Örnsberg is the work of Johan Ragnarsson. His first album, Redlinespotting, will be available in April on the London based label Perfectly Charming Records. This track is off that forthcoming record and it nicely blends anthemic pop with electronic touches.
The Swedish tunes are flooding in and I see no reason to wait `til tomorrow to share with you this perfect pop song from Love Lindblom. I’m told this is the first single from an upcoming ep from Love Lindblom. The debut album will follow this summer.
I’m a real sucker for catchy music like this that builds and builds into a frenetic climax. I love when the horns kick in. I love the diy nature of the video, you just know he asked all his friends to help out. In short I think I Love Lindblom.
Video for “Till min syster”
Sometimes remixes take away a little too much from the original song. In the case of this remix of the new single from Cloetta Paris I think Alex Dynamite added too much of his own sound and took away too much of Cloetta’s vocals and presence. Nonetheless, a new song by Cloetta Paris is something to celebrate. This remix is from the single release You and Me by the Stereo on Tabocco Records.
You and Me by the Stereo (Alex Dynamite Remix)
The other day I went off on aging pop stars attempting to connect with teens through music that is base and exploitative. The post revolved around a song/video by Oh No Miriam! called “Teenage Love”. Well now here’s another song by a teenager entitled “Teenage Love”. The band in question is basically a 16 year old Stockholm kid that goes by the name of Sandstream. This is the first single by the group (the Myspace page went live 4 days ago) and it is a duet with a mysterious female singer.
The song starts out with a robotic introduction but this is not Daft Punk electro trash. Instead it’s melodious electro-pop with its roots in English dance pop of the 80′s and 90′s (Depeche Mode, Cure, Echo and the Bunneymen etc etc). The duet is one of the elements of the song that sets it apart, the other is the earnest vocals of the male lead singer. Let me know what you think of this in the comments…I’m going to leave this post up for a day or two to let this settle in.
It’s funny that teens look to singers years, if not decades, older than them for guidance. How, for instance, has Madonna and her team of aging songwriters anything of relevance to say to young people. Even the American idol teen sensations have a team of managers, agents, and assistants around them at all time stifling any type of normal teenage life.
On the other hand you have Oh no Miriam! documenting the real trials and tribulations of growing up. I wrote about Miriam’s music here first. And now “Teenage Love” now comes with a nice little lofi video.
Teenage Love (via Letters Have No Arms)
“Teenage Love” video
You can get pretty jaded pretty fast doing a music blog. The daily deluge of PR emails, lame band recommendations and mp3 links is truly astounding. So it was refreshing to barely get an email that didn’t really contain an mp3 of the debut single off of Rena Rama first record. See, Rasmus Ek from the band acknowledged that he was crap with computers and didn’t know if the file he sent was an mp3 or not. It wasn’t (it was a goddamn .wma file). Anyway I converted it to an mp3, but that’s besides the point. The point is that here’s a band that has made the music first and foremost and not the marketing and promotion. You won’t hear about them on any other site, but this song is simply drop dead gorgeous.
“Klass 6B” is hard to quantify or pigeonhole. It’s very rhythmic without being over come with electronic beats. It’s very joyous too, but I expect the lyrics aren’t all sunshine and puppy dogs. Rasmus sites influences as diverse as Timbuktu (Swedish hip-hop artist), Laleh, Maia Hirasawa and The Beatles. But there’s clearly a touch of jazz and perhaps some Eastern European folk in “Klass 6b”. Add to that the children’s voices in the background, an umpa umpa tuba, a catchy sing-along section, and a muted trumpet and you have the Swedish song of the new year.
The band is unsigned out of Stockholm and is preparing to release their self-titled debut on January 27 with a release party and show that night at Debaser Slussen.
The San Marinos wrote the other day with an update and 2 new songs. They’re to be looking for a cheap place to record their lofi songs in a slightly more hifi way. So if you know of a great cheap studio in the Stockholm area give them a jingle on their MySpace page but let me just say I love them them just the way they are. Of course, if they had true production values I could easily see their music coming out in a nice The Beautiful South shape.
Anyway these two songs are perfect twee pop: the lilting vocals, wistful themes, simple beats and romantic ideas all add up to form the ideal indie pop tune.
I’ll give you one of these new songs today. But if you beg and plead in the comments section I’ll add the second one tomorrow.
P.S. Songs:Illinois has had three great days of music with posts about Willie Nelson, Ramblin Jack Elliott and Phil Lee.
While everyone else was trying to figure out how to sell digital music Songs I Wish I Had Written circumvented the problem entirely and instead is giving the music away but selling the devise the music was created on. In this case it’s the ancient instrument known as the musical box. Here’s the email I received this morning:
Before Christmas, we published a mini-album with Moto Boy, which has a very atmospheric and genuine aura about it and we thought that now is the time to do something more.
This is where the musical box arrive. It’s a nineteenth century invention and produces sounds by the use of a set of pins placed on a revolving cylinder so as to strike the tuned teeth of a steel com. It has an amazing sound and attraction.
In true Songs I Wish spirit we give away the music digitally and charge for the manufactured gadget. So $0 for MP3 and $25 for a totally unique musical box!
Buy the Moto Boy musical box here.
The Malmo based garage rockers Babian are about to release their record Fullproppad, Listtoppad, Livrädd & Uppstoppad. This is the first single from it. It’s super catchy regardless of the language you speak. Of course as with much of the music on Swedesplease you’ll only hear it here first. Enjoy!
