News Archives: May 2000
Per: “Now we just hope that fans still remember us”
Written by roxeteer on May 31, 2000 to Misc.
According to Aftonbladet, Roxette’s record deal for the USA is not signed yet, but it will be in the next few days. Per and Marie are very enthusiastic, even though Roxette hasn’t released an album in the States since 1994, mostly because of problems with EMI’s US branch.
Things started to get worse in 1991 when “grunge guru” Gary Gersh became EMI USA’s chief. “After that it was only grunge and Beastie Boys that mattered,” says Per in Expressen. “We did all that we could to have EMI USA not release our greatest hits compilation in 1995.”
Now a revised compilation will be released by small record label Edel America and Per is very optimistic. “The US market is very conservative. In England, it’s impossible to be an ’80s band and make a comeback. But if you’ve had hits in the US, you get respect,” he said. And hits Roxette has made: 13 out of 16 songs on their greatest hits compilation have been on the US chart.
“Now we just hope that the fans in the US still remember us,” says Per in Aftonbladet.
According to Expressen, a new Roxette album will be released internationally in March 2001.
Roxette Video Collection on MTV Brazil
Written by administrator on May 30, 2000 to Misc.
This weekend, MTV Brazil will show a Roxette Video Collection! There was a poll on their site to choose
which artists’ videos would be shown this month. Roxette was one of the acts that received the most votes. Their Video Collection will be broadcast on Sunday at 10pm and reprised next Tuesday at 9am.
Per writing music for bridge opening
Written by tevensso on May 30, 2000 to Misc.
Per Gessle has been commissioned to write a musical piece for the opening of the Öresundsbron (Öresund Bridge) on July 1st. The bridge connects Sweden with Denmark, and includes a lower level for trains. The one-way toll for a car will cost 275 SEK while the train will cost between 70 and 140 SEK.
- Kulturbro (Culture Bridge) (There is also a biennial for art, music and culture, opening on September 15th.)
Marie knocked down from #1
Written by roxeteer on May 29, 2000 to Misc.
Marie’s greatest hits compilation “Äntligen - Bästa [1984-2000]” has dropped down to 3rd place on the Swedish album chart. Britney Spears’ new album went straight to #1 and the compilation of the songs heard in the Eurovision Song Contest went up from 9th place to 2nd place.
Marie’s album was continuously #1 for 7 weeks.
Edel America Records – Roxette’s new label in the US
Written by roxeteer on May 29, 2000 to Misc.
Roxette has finally found a suitable record company to release their material in the USA. Instead of choosing a giant like Sony or Warner, Per and Marie have reached an agreement with a smaller company called Edel America Records, whose parent, Edel Records, is based in Germany.
“We wouldn’t be an important artist for Sony or Warner. But for Edel, we are. We’ll get the highest priority there,” Per and Marie report in an interview published by Hallandsposten.
This new deal is the reason for the delay in the production of the new Roxette album. The album was supposed to be released in the autumn, but is now postponed until February 2001. Then it will be released world-wide — including the USA.
“Have A Nice Day” won’t be released in the US at all. However, Edel will release an updated version of the “Don’t Bore Us - Get To The Chorus” compilation in the autumn. The new version will contain “Wish I Could Fly” and “Stars” from “Have A Nice Day”.
Ten songs recorded for new album
Written by roxeteer on May 29, 2000 to Misc.
Roxette has recorded ten songs so far for their new album. Five more will be recorded when the studio sessions begin again in mid-September. Of those songs, 12 will be chosen for the album.
Clarence Öfwerman and Christoffer Lundquist are still in Roxette’s band. A new face is Jimmy Monell from April Tears. According to Per, “he’s 22 years old and comes from another world,” he’s new to studio working and brings in fresh ideas.
Whether or not there will be a world tour depends on the sales figures. “Touring has two sides. It changes one’s life a lot for a period of time, but it also gives satisfaction to frustrated fans who think that we never ’show’ ourselves to them,” Per says. “You have to ask yourself if it’s worth it — especially now when both me and Marie have a family.”
Gyllene Tider will re-release their first album to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the original release date. There are no plans to bring Gyllene Tider back on stage this summer. “Then there would be no audience for Marie…” Per grins. “But seriously, next time Gyllene Tider is on stage, we must have something new and fresh with us.”
This summer, Per will be spending time with his wife Åsa and son Gabriel in their luxury house in Sandhamn, Halmstad.
Per speaks about HAND’s lack of success
Written by roxeteer on May 29, 2000 to Misc.
“Have A Nice Day” wasn’t as big a success as Roxette had hoped. The album has so far sold “only” 1.9 million copies. Per thinks there are several reasons for this.
