Swedish~ Stereo~

SVT presented participants of 3rd and 4th semifinal of Melodifestivalen and among them 8 completely new announced names and band The Playtones announced last Saturday on Dansbandskampen show. Finally we've got really exciting mix of schlager-veterans and interesting newcomers but comparing with year before next meloseason looks poppier, more uptempo and full of great songwriters who was making Melodiestivalen history of 00s.

One of the most surprising discoveries of presentation was new project Shirley's Angels - trio of Shirley Clamp, Vera Prada and Jessica Marberger with the song "I Thought It Was Forever" from glorious songwriting gang Alexander Bard, Robin Abrahamsson, Bobby Ljunggren and Henrik Wikström. Shirley is well-known ESC-related name since performance of Antique on Eurovision-2001 with her as backing singer through all 00ies as artist who performed one of the biggest meloanthems "Min Kärlek" left second in 2004, many still wait for her comeback with victory and who knows - maybe it's the right time. Jessica Marberger is one of constant backing singers of Melodifestivalen and owner of really powerful vocal, Vera Prada is known as dancer and choreographer of Melodifestivalen so she seems to be responsible for dances in this company. "I Thought It Was Forever" brings Shirley back to her schlager-roots, it's uptempo song with great chorus but pinch of sadness as well.

Another exciting, no, EXCITING news were that one of the biggest songwriters of the planet right now RedOne is stepping into competition with his fresh project Love Generation. Girls have managed to release only one single in Sweden this Summer and say that their Melodifestivalen work is uptempo in RedOne-style sounding more proper for Melodifestivalen. Team hasn't chosen which of two songs will be performed by them but both options are gonna be great.

Not rumoured actively this year but name that was rolling around as possible last wildcard of Melodifestivalen-2010 Linda Sundblad is also in! Linda is the one of the loveliest singers of Sweden who has become popular as vocalist of internationally succeeding band Lambretta but later she went solo and managed to release already two albums. Song "Lucky You" was written by her with Epicentre team - Johan Bobäck, Fredrik Thomander and Anders "Gary" Wikström who previously wrote her Top-10 hit "Let's Dance" and Linda says "Lucky You" is a lot in her style but a bit with ABBA-warmth.

Fantastic Linda Pritchard is back with huge classic ballad "Alive" written by Oscar Görres and Fredrik Kempe. Year ago Linda was singing demo of "Hollow" (the song that was later given to Peter Jöback), there were many tocuhed to tears by that demo and right that time rumours started to flow around that this song is gonna be year's winner but finally it hasn't happened and Linda who performed the song "You're Making Me (Hot-Hot-Hot)" hasn't qualify to final but right after Melodifestivalen Christer Björkman has contacted her and they started to plan revanche!

Linda has not the latest Fredrik Kempe's song on Melodifestivalen. The Playtones (winners of show Dansbandskampen) has got Fredrik's song "The King" that was rejected year ago but was recorded this year by Тop Сats, SVT had their own candidates thoug. Band describes the song as retro rockabilly track with modern touch.

Another new announced artist was Sebastian Karlsson with the song "No One Else Could" he co-wrote with Andreas Alfredsson Grube. Sebastian (2nd place of Idol-2005 after Agnes) already competed in 2007 so it's not his debut. He describes the song as mix of synth-pop and guitar-pop and the show behind him will be done by Rickard Engfors who worked before with Emilia, Måns Zelmerlöw, Pernilla Wahlgren, Marie Serneholt and many other meloartists.

Favorite of many schlager-fans last year Eric Saade is coming back with Fredrik Kempe's song "Popular" and he claims that new song is better than "Manboy" and expensive show that will require even help of stunt-masters can not only take with the storm Melodifestivalen but as well Eurovision. Along with Melodifestivalen Eric will also be making promo in Russia in the beginning of the year.

Young artist Sara Varga was presented with the song "Spring för livet" that she wrote herself with Figge Boström, she describes it as calm and very personal song. Sara is relatively new artist playing some half-acoustic stuff so she has a chance to become Anna Bergendahl of this year.