Pre-order the new record here.
“Ja Sa Ja” video
Here’s a little end of the day nugget courtesy of Youtube of Oskar Schönning Trio performing last month at the Lilla Hotellbaren in Hotel Scandic Malmen in Stockholm. Oskar is also in the Loney, Dear band but I’m guessing this is wear his true heart lies. Looks like a great little club and the trio is burning up. Enjoy!
Don’t let the out of phase intro to “Discoliner” throw you off. When that gives way to actual beats, robotic vocals, and sampled chants of la, la, la, la, la, this song really takes off. This comes off a free digital album called Music For Men from the young Swedish trio Stay Ali and is available from the Italian netlabel Signorafranca here now (makes a nice bookend with that Val Venosta post from yesterday).
All of my carping about the greatness of the Swedish electronic duo Val Venosta has paid off with an exclusive sneak peak of their upcoming EP Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Wolf.
“I Think Billy Wilder Would Like This” expands on the earlier songs of Val Venosta. The robotic synthesized vocals and thumping beats are still present but now the melody is a little more present and the indecipherable chorus is pushed to the front of the song. All in all a great song to get 2009 off on the right foot.
I Think Billy Wilder Would Like This!
P.S. Songs:Illinois is back with an exclusive first listen to a track from the Brooklyn based gypsy punk group Luminscent Orchestrii here.
When you write 600 or so music blog posts a year it’s sometimes hard to find a way to single one out as something special. Luckily I have another platform or two when I think something is truly deserving. So today’s band/song will both appear on Songs:Illinois and be part of this month’s upcoming M.A.P. post. I can’t say enough good things about the Swedish pop band The Bridal Shop. I think they perfectly meld the sounds of electronic pop of the 80′s with shoegaze of the 90′s and indie from the 00′s. In other words they’re the complete package.
Their Peruvian label (I know that’s kind of a weird locale for a Swedish group) deserves kudos as well for releasing some of the best indie pop this side of Cloudberry. This song is from the band’s Plastilina Records mini album called In Fragments coming out in February of 2009.
The Ideal State (originally released on a Happy Robots’ compilation)
Bonus
If you speak Swedish you’ll have better luck with this press release than I did.
Hanna Hirsch kommer från Stockholm och har sedan 2004 gett ut tre sjutummare. Tala svart är deras debutalbum. Musiken bär på en desperation, ett vemod och en iver som är besläktad med band som Tant Strul och Modern Lovers. Själva säger sig Hanna Hirsch vara influerade av Blondie och Discharge. Även om Hanna Hirsch är sprungna ur en punkscen kan Tala svart snarare betraktas som en popskiva, med texter som skär djupa sår. Detta är livsviktig musik.
”Så vilket vapen skulle du välja; en motorsåg eller en pistol, en gaffel, en sked, en smörkniv, en papperskant, en hårborste, eller en kudde. Välj kudden, så blir jag av med dig.”
However if you are like me and don’t read/speak a speck of Swedish you’re better off listening to these two songs off of Hanna Hisch’s new record Tala Svart. I wrote about the band here first.
If Ida Marie hadn’t been polished up like a diamond and packaged like the next big thing she’d be lucky to sound a little like this.
One of the leaders (Wailin’ Henry) of the band Strayfolk has a song in an upcoming Swedish language film. I’m a big fan of Strayfolk so I was happy to hear of this new development. Here’s the song “The Water” from the film The Gun.
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The big Swedish Christmas mix update is down at the bottom of this link.
Ghostpony have sent me another track from what must be their new EP. It’s as funky as the earlier stuff I posted here.
P.S. I’ve added Metro Jets “Jingle Jangle Christmas” to the Swedesplease Christmas mix.
Matti Bye creates stirring music suitable for film soundtracks that combines Swedish folk with all sorts of other influences. His new release is on the independent Swedish label Rotor Records. I haven’t written about much instrumental music like this on Swedesplease. In fact besides the experimental electronic music I can only think of one other instrumental (non-jazz) group that I’ve written about – and that is Detektivbyran. The music from Matti Bye is a distant cousin to that.
The song Departure starts out melodic enough but by the end it peaks in a dissonant crescendo that rivals modern day punk music.
You can buy his new record Drömt here or here.
Uppbrott (Departure)
P.S. Two new songs added today to the Swedish Christmas mix here.
Besides the very basics (pop songs in Swedish) I’m at a loss to describe these two new songs released by Stockholm based Vesper Records. The record label itself is an enigma to me with a hodgepodge of styles represented on their roster including singer-songwriter and Swedish reggae. So it’s hard for me to get a handle of these songs for that reason, as well as that both are sung in Swedish. Both songs are soaring pop and both are from the artist’s debut records due out in early 2009.
The new EP from My Darling You! on Luxury Records is delayed `til February, but for now let’s take a look back at some of their output through the years.
It’s a pretty compelling catalog even if I didn’t always go along for the ride.
More than I thought you were capable of
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I don’t want to put too much into this point but one of the things I find heartening about this video is the fact that Annika is so accessible. Here’s a woman that a whole generation of girls in Sweden look up to and she is as normal/dorky/plain/beautiful as the girl next door. Instead of hiring dancers she gets four of her friends to help with the video. That has to say something about the culture in Sweden and even more so about the culture of hollywood/major label stars/nashville here in the states.
“X Telling Me About The Loss Of Something Dear, At Age 16″
