HALMSTAD - November 24 there will be a major Roxette auction in Halmstad. Hallands auktionsverk, where the Gyllene Tider-auction was held last year, will auction out a large Roxette/Per Gessle collection, with rarities like the 12” single “Spegelboll,” “Look Sharp!” as a picture LP and CD, the German edition of the “Chances” 12” single and many more. The collection includes basically everything released by Per Gessle and Roxette, from “Per Gessle” to “The Pop Hits,” on CD, LP, 3”, 7”, 12”, MD, DCC, MC et cetera, all in all over 400 items.

  The Daily Roxette has been in contact with the seller, who wishes to remain anonymous, and asked why he sells off his rare material. “I don’t know really, I just realized it was Gyllene Tider I wanted to collect. And I also think that I can never get a complete Roxette collection,” he says. Included in the auction are LPs, CDs, singles, cassettes and video tapes. All original and in great condition of course. Many items will be bundled, and the starting prices are kept low on purpose. “Yes, for instance the single of say ’Fading Like a Flower’, it isn’t worth all that much and was released in so many countries, so we bundled items like that.” Other things, like the very rare Mexican “Milk & Toast & Honey” promo CD will be sold separately.

  You don’t have to be physically there to bid; you can bid via e-mail, telephone, fax and regular mail. The only thing you have to think of is to bid before the auction starts. There is also the option to be on the phone during the auction, doing that adds a hefty fee to the bid and is probably not worth it in this case.

• Hallands auktionsverk (In Swedish)
• The list

STOCKHOLM - It’s a sunny day here as we arrive in Sweden’s perhaps most beautiful city, and we go directly to Doktor Glas’ gallery to check out Marie Fredriksson’s art exhibit. It’s at the very beginning of the lunch hour, and the place is empty. But the girls behind the counter explain that there’ve been lots of visitors. Among them all, two German girls and a Spanish guy. They also share that a critic came in and praised the drawings without knowing who had done them.

  More drawings arrive as The Daily Roxette is there. All drawings in the exhibition have been sold, and the catalog book is selling very well. Marie Dimberg, Fredriksson’s manager, tells TDR that the book will be sold via musicshop.se and maybe a few other sites. The price will be the same, plus postage. Possibly they will print more copies.

  TDR, along with such other newspapers as Dagens Nyheter, Svenska Dagbladet and Göteborg’s Posten had been invited this afternoon to the “inner sanctum” of d&d in Stockholm to conduct exclusive interviews with Marie Fredriksson. When this reporter walks through the office door, we’re greeted by manager Marie Dimberg (suffering from a bad back) and a radiant Marie Fredriksson.

  Dimberg asks us if we want anything to drink so Marie asks for some tea and I get a glass of water. Marie is dressed in black with a nice leopard shirt. She looks just like the popstar we all know. Dimberg serves Fredriksson a lovely cup of green tea flavored with vanilla. “Yummy,” Fredriksson smiles.

  I start by telling Marie that the first time we met was after a Gyllene Tider concert in Avesta (1984) where we discussed her being very nervous about releasing “Ännu doftar kärlek.”

Don’t you think this is a bit the same?

  Marie laughs, “Gosh, that’s a long time ago. But you’re right, that’s very clever!” Marie continues “I’m so excited about all this. Very proud about my first exhibit.”

How did this exhibit come about?

  A few years back I started drawing in charcoal, and I felt this was special, this was it, so to speak. And I felt I just had to let go. I drew tons of pictures!”

  Marie continues by telling TDR that charcoal is a great material to draw with. “It’s so… raw and black… and yet… soft, you know?” We talk a little about her drawing “Trött” (“Tired”), and Marie laughs and says “Yes this one is a man, and he’s so damned tired with his wife, because she nags and nags and nags. He’s so tired!”

No plans to start dabbling in water colors?

  “Yikes no!” she laughs.

  All through the interview Marie laughs now and then. You can tell that this is truly a happy person right now.

So, is your new title “artist” or “popstar”?

  “Both,” she smiles slyly, and adds “maybe a popartist?”

Like Warhol?

  “Hmmm, no that doesn’t work… of course.”

Why did you start drawing?

  “One day I felt the urge to go out and shop for pencils and large pieces of paper. Large! But now when I see the drawings [points to a corner of the office] I think ’Huh? I thought they were bigger?’ I wish I’d made them even bigger!” she laughs. “I just love that big format!”