One of our favorite artists Anders Fernette was presented with the song "Don't Stop" written by JC Chasez(ex-N'Sync), Carl Falk and Kristian Lundin. Oh! And here I'm gonna tell you a story about my dear friend Poster Girl. More than year ago PG wrote about her Myspace-dicovery of amazing demo performed by our beloved Anorah and few months after this song was taken to Melodifestivalen and disqualified right after it was discovered that song was available for public before. That story has repeated this year again!!! PG on her blog told about amazing demo recorded by JC Chasez and co-written by Carl Falk that Carl put on his Myspace-page (truly great track that was among others soundtrack of my life this year) and right after Anders Fernette's song title and songwriters were revealed it was 99% clear it's that song so logically it was disqualified soon after. However Anders with songwriters have a week to prepare another song and if SVT will like it he'll get a chance to compete. And we really hope he will. Anders is ex-participant of Fame Factory with loads of albums and some amazing modern stuff he released last two years so we're waiting for him to get back with not less great song.

Talking about previously announced artists Sara Lumholdt plans some interesting show with the song "Enemy" that she descibes as mix of pop, rock and r'n'b'. Simon Forsberg speaks about Fredrik Kempe's "Tid att andas" as huge ballad with nordic touch but warm feeling. Webbjoker Julia Alvgard says that her ballad "Better or worse" is re-produced but doesn't change common style. Nicke Borg describes his song "Leaving Home" as classic ballad growing and growing to incredibly grand final. Melody Club claims their song "The Hunter" is a lot in their style, very fast, explosive and epic.

We say thank you for all information again to Scandipop, Poplight, Schlagerprofilerna and Schlagerzoot!

Oh wait! I should finish with something spicy so I'd like to show you bets of bookmakers who already take money for the winner and Eric Saade with Love Generation are looking like the biggest faves (weird that Linda Sundblad's song's called "Forever"). Well, we shouldn't trust these people as year before they put Darin and Peter Jöback as the biggest faves and Måns with BWO in 2009. Anna was 15th and Malena - 14th. But however it's interesting to see who is considered as the biggest folk's favorite beforehand.

I guess you've got we have a weakness for voice of young sweet Sibel, so it's definitely pleasant to discover some new pieces of her music and this new is completely brilliant!
American Disney channel has started airing new tv-show "Shake It Up" collecting some great forces for music decoration of series. One of songs was recorded by Sibel and googling a bit gave us information that it was written by Niclas Molinder, Joacim Persson, Johan Alkenäs and Drew Ryan Scott and it's not surprising information as this great Swedish songwriting team (Niclas, Joacim and Johan) worked a lot for Disney channel last time. Some recent examples are songs for "Jonas L.A." series soundtrack ("L.A. Baby (Where Dreams Are Made Of)", "Critical", "Hey You", "Things Will Never Be The Same") - all of them sound not less than epic! Niclas and Johan were long-time well-known as TWIN recording many significant hits in Sweden (Velvet, Da Buzz, Danny, Darin, Helena Paparizou, Charlotte Perrelli) and though they weren't involved in some big releases in Sweden last few years but being joined by Johan they've gone more internationally with songs for world stars like Ashley Tisdale and Charice.
"Shake It Up" is another great pop-song with promisng electro intro growing into energetic pop-track with powerful rhythm blasting in anthemic double pop-chorus, it's like "My Life Would Suck Without You" mixed with "Firework" so check it and I bet you should love it.

Robyn's third pard of trilogy "Body Talk" is finally out in Sweden on previous week together with final compilation "Body Talk" containing 5 songs from every of 3 EPs. So we've logically lost acoustic versions of "Dancing On My Own" and "Hang With Me" and 4 another tracks and we officially miss "Include Me Out" and "Jag Vet En Dejlig Rosa" but still consider final album as real pop-masterpiece that has made many people who even weren't Robyn's fans before follow her career whole year.
Few months ago Robyn presented beautiful acoustic track "Indestructible" with magnificent strings arrangement on previous EP that on "Body talk Pt.3" turned to electropop younger sister of "Dancing On My Own" and "Hang With Me" - light and delicate, maybe not with the same huge hit-potential but still reaching Top-10 in Sweden. However third Robyn's album this year has got some even more exciting thing - "Time Machine" collaboration between Robyn and Swedish biggest export-hitmaker Max Martin mixing some best moments in music of both - fragile sensitivity of Robyn's melodies and magic catchiness of Max Martin's stuff. It's not yet confirmed yet if it's gonna be the next single of Robyn or any of the rest 3 new tracks: "Call Your Girlfriend" - more dynamic and less dramatic version of "Dancing On My Own" with flying huge chorus, "Get Myself Together" - cheerful pop-song with catchy rhythm and "Stars 4-Ever" - colder club-track repetetive but light enough not to be boring. However here's best track of "Body Talk Pt.3" and new enjoyable performance of "Indestructible".

