HELSINKI - Finally it has happened! Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of The Daily Roxette, Visa Kopu, has finally gotten his Tia! On Saturday, April 23, Visa and Tia tied the knot in front of 35 guests at restaurant Haikaranpesä. The venue is located 76 meters above sea level in the Haukilahti Water Tower in Espoo.

  To the sound of Roxette’s “Run to You,” they walked in: Tia wearing a beautiful champagne-colored dress with matching flowers while Visa donned a British style tuxedo with a golden cravat. The civil ceremony and vows remain somewhat of a mystery to TDR, as this reporter doesn’t speak Finnish.

  After the ceremony there was a reception with a buffet lunch consisting of cold and warm dishes and wine. The happy couple received presents of course, among them a CD with rare Roxette demos, a couple of rare Gessle DVDs, Kosta Boda glasses, Iittala silverware, bath towels, numerous other CDs and of course money.

  In the middle of the dessert an a capella group appeared and sang a few chosen bits in Finnish that seemed to be appreciated. They finished with a – to say the least – strange version of Roxette’s “How Do You Do!”.

  When the reception was over, the younger part of the assembled guests left for a bar in central Helsinki called “American Bar” where, of course, drinks were consumed.

  The bridal couple will go to Osaka, Japan on their honeymoon.



All the best to you from Lars-Erik, Judith and Thomas… and we understand Per sent personal congratulations as well!

GOTHENBURG - Per Gessle received the Lisbergsapplåd award yesterday in front of the first visitors to Gothenburg’s amusement park, which had just opened its doors for this year’s season.


  “It is a honor to receive this award. I actually didn’t know it existed,” Per said to Göteborgs Posten, “but when I saw the names of those who received the award previously, I felt very flattered.” Per also explained that Gothenburg has played an important role in his career with Gyllene Tider, Roxette and as a solo artist.

  Per is busy these days with various projects but he hesitates when it comes to revealing more. “I have a frame, an external skin that I try to fill with content. The feeling is similar to the one I had when I worked with Mazarin, something I do for my own, without compromises and much involvement. A feeling of freedom. We will see what it will result with,” he tells GP.


  Per had a bit more to say to the Official Roxette Fanclub. He explained that he’s writing in both Swedish and English and working with Clarence Öfwermann, Christoffer Lundquist (both producers of Mazarin), Jens Jansson and Helena Josefsson (who played on the Mazarin album and tour) in Christoffer’s studio, The Aerosol Grey Machine. What will this turn out to be? He doesn’t know yet.


  Per also explained that there’s nothing planned with Roxette right now and that Marie has recently bought a house in Spain, where she plans to spend a lot of her time.


  Last, but not least, there are plans to release the Gyllene Tider documentary on DVD this summer. The documentary was aired on TV4 in January and was supposed to have been released at the end of January. Per said that there will be additional material on the DVD – goodies for all Gyllene Tider fans: all the TV performances they have of GT in the ’80s, a concert from the ’80s, as well as the “Teaser Japanese” video.

• Article in Göteborgs Posten
• Article in ORFC
• Article in Göteborgs Posten II

MALMÖ - While some Swedish artists sign an open letter to stop the downloading of their work, others find Internet a fast, easy and simple way to release music.


  This is the case of Junk Music, a publishing company founded in the spring of 2004 by, among others, Christoffer Lundquist, member of Brainpool and producer of artists like Per Gessle, Gyllene Tider, Bo Sundström and Ulf Lundell.


  Yesterday Junk Musik became the first Swedish company to abandon the CD and release their first single online. The single in question is “Lady Gwendoline” by Metro Jets (David Birde and Magnus Börjeson). The song was recorded on Monday 18, mixed by Christoffer early yesterday morning and put on sale online a few hours later at the price of 10 SEK (approx. €1). Singles by Brainpool, Florian Horwath and Justin Winokur are also available via Junk Musik’s website.

• Junk Musik

STOCKHOLM (UPDATED) - Ifpi (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry) issued today an open letter that has been published in several Swedish newspapers. The purpose of the open letter is to address the copyright issues and downloading. 112 Swedish artists have signed the letter, among them Per Gessle, Göran Fritzon, Clarence Öfwerman and Lasse Lindbom.

  “For us artists it’s totally unacceptable to have a debate where the general meaning is that it is OK for people to steal records and films, or for that matter the newspaper Expressen, in a store. But somehow some leading voices think it’s OK to steal via the Internet,” reads an excerpt from the letter.

  Other artists like Håkan Hellström and Nanne Grönwall feel that an open letter from Ifpi is the wrong way to do it. They are both happy that people want to download their music and say that the music industry should try other ways. Nanne says to Expressen “This is just about the same thing like when the cassette tape arrived. The record companies blasted out that this was the death of the record industry. And it surely wasn’t.” Anders Nunstedt, pop columnist of Expressen, says that the record companies should see Internet downloading as the solution, not the problem.

