The word according to Gessle
Written by tevensso on May 13, 2008 to Exclusive and Per Gessle.
STOCKHOLM - "The World According to Gessle" was released May 2, 1997, it's now back, bigger and better. At least that's what EMI and Per want us to think. Are they right? The Daily Roxette got ourselves a little chat with Per himself regarding the re-release of this, among fans, widely liked album.
So, Per, back in the lime light yet another time, this time with an old album, tell us, what's the point in releasing "The World" again?
"Well, the thing is that it wasn't available at all anymore!," says Per, quite upset. "I happened to notice this by chance at the EMI office in Stockholm and nobody could explain why it had been deleted. So I decided to put it back on the shelves, but of course with added material I know some people are interested in. Like you for instance." Per smiles and points at this reporter.
Yes, and I am very thankful for that! You've added tons and tons of demos on the second CD, and I have to say, nice ones. What made you do that? I doubt it's that common these days.
"Well, first of all I wanted to make the re-release special. So basically I just asked myself what I as a fan, would want from an album like 'The World.' And the most obvious thing to me is 'behind the scenes' -material, like the original demos for instance." explains Per and continues "If you're really into an album it's always interesting to get to know how the working process got started and so on."
On this release we're getting no less than 20 demos, of which only one has been released before, that being "June Afternoon," and that's not even counting the six B-sides from the singles that are on the first CD. The three Jonas Åkerlund videos of "Do You Wanna Be My Baby?," "Kix" and "I Want You to Know" weren't included but will be available somehow as downloads. It's not yet certain how though. Also missing is the Electronic Press Kit.
How did you feel when you went through the songs again, during the remaster? Did you still like them?
"I haven't really listened to this album for many, many years and yes, to my surprise, both Clarence - who was with me during the new mastering - and myself loved it! I can hardly remember recording it though… Just fragments, bits and pieces" smiles Per. "Don't ask me why… I remember that the basic idea was to use the Gyllene Tider-band since we just had done the very successful 'Återtåget' tour and the band sounded extremely tight at the time!! GT is still a brilliant power pop group if you ask me!!" Per is really into it now and goes on "But it only lasted for five six songs if I remember it correctly. Then Christoffer, Jens and David from Brainpool came in and changed my life forever."
Will there be another "The World" sometime?
Per looks thoughtful… "Well, these days I prefer to do my English work as the soothing sunny Son of a Plumber. But hell yes, someday I'll make the definitive ultra-catchy-power-pop-guitars-skweeked-to-13-sort-of-record! It would be nice. I have it in my system somewhere. It pops up every other Saturday night when I make silly dance moves."
We've all been there Per, no need to feel bad.
Reading the dates on the demos one realizes you recorded several of them during the Återtåget tour, how do you find the time?
"To my (and to my family's) surprise I always seem to unwind from the crazy tour schedules writing new songs…" Per says with an amazed frown. "I don't know why, it's always been like that. Maybe I get bored playing basically the same songs every night. I need new blood in my system… new stories, new truths, new lies."
Good for the fans of course! Going back a bit though, would it be fair to call "The World" almost a Gyllene Tider album? I mean in the book "Att vara Per Gessle" you mention that it started out almost like a GT project, but you got tired of it.
"Well, hmmm, no" says Per and shakes his head. "Like I said before I only wanted to use the lads as backing musicians, I felt songs like 'Stupid,' 'Do You Wanna Be My Baby?,' 'Reporter,' 'Elvis in Germany' and 'T-T-T-Take It!' would fit this beautiful combo perfectly. Just the way it worked recording Roxette's 'June Afternoon' with these guys. But I was only partly right. Like I said, after a while we ran out of freash ideas."
Too bad. What can you tell us about the future for Per Gessle, Gyllene Tider and Roxette? What are your plans? GT30 and PG 50 are coming up around the bend…
"Well, currently I'm very pleased to be involved in Tomas Alfredson's movie 'Låt den rätte komma in.' It's a brilliant flick and will kick ass everywhere. Otherwise, there's nothing I can talk about at this point but you know me… there's always something waiting around the corner" Per says with a grin on his face.
Our time with Per Gessle is over for now and we'll leave him and his corner. Until next time.
The album was released May 9 in Germany and will be released May 14 in Sweden.
Other articles with the same topic
- Roxette live in Kazan: the set list (February 28, 2011)
- Roxette's Charm School World Tour is underway... with extension planned! (February 28, 2011)
- Per makes another mixed tape (February 25, 2011)
- Plans for Roxette in Canada seem to be coming together (February 13, 2011)
- Happy birthday, Per (January 12, 2011)
32 comments
tevensso (moderator) said on May 13, 2008 22:27:
He he, sorry, my bad. Too tired to edit this kind of thing at this hour. That was BAD! Changed it to what it should’ve been. :)
CRIZ said on May 13, 2008 22:33:
Thanx for the interview!!