We keep track of multiple Christmas releases wave which is as massive this year as actually always and this time we've even got comeback of our beloved schlagerstar Magnus Bäcklund.
Seems like after break-up of popular duo Fame female part of it Jessica Andersson never disappeared for a long time and last year was especially active for her with release of debut solo-album "Wake Up" last Autumn, participating in Melodifestivalen with the song "I Did It For Love" and The Queen tribute tour "Champions of rock". But we didn't get to know a lot about her Fame-partner Magnus Bäcklund after release of his solo-album "Never Say Never" in 2006. This year his name floated out when Idol-2009 winner Erik Grönwall released debut-single "Crash and Burn" (not considering Idol-winning song) that turned to be cover from "Never Say Never". Small scandal as it was presented as original Erik's stuff but rush of attention to Magnus. However Magnus kept touring and was involved in music without some loud releases though. He's got hard times recently when his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer but after operation she's getting better and doctors are sure illness has gone so family has a chance to get back to a normal life and Magnus' getting back to his career with new Christmas single "Julens Hemlighet" - original track written by Alexander Holmgren, Anders Grahn, Troy Tuminelli and Juan Carlos Perez Soto. It's a classic sounding Christmas song with a proper warm feeling built on exactly that lovely schlager-tune you could expect from old good Fame-Magnus and you can enjoy its preview below.

September celebrates her first #1 hit in Sweden "Mikrofonkåt", before only "Satellites" managed to reach #4 but participation in popular tv-show Så mycket bättre has really pushed her hard (due to Aftonbladet's poll around 70% of readers from more than 7000 voters think that Petra's covers are even better than her own songs) and Petter's cover made by her debuted right on the 1st place of Swedish chart.
Great time for starting promoting new solo-stuff and September is finally presenting new single "Resuscitate me" to the world and makes it with a whole bag of goodies with video and mixes for this song.
"Resuscitate Me" video was directed by Patric Ullaeus, Petra appears in it with new short hairdo dancing with cables attached to her hands and saving her soul when body needs some resuscitation with warm love memories. September who likes to play with dark lyrics in dance music ("Until I Die", "R.I.P.", "Flowers on The Grave" etc.) keeps dancing on a broken glass bringing together dramatical keys with life-asserting club beats and does it in her own recognizable way constantly attracting attention of pop-fans around the world.

Along with video full packed single with extended mix and also mixes from Buzz Junkies and Moto Blanco finally has seen the light. Moto Blanco provided slightly trancey light radio-track when Buzz Junkies has made club delight but still very poppy track with loud layers and heavy dance beat.

Going back to Så mycket bättre - theme of the latest show was dedicated to Christer Sandelin's covers (Style's vocalist) and as we guessed right Petra was singing "Vill Ha Dig" but in pretty original version as dark pulsating and hypnotizing electro-track with a beautiful strings section, we really hope it will be released on forthcoming compilation of Så mycket bättre. Petter has made another beautiful electronic version of "Hjärtats ensamma slag". Thomas Di Leva presented cover for one of the latest Style hits "Vill ha dig igen" in very close to original synth sound. Lill-Babs with "Fantasi", Lasse Berghagen with "Dover Calais" and Plura with "Den hon vill ha" kept it on more retro-field.

Soon we're gonna get brand new video for Rebound's next single "Psycho" that they shoot with Mikeadelika but for now we're staying with just two band's singles and we have nothing to do but discovering some unreleased pieces of their music.
Yesterday demo-record titled "Safe" sung by Eddie Razaz and written and produced among others by Chris Antblad (Sibel, Anders Ekborg, Larz Kristerz, Molly Sandén) has leaked on youtube and surprisingly though it's just a demo it sounds quite prepared and could easily be released on Rebound's album.
"Safe" is very calm minimalistic song in Bubbly-style with careless atmosphere where you don't really feel need in anything but synth, beats and Eddie's voice, very relaxing and enjoyable track.

