HALMSTAD/HELSINKI - An old friend of Per’s, a member of Gyllene Tider, a co-writer of “Listen To Your Heart”, Mats “MP” Persson is in the spotlight again. He has written a song for the Finnish selection of Eurovision Song Contest 2004. The song, titled “Can’t Stop Loving You”, will be performed by Patrick Linman, a singer-songwriter who wrote the song together with MP. The selection will take place in January 2004.

  “I almost forgot we even sent a song to the contest,” MP told Hallandsposten. MP and Linman met each other at a seminar for people in music business that took place on a ferry traveling from Sweden to Finland. MP was there promoting new artists from Halmstad and Linman was performing as a troubador.

  Because of Finland’s bad result in 2002, the selected song must also go through the all-European semi-final on May 12 to qualify for the Eurovision Song Contest final in Istanbul on May 15. However, after bomb attacks in Turkey, there has been talks on moving the final to a safer place in Europe.

  We reported earlier that Per has been invited to write a song for the Swedish selection of Eurovision Song Contest.

• Hallandsposten article (in Swedish)
• Helsingin Sanomat article (in Finnish)
• List of songs on Finnish selection

STOCKHOLM (UPDATED) - Per Gessle will be among the celebrities donating artwork to an auction that will be held on December 1, International AIDS Awareness Day, at Folkoperan in Stockholm.

  Per, along with such other Swedish celebrities as Carolina Klüft, Ainbusk Singers, and the painter Ardy Strüwer will donate paintings. The theme of their paintings is safety.

The money raised will go to the AIDS programs at the Red Cross. Prior to the auction, the paintings can be viewed at Art Gallery on Hornsgatan in Stockholm.

  Update: Tuesday, December 2, the bidding closed. The final bid on Per’s painting was 30,000 SEK ($4,000). Click the image of the painting to see it bigger

• Aftonbladet’s story (In Swedish)
• Art Gallery
• The bids
• Aftonbladet, follow-up (In Swedish)

STOCKHOLM - This week “Mazarin” falls two spots to #16 on the official Swedish album charts. It’s still selling and the chart also confirms that “Mazarin” now has sold four times platinum (240,000 copies).

  The posters for the new DVD “En Mazarin, älskling?” also tells that “Mazarin” has sold 4 x platinum.

• The Swedish album charts via Aftonbladet

STOCKHOLM (UPDATED) - The next single off “Mazarin”, as previously reported, will be “Tycker om när du tar på mej”. Confirmed release date is Dec 10. Enjoy the tracklist:

1) Tycker om när du tar på mej - 3:25



2) Mannen med gitarr (demo 20 november 2002) - 3:15

Previously recorded by female Swedish singer Monia Sjöström.



3) Viskar (demo 30 augusti 2002) - 3:29

“Viskar” is taken from the 1986 album “Scener”.



4) Kyss från en främling (demo 18 oktober 1999) - 3:03

Recorded as “Kiss From a Stranger” by Gyllene Tider in 1984 (but not released until 1990), and also recorded by Swedish dance band Blue Light in 1985 as “Kyss från en främling”.

• Buy it at CDON.

STOCKHOLM - After an amazing consecutive 22 weeks at #1 on the Swedish radio show Svensktoppen, Per falls to #2 with “Här kommer alla känslorna”. On the other hand, “På promenad genom stan” is a newcomer at #6.

  As previously reported, “Känslorna” is on the top 5 list of longest-lasting #1s ever.

• P4 Svensktoppen (In Swedish)

(UPDATED) - The new Roxette DVD called “Ballad & Pop Hits - The Complete Video Collection” is out now, so far only in PAL format. This is the new title of the updated “All Videos Ever Made” DVD.

  Capitol Records Sweden confirms this is a worldwide release. TDR’s sources claim this DVD has better video and audio quality than the previous issue. Added to the new DVD are the two latest videos; “A Thing About You” and “Opportunity Nox”, while some of the extra material has been removed.

• Capitol Music Canada
• HMV/Amazon Canada
• CDON (EU)

Read more…

STOCKHOLM (UPDATED) - Per Gessle visited the morning show “Nyhetsmorgon” (News Morning) on Swedish TV4 today. They started with showing a full song (Sommartider) from “Sommar-Mazarin” just to show the frenzy at the gigs. The clip was in widescreen so that bodes well for the upcoming DVD. TV4 will air about one hour of goodies from the Gothenburg show on January 1.

