAc&feature=related
Keops Pyramid, Hoola Bandoola band, 1972

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNGnLN8plB8
The Modern, Frida Hyvönen, 2005

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAxrmJr5Fqc
Levande Begravd, Liket Lever, 1979
(…as referenced in the opening lines of Dom Där Jag Kommer Ifrån, Håkan Hellström 2010,
and one of my favourite songs by him).

Then there is of course Mattias Alkberg and The Bear Quartet and everything they’ve ever done.

Oh god, I keep thinking of more things that has to be mentioned…

Hm. I’ll leave you with this…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3M8V_ryCQrU
…Refused Are Fuckin Dead

Plus three more:

Allt Som Är Ditt, Säkert!, 2007

Ingen Så Blå, Parker Lewis feat. Love Antell (from Florence Valentin, some say Sweden’s very own Glasvegas), 2009

Dynamit, Timbuktu feat Peps Persson

Lisa Milberg

May 2, 2011