I've missed two of the latest Idol episodes so here's the compressed introduction to what happened on the show last two weeks.
Rock-theme on Idol was rolling from some old monster-hits to relatively fresh ones. Olle Hedberg performed The Rasmus' "In the Shadows" that was more proper to his comfortable zone but not enough to be stable. Elin Blom with Raibnbow's "I Surrender" sounded much more prettier making it more poppy though. No need to say Jay Smith was completely in this theme rocking with Primal Scream's "Rocks". Linnea Henriksson has made completely crazy performance with Mando Diao's "Dance with Somebody" with tonnes of expression she's able for. Minnah Karlsson's was a bit more cold trying to lift Van Halen's "Jump" but it was incredibly hard to lift this complicated song up. Andreas Weise also had difficult song "Start Me Up" by The Rolling Stones but he also couldn't be blamed for boringness of performance.
As a next stage participants should've sung in duets. Jay was singing U2's "Sunday Bloody Sunday" with Linnea and it felt a bit like year before when two faves Tove and Erik sang "Kids" together, it was quite lovely performance. Elin and Minnah provided schlager-version of The Ark's "Calleth you, cometh I" being compared afterwards with ABBA. Andreas and Olle has delievered less successful version of The Spencer Davis Group's "Gimme some lovin´" falling for bad song choise but looking tough in suits and sunglasses though.
However it was Elin together with (shock!) one of contest's faves Linnea who were left to the final duel and as it was expected Elin has left the competition.
Tove Styrke has become guest of the show presenting her new single "White Light Moment" with minimalistic but very beautiful performance.

Week later Idols have got theme of classic hits and some unexpected songs like Jay singing Madonna and Linnea covering ABBA. Andreas was back to his musical+disco field making colourful performance of Tom Jones' "She's a lady" and less alive but still bright Kool and the Gang "Celebration". Olle has started with David Bowie's "Let's dance" looking not so comfortable in terms of performance choreography but then has provided completely fantastic Elton John's "Your song" becoming 100% his own. Linnea has started with more dynamic "I can't help myself (Sugar pie honey bunch)" from The Four Tops that turned to be more usual/crazy Linnea's performance but than blown arena away with ABBA's "The winner takes it all". I've heard some really touching ballads from Linnea but this song touched me almost to tears. This is weird some performances hasn't appeared on youtube or were taken away but as soon as this one will appear, I'll let you know. I was more convinced that Minnah is good in ballads as in nothing else - "Always on my mind" from Willie Nelson sounded completely magic and incredibly beautiful with her voice. "I'm so excited" from The Pointer Sisters sounded more expectedly and suited Minnah's voice very well also. And another biggest surprise of the night was Jay who firstly fought with his rock-voice singing Frank Sinatra's "Fly me to the moon" and later provided epic performance of Madona's "Like a Prayer" appearing in kilt in the darkness with a smoke around. Jay grows as public favorite. Last week it was discovered that he smoked hashish few weeks ago but TV4 has decided not to disqualify him and seems like interest of audience has even grown so much that the question who will win has obvious answer. The only intriguing question is who will participate (to compete is not right word here) with Jay in final.
This time final duel happened between expected Andreas and again unexpected another fave Olle, and result wasn't shocking - Andreas has left Idol.

Swedish secret music weapon Mohombi is dropping new bomb releasing brand new single "Dirty Situation" with the help of another world scale star Akon (I'll remind you that previously Nelly was featuring Mohombi's single "Miss Me").
Though before another song "Sex Your Body" was rumoured to become next Mohombi's single Sweden has got release of another dance track "Dirty Situation" and artist has already premiered trailer of video for this song. And this is what was a key to riddle of dance section in "Miss Me" video. This track is probably the most dancey Mohombi's song that can't be compared with any of other RedOne's works, it contains huge synths layers, energetic beats and African music influences folowing whole Mohombi's music direction. Due to trailer video is going to be not less great international shot than previous ones being impressive visually and choreographically.
On the other hand "Sex Your Body" sounds like a bridge between dance-sound "Dirty Situation" and more r'n'b "Bumpy Ride" with its heavy beat and chorus getting stomped to your head with simple but catchy melody line so definitely it wouldn't be bad choise to be released in some other countries. Check both "Dirty Situation" and "Sex Your Body" below.