  Per’s interview revealed not so much new. Roxette will not do anything actively during 2004, they’ll wait to see how Marie feels. Gyllene Tider’s possible tour will be decided during December. “What speaks against a tour is that ’Återtåget’ still is the biggest tour in Sweden ever, so it’s a big fall for us…” Per smiled. He added that he very much would like to tour with his old friends, There will at any rate not be another solo tour next year.

  Otherwise, Per is in the process of writing new material. And he has also painted a painting for Art Against AIDS, as previously reported.

  Per Andren, Daniel Alvedahl and Dominik Rzepka contributed to this article.

The long-time producer Clarence Öfwerman, who has worked with Roxette since the very first single, has written the music for this year’s Swedish Christmas calendar TV series. TV’s Christmas calendar is an old annual tradition for children and has a different theme or story each year. This year the series’ name is “Håkan Bråkan” and it will be broadcast every day from December 1 until Christmas Eve on SVT.

  Now it’s two weeks to the premiere and Clarence has all the music ready, at least for the first 16-17 episodes. “In the last episode there will come an aunt from space in a sleigh. I don’t know what music there should be, but I still have a couple of weeks to make up my mind,” he says.

  Making music for TV has been a new world for Clarence. “I’ve just started to realize how many people and how much technology is involved. It was also unbelievably cool to be able to go to Berwaldhallen and play with 40 strings from the Radio Symphony Orchestra.”

  Editor’s note: According to the article, Clarence’s favorite Roxette songs are “It Must Have Been You” and “You’ve Got The Look”. We hope it’s the reporter who has made the mistake.

• Nacka Värmdöposten article (in Swedish)
• SVT’s introduction to “Håkan Bråkan” (in Swedish)

STOCKHOLM (UPDATED) - Per Gessle’s live DVD, “En Mazarin, älskling?”, recorded during this summer’s “Mazarin” tour, has a definite release date now: Wednesday November 26. Per will sign his new DVD exclusively at Åhlens City in Stockholm at 5 pm that same day.

  The DVD will contain the following goodies:

01: Kung av sand

02: Vilket håll du än går

03: Gungar

04: Inte tillsammans, inte isär

05: (Hon vill ha) Puls

06: På promenad genom stan

07: Timmar av iver

08: Segla på ett moln

09: Flickan i en Cole Porter-sång

10: Jag tror du bär på en stor hemlighet

11: Småstad

12: Smakar på ett regn

13: Tända en sticka till

14: Bandpresentation

15: Här kommer alla känslorna

16: Födelsedag

17: Spegelboll

18: Juni, juli, augusti

19: Gå & fiska!

20: Om du bara vill

21: Tycker om när du tar på mej

22: Det är över nu

23: Sommartider

24: Billy

25: Ta en kaka till! - Mazarindokumentär

26: En Mazarin blir till - 33 minuter verklighet filmad av Per & hans vänner

27: Mazarin Back Stage - Följ med Per, band & Crew bakom scenen

28: Produktion - Vem har gjort vad

  The DVD (7243-5990409) features Dolby Digital 5.1 sound, 16x9 anamorphic widescreen picture, and is in PAL system, region 0.

  Update Nov 13: “En Mazarin älskling?” will also be available on VHS.

• Order the DVD at CDON (Sweden)
• CDON (EU)

STOCKHOLM - Per Gessle received the Guldapa (Golden Monkey) at the Swedish Hit Music Awards tonight. “This is my first Golden Monkey as a matter of fact,” Per commented when receiving the prize. The prize is Radio Rix’s special award for the most played artist during the year. Per once again wore all black, with a Clockwork Orange T-shirt.

  Per also won a Guldälg (Golden Moose) award for best Swedish song with “Här kommer alla känslorna.” “It’s me again,” Per said with a smile when he came back on stage. “I think ’När vi två blir en’ should have won,” he continued. Miio was also nominated in the category with their cover of Per’s Gyllene Tider song.

  Per performed “Känslorna” on the show, playback.

  The Rasmus, a group selected as the warm-up act for Roxette’s “Room Service” tour in Scandinavia, won the award for best foreign song with “In the Shadows”.

• Radio Rix (In Swedish)
• Swedish Hit Music Awards (In Swedish)