• Purchase “After The Change” (The book incl. postage to Europe costs 54 Euro)

Read more…

SAINT TROPEZ (UPDATED) - “Son Of A Plumber… are you nuts?” I say to Per over the phone. “Ha ha,” he says, “yes it feels like it.” Per is in Saint Tropez to finalize the mixing of his new album, and another tradition he has is to finish off in Saint Tropez. “But it’s been raining until ten minutes ago,” he reports.

  The album title will indeed be “Son Of A Plumber” and will initially be released in Sweden only. If the record is well received, it may be delivered “worldwide” in January, with a European/Swedish club tour to follow.

  Per & Company have recorded no less than 26 songs, and when this reporter asks for a double album Per seems intrigued, especially if there’s a vinyl edition. “Vinyl? Great idea! A double vinyl album? Son Of A Plumber’s white album! Ha ha!”

  The album sounds very diversified; country, pop, ballads, instrumentals et cetera. “We’ve recorded three, four 50-second instrumentals that we want to include,” Per divulges. “Sort of like soundtracks to movies. We have pan flutes as well!”

  There will be a single off the album out in the middle or end of October, but the single has yet to be decided. Per decides to share some info about some tracks:

• Substitute (For the Real Deal)
• I Have a Party in My Head (I Hope it Never Ends)
• Keep the Radio On (This is the Perfect Song) - “A newly recorded version taken from The Lonely Boys’ album.” Although it started out as an unreleased Gyllene Tider-song.
• Making Love Or Expecting Rain - “It is
  a line from a Bob Dylan song, no need to speculate guys!”
• Hey Mr DJ (Won’t You Play Another Love Song) - “A country duet with Helena.”
• A nine-minute medley including a falsetto blues and “Are You An Old Hippie, Sir?”
• I Never Quite Got Over the Fact that the Beatles Broke Up - “This one makes you happy, possibly an album closer, we have a few.”
• Drowning in Wonderful Thoughts About Her - “Probably the first track of the album”.

  “My thoughts regarding this project was to sort of start a one man band, like Badly Drawn Boy. And also, we recorded no demos for this project. I played the songs for Christoffer and Clarence, and they were like the evil jury in [American] Idol. They then said if they liked the songs or not. If they didn’t - we didn’t record it.” Per tells TDR. He also mentions that they had somewhat strange recording techniques making this album. They would tell Helena to sing something and if she asked how or what, they would say “improvise.” This has given some strange, but great results, with lots of “la la la la la” but also other interesting effects.

  Regarding the sleeve, Anton Corbijn took the pictures this time around, just like he did with Per’s previous solo album, “Mazarin.” Most of the pictures are taken in Christoffer’s garden and some in London, while the sleeve pic itself is taken in London.

  The only thing Per didn’t tell us was how the guitars really were tuned after all…

  Update Sept. 30: The album has been delayed one week due to technical issues. The new date is November 23.

BERGEN - On Saturday September 3, as previously reported, Per Gessle and band performed an exclusive concert for the staff at Hydro in the Grieg Hall in Norwegian town Bergen. It was a special invitation gig only, with an audience of about 1,500 happy Norwegians.

  Mazarinerna consisted this time of MP Persson, guitar; Jens Jansson, drums; Clarence Öfwerman, keyboards, Helena Josefsson, backup vocals; Magnus Börjesson, bass guitar and Christoffer Lundquist, guitar. Per comments the gig: “Bergen was a gas! Very heavy! This band composition is the most fun I’ve ever played with…”

  The Daily Roxette has gotten its hands on the setlist:

1. En sten vid en sjö i en skog

2. Juni, juli, augusti

3. Gungar

4. Det hjärta som brinner

5. (Hon vill ha) Puls

b a n d p r e s e n t a t i o n

6. Här kommer alla känslorna…

7. Segla på ett moln

8. Kung av sand

9. Födelsedag

10. Ljudet av ett annat hjärta

11. Gå & fiska!



Extras



12. Tycker om när du tar på mej

13. Det är över nu

14. Sommartider

  “’Sommartider’ was a huge hit in Norway as well, one could tell…” Per says happily.




All photos courtesy of Per Gessle, photographer unknown.