Last week we've got not only officially presented brand new hosts of next year Melodifestivalen - Marie Serneholt and Rickard Olsson but also 6 new participating names who'll be competing in first 2 semifinals, some information about their songs and plans and some bonus rumours about final artists who can be announced next Monday.

Talking about hosts Marie Serneholt is well-known artist - ex-participant of famous pop-band A-Teen who started solo-career 4 years ago and tried Melodifestivalen-2009 but hasn't succeeded and since that was more involved in TV-shows, musical and everything except her own music. As Marie is naturally funny, charming and alive person it's a great news that she was chosen as I hardly imagine her getting stuck or confused in case of not funny joke or forgotten text. Rickard Olsson is another familiar face on Swedish TV being involved for many years in some popular tv-projects like Bingolotto and Nyhetsmorgon. He's like less sarcastic but more energetic version of Kristian Luuk (host of MF-2007, 2008) so undoubtfully it's not bad news as well!

Moving to new official artists and songs of Melodifestivalen... YES!!! ANNIELA WILL PARTICIPATE IN MELODIFESTIVALEN-2011! One of the most promising pop-artists we've discovered this year, very sweet person, beautiful and talented girl that gave Swedish music lovers delightful pop-gem "My Confession" this year was chosen with the song "Elektrisk" written by Johan Alkenäs, Tim Larsson, Tobias Lundgren, Johan Fransson - team behind "Kalla nätter", "Alcastar" and "Om natten" . So we send our warmest congratulations to Anniela and happily announce that "Elektrisk" is due singer's words is a lot in a vein of "My Confession" (read it as it's gonna be brilliant).
Another great expected name was Le Kid who wrote the song "Oh My God" themselves (should band with hit-stuff for BWO, Alcazar and Agnes ask someone's help?) and they describe it as their typical song not written especially for Melodifestivalen with touch of Motown. However we trust their taste!
Some unexpected but rumoured name Jenny Silver who was left last in semifinal this year with the song "A Place To Stay" is coming back with "Something In Your Eyes" written by Erik Bernholm, Thomas G:son and Henrik Sethsson - team behind Danish song "In A Moment Like This" at Eurovision-2010. Jenny describes the song as big disco-schlager with key-change, loads of ABBA-influences sounding like modern version of "Tusen och en natt". Before it was offered to Charlotte Perrelli but she refused it and Jenny has got a chance to make a great revanche.
Daniel Karlsson under new name The Moniker enters the contest with *oh my God!* another "Oh My God!" song (with exclamation mark, should we expect more emotional song than Le Kid will perform?). Daniel was 4th on Idol-2007 beaten by Amanda Jenssen and Marie Picasso but more successful than EMD's Mattias and Gathania.
Artist who was rumoured to enter MF every year and by unofficial information was rejected in 2008 Brolle was presented with self-written song "Seven Days And Seven Nights" that was initially written as a ballad but ended up as uptempo mix of rock and rockabilly.
And finally really surprising name of Christian Walz with the song "Like Suicide" from Fernando Fuentes, Henrik Janson and Tony Nilsson. Christian has apeared on a stage more than 10 years ago releasing three albums and some notable hits like Wonderchild and What's Your Name?. His sound is something between Salem al Fakir and Vincent but a bit more raggae and guitar-pop - mix that sounds exciting with Tony Nilsson's song ("You're Out Of My Life", "Headlines", "Love In Stereo"). Christian descibes his song as his own sound with spaceship atmosphere.

As well some previously presented artists talked about their songs.
- Sanna Nielsen describes her entry "I'm In Love" as uptempo with huge refrain and says she never did anything like this on MF.
- Elisabeth Andreassen says her balad "Vaken i en dröm" sounds a lot like her previous Eurovision entry "I Evighet".
- Danny describes his "In the Club" as club-track with the touch of urban sound. r'n'b and hip-hop that he was into before starting his dance-pop career.
- Swingfly also describes his "Me And My Drum" as strong party-song.
- Rasmus Viberg's "Social Butterfly" is pop-song with folk-sound that was initially recorded in a different version.
- Måns Zelmerlöw's protégé Loreen will perform "My Heart Is Refusing Me" that by her own words has grown from ballad to original electronic mix inspired by Björk with loads of strings.
- Dilba's song "Try Again" is a strong dance-track.
- Pernilla Andersson calls her song "Desperados" style "spagetti-western" - country-song with loads of guitars, strings and atmosphere of Clint Eastwood films.