“Looking back, I think now that the album feels a bit uneven,” says Per. “And, we simply chose the wrong single tracks.” Per thinks that “Wish I Could Fly” was a good choice, but the second single “Anyone” wasn’t. “Ballads traditionally are not very strong summer singles.”
“It was the English EMI that had pressure on us — against the wish from the European headquarters — to release ’Anyone’ as the second single. And that’s what we did. But when it flopped, England didn’t want to release it at all.”
Marie’s birthday today!
Written by roxeteer on May 29, 2000 to Misc.
Gun-Marie Fredriksson, born in Össjö on May 30, 1958, celebrates her birthday today.
Happy birthday to Marie from The Daily Roxette and all her fans!
Marie ready to hit the road
Written by roxeteer on May 28, 2000 to Misc.
Swedish web portal World Online has a short article about Marie’s summer tour. Marie tells once more how nice it is to tour in Sweden and to sing her Swedish songs live again. The tour premiere is on July 12 in Borgholm castle, familiar to those who have seen “Listen To Your Heart” and “Dangerous” videos. According to the article, Marie has a 7-person band backing her up on the tour.
HAND message board in new location
Written by roxeteer on May 28, 2000 to Misc.
The address of the www.haveaniceday.nu message board has changed. The link on the site has not yet been updated.
Marie concert tickets readily available, no “sold out” shows
Written by roxeteer on May 24, 2000 to Misc.
EMA Telstar spokesperson Agneta Christiernin told TDR today that none of Marie’s summer tour concerts have been sold out yet. According to Christiernin, this may be due to the fact that the venues are so large, capable of holding from 5,000 to 20,000 people. Christiernin believes that ticket sales won’t speed up until mid-June. At the moment, there are no guest stars booked for the tour. “But [we] will see about that at the end of June when the rehearsals have started,” said Christiernin.
Solve the mystery of the parody
Written by roxeteer on May 23, 2000 to Misc.
A site for solving the mystery of the creators of “Do You Want Fries With That?” parody has been launched. At the site — which is called Spywebs — you can discuss with other curious people and vote for a suspect.
Roxette’s Spanish studio on the Web
Written by roxeteer on May 22, 2000 to Misc.
El Cortijo, the studio located in Marbella, Spain, where Roxette recorded most of the “Have A Nice Day” album, has opened its own website. The pages contain pictures of the beautiful studio house from both outside and inside. On the website, you can also find recipes of the dishes typically served in El Cortijo.
Roxette included in U.S. broadcast of World Music Awards
Written by Lars-Erik_Olson on May 22, 2000 to Misc.
An ABC spokesperson confirmed today that Roxette’s performance of “Wish I Could Fly” will be included when they broadcast the World Music Awards program on Monday, May 29. This will be the first time — other than in old music videos — that Roxette has appeared on U.S. television in many years!
The people behind the parody respond
Written by roxeteer on May 21, 2000 to Misc.
A couple of days ago TDR reported on the Do You Want Fries With That? parody site. The big question since then has been, “Who are the people behind all this?”
It may be that the question won’t be answered — at least not yet. TDR sent an interview request to their mysterious Hotmail address and got two different replies. It seems that there is a loosely connected group of people behind this, probably located in more than one country. Most of the work, however, was done by only two people. Most likely these two are the people who answered my message.
Roxette.org closed for maintenance
Written by roxeteer on May 21, 2000 to Misc.
The Roxette.org designers have closed their site in order to to make improvements to the service. The site will be online again in 2-3 weeks.
Do You Want Fries With That?
Written by roxeteer on May 18, 2000 to Misc.
Did you know that Roxette has already made their new album’s website public? No?!? Me neither.
The “new album” is called “Do You Want Fries With That?” and it won’t be found in the Roxette section of any record store…
This website contains a fierce parody of Roxette and their material. Don’t get offended!
- Do You Want Fries With That? (Parody site)
Halmstad is the city of the rich
Written by roxeteer on May 18, 2000 to Misc.
According to Halmstad’s local newspaper Hallandsposten, every 35th inhabitant of Per’s home town earns more than 1 million SEK (approx. 110,000 USD) per year. The figures are taken from the latest tax statistics in Sweden which are from the year 1998. The person who earned the most was company owner Svante Berger, whose annual earnings were 206 million SEK (22.5 million USD). Per Gessle is #7 on the list.
An interesting fact is that there are still more unemployed people (2,605) in Halmstad than millionaires (2,475).
US compilation album to be released in August
Written by roxeteer on May 17, 2000 to Misc.
According to an answer on haveaniceday.nu’s “Ask Per” section, Roxette will be releasing a new compilation album in the States this August. Unfortunately, this also means that the “Have A Nice Day” album won’t be released in the US at all. However, Per says that some songs from “Have A Nice Day” might turn up on the new compilation album.