BERGEN - Norwegian oil company Hydro is celebrating their 100-year anniversary and “Per Gessle & band” have accepted an invitation to play for the staff in the northern town of Bergen on September 3.

  Hydro’s celebration starts today in Oslo with Norwegian popgroup a-ha giving a free concert in Frogner Park. a-ha, who recently performed at the Live 8 concert in Berlin, will premiere some of the music on their latest album. The group will also play an already sold-out gig at New York City’s Irving Plaza on September 12, their first US concert since 1986 and almost exactly 20 years after the hit “Take on Me” soared to the top of the charts worldwide.

  Per tells The Daily Roxette that he will play Bergen and Stockholm in September to keep his band Mazarinerna in good shape.

  This isn’t the first time Per has played company gigs, Roxette played for the OM group a few years back, beer giant Carlsberg has had a visit as well, and now last summer Swedish operator Tele 2 had Gyllene Tider visit them.

Elisabeth Mathisen contributed to this article.

• Hydro

Christoffer Lundquist, who has worked as a musician and producer on many recent Gessle and Roxette albums, releases a 4-track solo EP on August 22. The EP is called “Major & Minor Songs” and it will only be available for download, first on CDON and later also on iTunes Music Store.

  The EP is published by the record company Junk Musik which is partly owned by Lundquist. On August 22, Junk Musik will also release a new song, titled “Une Histoire”, from Sandy Mouche. The band’s lead singer is Helena Josefsson who is also collaborating on the forthcoming Gessle album.

• Junk Musik
• Sandy Mouche (they also have a clip from the new song)

HALMSTAD - Per Gessle has issued this statement to The Daily Roxette due to the recent reports of Per and Micke ’Syd’ being in dispute. Here’s his message, unedited:

The story so far:

I was born in 1959. Gyllene Tider (in the most famous line-up) was formed in 1979. The group was disbanded, with smiling faces, in 1985. Since then I’ve had my heart beating around the clock for Roxette or pounding gently for my solo career.

On very few occasions we have re-united Gyllene Tider. Two of those occasions were Återtåget in 1996 and GT25 (the tour) / Finn5Fel! (the album) last year. After the latter’s amazing success everything has returned back to “normal”, i.e. Roxette and my solo stuff.

There are currently no plans for further GT-projects. The main reason being the unbelievable success from last year which is hard, if not impossible, to follow up.

I have sent my wedding-congrats to Micke & Helena and I sincerely hope they’ll get a happy and prosperous life together.

Moneywise I never make any official comments regarding deals and contracts. However, the figures and internal splits that have been suggested in the media are laughable and nowhere near the truth.

Yeehaa!

P., sunny Halmstad July 22 - 2005

Micke ’Syd’ has denied the reports as well, but said that “sometimes in life relationships just don’t work” without going into details.

“It was actually your beloved Per Gessle who initiated the compilation,” said Brainpool’s David Birde in an exclusive interview with The Daily Roxette regarding their forthcoming greatest hits album.

  “Apparently he was at home, listening to our albums and was once again struck by how good we were,” David tells TDR. “He started to mail us, coming up with a running order for the album. Eventually he wore us down and we said: ’OK, you’ll get your compilation if…’

  “’If what?’ was Per’s instant reply.

  ’If you write the sleeve notes.’”

  Per agreed and so the album, titled “We Aimed To Please,” will have an introduction written by him.

  The members of Brainpool, including the former lead singer Janne Kask who left the band in 1997, are very happy to be able to present such a huge bulk of material. For example, there will be all of Brainpool’s videos on a bonus DVD that also contains the demo tape recording that gave the group their deal with Jimmy Fun Music, Per’s record company. It will also contain “the horrible ’Bandstarter’ demo recorded in a hotel room in Stuttgart during the Roxette tour and much more,” muses David. Brainpool was Roxette’s supporting act during the Crash! Boom! Bang! tour in 1994.

  “The actual CD contains all our singles, plus the songs that would have been singles if we had released more,” David continues. The compilation will be sold at the price of a regular CD. All songs are commented by David and Janne and the artwork by John the Fisherman is, according to David, “an orgy of Brainpool nostalgia!”

  David also tells us that the two new songs, “A Different Life” and “Let Me Win,” were originally written for Belinda Carlisle in 1995 but never made it to her album. “They have been hidden away in Jimmy Fun’s vaults until now, so they are very exclusive.” Read more…

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!

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…