The current issue of Billboard magazine reports that McDonalds restaurants has once again signed a deal to distribute inexpensive CDs, and mentions that the last time this was done, EMI was the partner with Roxette and Garth Brooks involved. Regular music retailers were furious with the arrangement.

This time around, there will be various compilations — including one from Jive with N’Sync and Britney Spears.

The former head of EMI in the States, who now is a principal in a recording industry finance company, was involved in putting this marketing deal together.

The cover picture of the new greatest hits album for the US market has been revealed on the Internet. The picture was included on a music industry advertisement which is currently on sale at eBay auctions site (someone has simply cut it out of a trade magazine)

This new greatest hits album is a revised version of the 1995 compilation “Don’t Bore Us, Get To The Chorus!” and it’s scheduled for release on September 26 in the United States.

While difficult to see in this “thumbnail” form, Marie is shown holding two “crystal balls” that show the faces of both Per and Marie.

The Swedish TV4 is working on a documentary on Marie’s summer tour. Footage for the film has been shot at least in the Halmstad concert, where they filmed Marie’s performance and the audience and interviewed fans. The documentary is due to be broadcasted in autumn. (Thanks to Mari!)

• TV4

Judith, the organizer of the successful campaign to get Marie on tour, has together with James (of Gun-Marie Guys and Gals fame) started a new petition. This time fans can leave messages to Marie for a live compilation, either on CD or on video/DVD. This new campaign has already been mentioned in many Swedish newspapers.

The site also contains article clippings and pictures from Marie’s ongoing tour.

• MF ƒntligen Tour Special

Roxette’s first American single in the better part of a decade, “Wish I Could Fly” has already earned its first honor.

Billboard’s online radio named the single its “Pick To Click” for its broadcast ending the week of July 22nd. The “Pick To Click” is awarded to songs that the Billboard magazine editors feel have the best chance to make it to the top of the charts.

Radio personality Chuck Taylor said of Roxette, “We love ’em around here” and that Roxette is “ready to re-conquer America.”

The mention comes about 28 minutes into the broadcast.

• Billboard Radio

Friday evening Marie had the second concert of her summer tour, this time in Roxette’s “home town”, Halmstad. About 5,000 people packed their picnic baskets and went to Brottet where Marie had a magnificient gig.

The evening’s big surprise were her special guests, Per Gessle and Mats “MP” Persson. They played Gyllene Tider’s “Kung av sand” together and then Per and Marie performed an acoustic version of the Roxette hit “Listen To Your Heart”.

In Halmstad, Marie ended her concert with “Så skimrande var aldrig havet” and with the words “I hope it won’t take 8 years again before the next time”.

• Hallandposten’s Swedish article

Judith Seuma, the webmaster of tro.roxette.org got a message from the Swedish reporter Cecilia Parkert who wrote an article about Marie’s tour in Metro. Here’s the message:

Hello Judith

 

What Marie said was that her fans mean a lot to her and that she’s read messages from fans at site on the Internet. The fans “demanded” that she’d go on tour in Sweden and this was what made her make up her mind.

 

Plus the fact that she really wanted to go.

 

She also said that some of her foreign fans send letters to her in Swedish. She is amazed that people abroad actually look up the words in her texts and learn a new language that way.

 

She hoped that some of her foreign fans would be able to come to Sweden to see her on tour. And, according to the newspapers here, part of the audience is from abroad.

 

Hope this is what you wanted to know

 

Cecilia Parkert

reporter, FLT

Judith’s site first hosted the petition to get Marie on tour and now hosts an unofficial guide for Marie’s summer tour.

• Metro’s Swedish article

“You can see that she loves her job and she really infected the people with her enthusiasm,” Måns Ivarsson writes in Expressen. He rates Marie’s live performance 3 out of 5.

Ivarsson says that Marie is a brilliant singer, but her lyrics don’t catch. He thinks it may be that Marie is more of a women’s thing.

“Her repertoire has a couple of pearls, but musically is pretty much only 80s’ nonsense. It sounds like she’s found a mixture of bands from 1985: Bangles, Fleetwood Mac, U2. Skillful, but lifeless sound.” Ivarsson thinks that the fast-tempo material is clearly the best, but ballads sound old and indifferent. “What saved the show was Marie herself and her charisma.”

According to Ivarsson, Marie’s show was 90-minute long compilation of 16 hits. In the middle of her show she had a solo performance with only her and a grand piano. The show was ended with “Äntligen” and “Den sjunde vågen”.

• Expressen’s Swedish article

Marie’s tour started yesterday evening in the Borgholm castle ruins. It was rainy, but 3,900 people still wanted to see Marie live in this exceptional outdoor venue, familiar to many Roxette fans from the “Listen To Your Heart” and “Dangerous” videos.

“I was really nervous about the bad weather - what if people wouldn’t come at all. It’s been eight years since my last solo tour and I got a wonderful response from the brave audience,” Marie says in Expressen.

Marie’s one-and-a-half hour concert got 2 out of 5 stars in Aftonbladet. “She is so good,” Per Bjurman writes. “But unfortunately: she is so uninteresting.”

• Expressen’s Swedish article
• Aftonbladet’s Swedish article

Read more…

The Swedish newspaper Metro has an interview with Marie who is preparing to leave on her summer tour. The tour begins today in Borgholm.

“My fans launched a website where people could write messages to me,” Marie tells. “There were people from South America, USA, England and other countries who wrote that I ’must go on tour in Sweden’. And that’s what made me to do it. This tour is for my fans.”

The compilation album “Äntligen” has already sold over 170,000 copies. “It’s fantastic. In fact, I haven’t fully understood it yet. It’s an enormous number of records these days when the record sales in general are reducing, partly because of the Internet. It feels like this is the album that many people have been longing for,” says Marie.

Marie’s previous solo tour was in 1992 with only indoor venues. This summer tour will consist of only outdoor venues, but for Marie it’s routine after Roxette’s huge world tours. “I’m used to perform in big arenas where you have to be prepared to stand out,” she says.

Marie’s band on the tour will be Mikael Bolyos, Staffan Astner, Christer Jansson, Mats Persson, Frank Ådahl and Katarina Millton.

• Metro’s Swedish article (nice pic!)
• Metro’s page in PDF (requires Acrobat Reader)