Cows love “The Look”
Written by roxeteer on May 17, 2000 to Misc.
Roxie has informed us on the Roxette Mailing List about this very… err… impressive site called The Dancing Cow Page. Some of you may think that this is just a rip-off of the classic Hampster Dance site, but this one has a major improvement… Well, listen to it yourself!
World Music Awards results announced
Written by roxeteer on May 11, 2000 to Misc.
The results of the 12th annual World Music Awards have been officially announced on the Internet. As we know, Roxette received an award for “World’s best-selling Scandinavian Act of the Year (1999)”.
Among the other winners, Michael Jackson received an award for “Best Selling Pop Male Artist of the Millennium” and Mariah Carey for “Best Selling Pop Female Artist of the Millennium”.
EMI embraces Windows Media format
Written by Lars-Erik_Olson on May 11, 2000 to Misc.
EMI, Roxette’s record label, announced Wednesday its intention to sell downloads using only the Windows Media format.
EMI Recorded Music will offer up 100 albums and 40 singles through digital retail outlets starting in July. While EMI does have the option to sell music in other formats, the company will initially use Microsoft’s format exclusively.
Roxette.net website calls it quits
Written by roxeteer on May 10, 2000 to Misc.
Steven Howlett has decided to close his Roxette site once again. In just eight months, he has started and closed three different Roxette sites: International Roxette News, Roxette Interactive and, after purchase of the domain name, Roxette.net.
“Due to immense time constraints and a heavy workload,” he writes on his site, “I have reluctantly decided to cease all my Roxette-based web activities. To put it simply, I’m exhausted. My occupation takes up an enormous amount of both my time and energy.”
Steven has placed a notice on the site indicating he wants to sell the roxette.net domain.
ABC to broadcast World Music Awards on May 29
Written by Lars-Erik_Olson on May 10, 2000 to Misc.
ABC (the American Broadcasting Company) will broadcast their version of the World Music Awards show on Monday, May 29, at 8 pm (Eastern and Pacific time zones).
While Roxette is not mentioned in the network’s short promotional “blurb”, U.S. fans hope that the Roxette segment will be included when the show is aired. Read more…
World tour planned for next year
Written by Lars-Erik_Olson on May 10, 2000 to Misc.
“The thought is that Roxette will go out on a world tour next year. It’s been five years since the last one,” said Per Gessle in an interview with an Aftonbladet reporter from his hotel room in Monaco. Per and Marie were there to accept a World Music Award and share the stage with, among others, Michael Jackson, Mariah Carey and Ronan Keating.
A more definitive statement — “Next year we’re going on a world tour” — is how the Aftonbladet editors restated Per’s comments above a photo of Per and Marie.
Marie #1 in Sweden for 6th week in a row
Written by roxeteer on May 10, 2000 to Misc.
Marie’s greatest hits album “Äntligen [Bästa 1984 - 2000]” is number 1 on the Swedish chart for the 6th week in a row. The album went straight to #1 when it was released in March.
The single, “Äntligen”, is #50 on the singles chart, falling 3 places from last week.
Fanclub members can order Marie tickets online
Written by roxeteer on May 9, 2000 to Misc.
Members of the Official Roxette Fanclub are now able to pre-order tickets to Marie’s summer tour concerts online. The Fanclub has made a contract with EMA Telstar which makes it possible to sell tickets on Fanclub’s website. The tickets are available only to Fanclub members.
The price of the tickets is 31 euros (+ 8-10 euros for shipping). Each member can buy maximum of 4 tickets.
Per indicates new Roxette single slated for January release
Written by roxeteer on May 7, 2000 to Misc.
Comments by Per, published in a Göteborgsposten article, indicate that the next Roxette single will be released in January. The new album — which is already being produced — will be released a month after that.
Roxette played for Ferrari F1 team
Written by roxeteer on May 7, 2000 to Misc.
Ferrari’s Formula 1 team had its 50th anniversary party this weekend in Barcelona, where the 5th Grand Prix of the F1 season was also held. On their way to World Music Awards in Monaco, Roxette performed live at the party. One of the other artists playing at the party was Chris Rea.
“I’ve been interested [in Formula 1 racing] since the Ronnie Petterson and Reine Wisell days”, Per said in Göteborgsposten.
Marie’s summer tour tickets on sale
Written by tevensso on May 2, 2000 to Misc.
The tickets for Marie’s summer tour are on sale as of today. The price is 250 SEK (27.95 USD), which is a bit steep in my opinion. There are, as far as I know, only field tickets available, since Marie only performs at outdoor venues. You can order tickets through BiljettDirekt at 0771-707070 or on their website. Note that you can make orders only within Sweden!