“ultra-catchy-power-pop-guitars-skweeked-to-13-sort-of-record!” ...I missed such wordconstructions! :D LOL Per at his best.
So the re-release was already released here in Germany on May 9th....and stupid me..I ordered it from SWEDEN?????????? *sigh* So Per..sorry..no german charts-entry-support from me this time.
realsugar said on May 13, 2008 23:02:
Yeah me too. I ordered my copies from sweden... I cannot wait to hear it!
7-Twenty-7 said on May 13, 2008 23:44:
There’s nothing to comment at all. But was TWATG so hard to get these days? I don’t think so!
gyllene_tjej said on May 14, 2008 06:50:
“I just asked myself what I as a fan, would want from an album like ’The World.’ And the most obvious thing to me is ’behind the scenes’ -material, like the original demos for instance.”
Thanks Per, and please keep that in mind releasing any forthcoming productions... That is what we, the fans really long for ( I’m almost done with the where-have-all-the-demos-gone RoxBox groaning, lol)
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Gessle: Det spelar ingen roll vad som skrivs, bara bilden är bra :D
carbon_boy said on May 14, 2008 07:05:
God, I love this man!!! If only I was half as witty and talented as MrG..... *sigh* at least it makes for interesting reading. ;o) Cant wait for my CD to arrive!!!!
Sascha said on May 14, 2008 07:25:
Thanx for this interview! Per sounds quite promising, great that he’s still love for guitar-driven powerpop. :-D
Roxerally said on May 14, 2008 08:09:
Great album Per, a real must have for the fans! Loving all the demo’s! :)
CRIZ said on May 14, 2008 11:13:
Well, to be honest I’m not extremely enthusiastic about demos. It’s nice and interesting to get to know how a song gets born but nothing more. The real finished songs are better. But well, Per if you read this : Keep on searching for some hidden jewels. Maybe you also find the coverversion you and Marie recorded loooooong time ago from “Itchycoo Park” by the Small Faces? I listened to some old Radiointerviews from my tape-archive recently and there you mentioned this cover you recorded during the Look Sharp sessions. I think it was in an interview from 1991-1992 somewhere in Australia...I don’t remember now. :)
..Hmmpf...the postman didn’t bring anything today....:(
pwbbounce (moderator) said on May 14, 2008 13:18:
I can’t wait to get my hands on this CD!! Hurry up and come!!
It’s sounds great!
@CRIZ - I remember that about Itchycoo Park as well. It was on a local radio station here, and Per introduced it and then the Small Faces version got played. A few weeks later, they were on again and this time it was Tom Petty’s Refugee! That made me go out and buy a Greatest Hits by Tom Petty!! he he
The good old days!!
SunnyB said on May 14, 2008 13:49:
as i’m writin’ this i’m listening to the “june afternoon”-track on the cd
damn! (pardon my language) the songs are soooo GREAT!
wieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
ok back to the cd now ^_^
royalball said on May 14, 2008 16:16:
I thought the article was fine! I think there’s been worse. Like reading articles of the anniversary of “Joyride” single, or some other single etc...etc...uh..so boring. I know if I were the one to submit an article on some anniversary on a single, or album it wouldn’t even be put on TDR...hmmm. I’m in no hurry to get this CD though, I already have the CD and some of those demos when they were B-sides. If it was a Per Gessle video collection that would be a different story.
It’s too bad though that Per doesn’t make albums anymore like TWATG. I guess it just means he’s getting old. It’s hard for me to get into the SOAP stuff. I only hear a couple, or a few SOAP songs and that’s it. I used to get excited whenever Per had something new to release but not anymore. But for the person who doesn’t have TWATG I think they’ll be happy with this CD! It really is some of Per’s best work!
Nixie said on May 14, 2008 20:11:
To some surprise I actually found this new CD today in my local Åhléns shop and of course bought it right away. Now I’m listening for the first time, and the demos are great!
A funny little detail is the typo on the back of the CD cover - an *acoustisc* version of Makin’ Love To You. :-)
TheRain1981 said on May 14, 2008 22:40:
A typo from EMI? The shock! It amazes me how some of their stuff makes it to the presses. I suppose nobody double checks the spelling. Anyhow, I’m looking forward to buying this release if I can find it somewhere.
gyllene_tjej said on May 15, 2008 06:13:
lol, do EMI faults still surprise anyone? Not me..