Participants of 3rd and 4th semifinal will be presented next Monday and 9 artists are not announced yet. By media rumours Eric Saade, Sebastian Karlsson, Sara Varga, Jimmy Jansson and Malena Laszlo are top-candidates for these places and Rebound is also waiting for approval of their entry so they still stay candidate and we keep our fingers crossed for them.

Below you can see list of participants of 1st and 2nd semifinals:

1st semifinal (Luleå)

Pernilla Andersson - Desperados (Pernilla Andersson)
Danny - In the Club (Figge Boström, Peter Boström, Danny Saucedo)
Swingfly - Me And My Drum (Johan Ramström, Patrik Magnusson, Teron Beal, Swingfly)
Le Kid - Oh My God (Märta Grauers, Anton Malmborg Hård af Segerstad, Felix Persson)
Jonas Matsson - On My Own (Sari Autio Olsson, Peter Autio)
Rasmus Viberg - Social Butterfly (Amir Aly, Henrik Wikström)
Jenny Silver - Something In Your Eyes (Erik Bernholm, Thomas G:son, Henrik Sethsson)
Dilba - Try Again (Niklas Pettersson, Linda Sonnvik)

2nd semifinal (Göteborg)

Anniela - Elektrisk (Johan Alkenäs, Tim Larsson, Tobias Lundgren, Johan Fransson)
Babsan - Ge mig en spanjor (Larry Forsberg, Sven-Inge Sjöberg, Lennart Wastesson)
Sanna Nielsen - I'm In Love (Irini Michas, Peter Boström, Thomas G:son, Bobby Ljunggren)
Christian Walz - Like Suicide (Fernando Fuentes, Henrik Janson, Tony Nilsson)
Loreen - My Heart Is Refusing Me (Moh Denebi, Björn Djupström, Loreen)
The Moniker - Oh My God! (Daniel Karlsson)
Brolle - Seven Days And Seven Nights (Brolle)
Elisabeth Andreassen - Vaken i en dröm (Lars ”Dille” Diedricson, Calle Kindbom, Kristian Wejshag)

Information is taken from interviews of Scandipop, Poplight, Schlagerprofilerna, Schlagerzoot so if you need to know more don't hesitate to check these great sites!

Swedish Stereo is coming out of weekly coma and I'll try to collect all those interestings things I've missed as soon as I can!
Let's start in alphabetical order... A... Ace Of Base! Ace Of Base is going to finally release "The Golden Ratio" as comeback-single in Sweden. Band has managed to succeed with their new album in Germany but now they're back to Motherland promoting new stuff appearing in different TV-shows and on one of them Förkväll they performed The Golden Ratio in acoustic and as more or less new female part of AOB is vocally new for us that's always interesting to check what they are about live, I should say it looked like very comfortable and confident performance for girls with no need to stand in front of huge public where that they probably aren't completely ready for, so it was enjoyable.
Band has also presented new mix of this song yesterday on their Facebook page, more nice dance light radio-friendly track than hard clubby thing, you're gonna love it if you like original version.

Last week many of "Så mycket bättre" participants released digitally their covers (actually everyone but Plura) that turned to be quite logical promo-decision and though Petter took whole 3 singles to iTunes Top-10, chart was waiting for Petra "September" Marklund, her cover of Petter's song "Mikrofonkåt" has become real hit among tv-audience and when finally it was released on iTunes it's taken just few hours to reach #1 and right now it's still there!
If the highest September's entry in basic Swedish chart was "Satelites" (#4) can "Mikrofonkåt" beat it? I think yes and it's even more amazing start of new September's career stage in Sweden than we could imagine.
Already this Friday September will release her brand new single (along with music video) "Resuscitate Me" that we exclusively presented to you in its full version few weeks ago, so here's the time for another exclusive thing - new monster hit of September in Sweden "Mikrofonkåt" - great club track with infectious tune and heavy dancefloor base. Everything in best traditions of September so you're gonna enjoy it!