• Ifpi letter PDF (In Swedish)
• Nunstedt’s column (In Swedish)

LONDON - A hospital radio station in the UK has a tentative release date for the dance single by Dancing DJs. The track is a remix of Roxette’s 1991 single “Fading Like A Flower” and is slated for release on All Around The World recordings for May 2nd.

  It is titled “Dancing DJ Vs Roxette: Fading Like A Flower 2005.”



The promo includes the following mixes:



1. Dancing DJs Mix

2. Alex K Bounce Mix

3. Hardino Mix

4. Discode Mix

5. Alex K Extended Mix

6. Hardino Radio Edit

• All Around the World
• Radio Horton

GOTHENBURG (UPDATED) - This year’s “Lisebergsapplåden” [Liseberg’s Applause] award will go to Per Gessle “because he has made Sweden a happier place in the past 25 years with his sparkling pop-pearls” says Liseberg’s marketing manager Pelle Johannisson in a note published on the amusement park’s website today.


  Per is expected to receive his award in person – a bronze sculpture of two clapping hands first created by Astri Bergman Taube in 1978 – at the Stora Scenen on April 23, the day Liseberg opens its doors for this year’s season.

  “I’ll probably show up a few days early,” says Per to GT, “as my big idol Nick Lowe performs in Gothenburg and I want to see that”. Per also confirms that he’s working on new material. “I’ve been goofing around in the studio with Clarence Öfwerman and Christoffer Lundquist. Slowly but surely we’re putting new material together,” Per says without giving any more details.

  Other winners of this award include Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson, Astrid Lindgren and Povel Ramel to name but a few.

• Liseberg Press release
• GT (In Swedish)

STOCKHOLM (UPDATED) - Per has said earlier that he’s working on a new album and now he has revealed parts of the new material. It comes as a big surprise that, instead of writing totally new songs, he has been remixing and translating the songs from his Swedish “Mazarin” album which was a huge success in Sweden in the summer of 2003.

  “I’m trying to reach wider audiences and why not use the songs that have been tested to have hit potential,” Per said to reporters in a Stockholm hotel. “This album is also a homage to ’Dance Passion’. I always loved it, but it was so underrated.”

  There’s more in common with “Dance Passion” than just the fact that it’s a remix album. Per asked the same guys who worked on the “Dance Passion” tracks to remix some of the “Mazarin” songs. “Tycker om när du tar på mej” (or “I Will Love You Forever” as it will be called) by René Hedemyr will make it onto the album. In fact, Per had plenty of remixes to choose from. “There must have been at least five different versions of every song. Only one of each were chosen for the album. Fans will love the extra material on the singles we release,” Per said laughing.

  Capitol has released an advance listening sampler CD with seven tracks (CDPRO 5110). The retail version will contain all 14 tracks from the original “Mazarin” album. Here’s the track listing on the sampler CD:

1. I’m Gonna Give You All I Can (But You Really Must Wait) (C&C remix) (Här kommer alla känslorna (på en och samma gång))
2. I Will Love You Forever (René’s 7” Mix) (Tycker om när du tar på mej)
3. We Will Be Again (Almighty 2005 Mix) (Smakar på ett regn)
4. Strolling Through the Town (Nordin Trance Mix) (På promenad genom stan)
5. Rockin’ (Slusnik Luna Vocal Anthem) (Gungar)
6. It’s My Day (Stonebridge Dub) (Födelsedag)
7. Disco Ball (Jimmy’s Guitar Mix) (Spegelboll)

The Daily Roxette wishes to remind everybody that this article was published April 1…

European group “DHT” and their cover of Roxette’s “Listen To Your Heart” has entered at number 9 on the Billboard Dance Radio Airplay charts for the week of March 19, 2005.

  This is the first Roxette-related track to feature in any American chart at any position since “Wish I Could Fly” in 2000.

• LTYH snippets

HALMSTAD - GylleneTider.se will be shut down April 1. There’s really nothing more to say. Possibly it will be back in some form later on, but nothing has been said at this point. What’s definite is that Göran Fritzon will keep the domain for now.

• Gyllene Tider (In Swedish)

STOCKHOLM (UPDATED) - Swedish musician Freddie Wadling (The Flesh Quartet, among others) will release a new album March 30. The album is called “Jag är monstret” (“I Am the Monster”), and contains songs written by other artists, like for instance Jocke Berg (Kent), Mauro Scocco and Per Gessle.

  Per’s little contribution is “Måla mitt minne” (“Paint My Memory”), a mid-tempo song written for the “Mazarin” album in November 2002, but was never fully recorded. Some of the melody is borrowed from Per’s own instrumental “View From a Bridge”, written for the opening of the Öresund bridge a few years ago.

  Titiyo sings with Freddie on this song.