I am still waiting for my copy, did not want to listen to the stuff from any other source than my own CD. Good things come to those who wait, or what do you say?
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Gessle: Det spelar ingen roll vad som skrivs, bara bilden är bra :D
CRIZ said on May 15, 2008 11:26:
You are so right gyllene_tjej-mouse. The postman was again very lazy today....I hope that my package didn’t get lost.
The wrong spelling?? Well to me it sounds like a lovely mix between swedish and english...acoustisc....akustisk ?? Svengelska?? Sweet if you ask me! ;)
PiterPam said on May 15, 2008 17:30:
I like the Demos very lot.
Especially “Everyday outside my window” and “Makin´love to you” are quite nice. For me, this versions are much better than the Rox-versions( but i like them too). And MLTY had such a great potencial...
And the Main Album has some different sounds too. Very nice to listen to it again.
7-Twenty-7 said on May 15, 2008 23:18:
Both “Everyday Outside My Window”and “Beautiful Things, Terrible Things” suck, in my humble opinion. I am glad they received ’Marie-treatment’, somehow. They improved a lot (’BT, TT’ was bore originally).
Demos don’t excite me. So I won’t buy this CD until the typo in the back-artwork is fixed, in a future re-re-re-re-release. I can live without it!
Jud (moderator) said on May 16, 2008 06:06:
Finally some crashing guitars! Even if it’s just a re-release, this is the most exciting release from Per’s corner in the last years (actually ... since 1997 ;-)) for me!
The other one was GT 04, even though it wasn’t the best GT ever, I finally managed to see them live! :-D
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Marie Fredriksson Online
Be strong, speak true
PiterPam said on May 16, 2008 13:40:
@7twenty7
How can you say, that both songs sucks without listening to it? This 30sec snippets doesn´t show the whole song.
I like to hear Demos. You can listen to the progress. Best example ist “Elvis in Germany”. And i like the BT, TT-demo too. Not so good as the albumtrack. But it´s a completely different version, that makes it so interesting.
And Per´s “Everyday”-version has a very catchy melody. Same style as “I wanna be with you”. Roxette´s version has interesting sounds in the background, but the whole song is a bit to boring for me.
7-Twenty-7 said on May 16, 2008 14:31:
@ PiterPam:
I’ve listened to both songs, entirely, not only the snippets. And in my opinion, the demos are bad, they can’t be even compared with the versions we already had. BT. TT sucks, it’s a sleeping pill!
’Elvis in Germany’ demo is better than the album version? Come on, it’s almost the same, I’d say 85%!
Robbie said on May 16, 2008 14:38:
I am very happy with this re-release. The best song out of the unheard ones in my opinion is “Elvis In Deutschland”, I really like the melody, a romantic one which doesn’t fit the lyrics though, but it’s my No.1.
Besides I am keen on:
“Beautiful Things, Terrible Things”
“Be Anyone You Wanna Be” (Demo)
Making Love To You
Everyday Outside My Window
Detective Jones
PiterPam said on May 17, 2008 09:59:
@7twent7
No, I like the albumversion of “Elvis” more. I just wanted to say, that with the 2 demos of Elvis you can hear the progress in producing that song. “Elvis in Deutschland” is younger than the “Elvis in Germany” Demo. Almost same lyrics, but totally other melody. But the albumversion sounds like the first demo from ´94 (Elvis in D ´96). So it seems that Per wasn´t so happy with the ´96 version.
That makes demos so special, especially when they sound totally different to the albumversions.
CRIZ said on May 17, 2008 14:27:
Oh...wow..the swedish post needed 5 days..that has been better before..anyway, I just became a big fan of “Every day outside my window”. “Every day” with Marie got toooo sad I think.
purplemedusa said on May 18, 2008 16:01:
On the topic of Brian Wilson, wonder what Mr Gee’s thoughts are re: “Smile” (2003).
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Album of the week “The Smiths - STRANGEWAYS”
rossyrox said on May 19, 2008 13:09:
Is it just me that can’t tell the original tracks have been remastered? They (especially stupid) still have a muffled sound.
Maybe it’s my ears!
AURYTE said on June 2, 2008 05:31:
And poor me still haven’t got the album. But I’ll give myself this present when all my exams are over!
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I wish you the best there is before you go to sleep
roxtexanet said on May 13, 2008 22:19:
Sure liked the sound of these quotes:
“But hell yes, someday I’ll make the definitive ultra-catchy-power-pop-guitars-skweeked-to-13-sort-of-record!”
“Otherwise, there’s nothing I can talk about at this point but you know me… there’s always something waiting around the corner” Per smiles grimly.”
(Although I’m not sure what to make of a ’grim’ smile following that comment...!)
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