Finally studio version of new Danny's single "In Your Eyes" has leaked!!!
If you didn't read my Summer post about single I'll remind you that it's cover of popular Swedish dance-project The Attic's single released back in 2005. As you can see new Danny's version seems not to change notably and it only shows how brilliant original was. We still don't have information when it's gonna be released and it looks pretty weird as Danny's going to participate in next year Melodifestivalen with the song "In The Club" and obviously needs some preliminary promotion. However he doesn't fall out of audience spot releasing album "Rewind" with E.M.D. on December 3rd and guys have presented new single "What Is Love" no so long ago. E.M.D. also recorded soundtrack "There's A Place For Us" for new episode of "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader" (to be exact - local version of soundtrack) that's going to appear on their album and even shot music video planned to be out very soon.

Lykke Li's coming back with brand new single "Get Some" and has just provided video for it.
Career of Lykke Li has started not so long time ago. In 2008 she released her debut album "Youth Novels" produced by Björn Yttling (Peter Bjorn and John) that became quite unique combination of indie-pop and electronic music being something completely original but still quite acceptable to turn many heads to this young promising artist. The album reached Top-3 in Sweden and was released in other European countries. Lykke Li featured releases of some respectable Scandinavian acts like Kleerup and Röyksopp and her songs got to soundtracks of huge Hollywood releases - "Sorority Row" and "The Twilight Saga: New Moon".
This Autumn Lykke Li's back and new single "Get Some" is another original mix of Tarantino-guitars, jazz-melodics and African drums. Lykke looks quite gorgeous in video in image of extreme-Gaga going Voodoo queen in hypnotizing set singing in front of huge screen with some crazy old films cut.
B-side of "Get Some" single - "Paris Blue" otherwise is very thoughtful dark track with minimalistic instrumental and Lykke's voice drowning in melancholic echoes and depressive mood.

Don't you mind a bit more Christmas mood from Måns Zelmerlöw?
That's good as I'd like to share some with you. Today Måns album "Christmas With Friends" is gonna be released in Sweden and Warner generously provides a taste of some other tracks. First one is "Vit som en snö" recorded with Pernilla Andersson, both Måns and Pernilla are going to appear on stage of Melodifestivalen next year so this duet looks like something very special but mostly it's all about beautiful original ballad track with utterly charming and gentle atmosphere. Another one is classic hit "Christmas (Baby please come home)", previously it was released by Mariah Carey and U2, not that it's a good decision to compare them. Let's start and stop on that we love them all equally. And don't forget to check another cover of "Winter wonderland" performed by Måns live at Nyhetsmorgon. I guess Sweden has just got new male Christmas-Carola with annual massive winter tours being held every year and not becoming less popular at all!

Andreas Johnson unleshes video for his latest single "Solace".
A little delayed you say? I say no, right in time, as it's video for the best Andreas' song since I don't know... "Glorious"? Probably.
In common it's cut from Andreas live concerts mixed with the artist walking around some lost (or maybe just not well looking) sewers (?!), I'm not an expert in enginireeng systems but maybe it's a good decision showing Andreas as really tough rock-guy. Say no to glamour and go man!
Ok, seriously, it's a good video and completely brilliant song, check it!

"Greatest Hits" compilation from Amy Diamond is out and it feels like a great celebration of huge music career of 18-year-old artist with many beloved hits and some new surprises on it. Let's check what new we've got on it.
First single "Only You" (cover of Yazoo's hit) from compilation surprisingly turned to be a ballad, probably not the best Amy's single so far but it got to Top-10 and sounding a bit childish it actually can be taken as idea to say goodbye to Amy's childhood before moving to a new era. Second single "True Colors" became another ballad and this time much more adult and touching ballad with loads of acoustic guitar and light country-touch, right what we like about Amy when it comes to live-performance! Another new song "Perfect" has a higher tempo, it's happy song full of life built on acoustic guitar riffs that you can easily imagine being performed in friends company. And the last new songs that I would really like to see as the next single is "Ready To Fly" - loud pop-song with anthemic beat and lovely strings being so popular and constantly successful these days in dance-pop - greatest among new Amy's hits! Compilation also includes acoustic versions of previous Amy's singles - "It's My Life", "What's In It For Me" and "Shooting Star" - great present to all fans and below you can see performance in the show "Piraterna" on SVT for kids where Amy's singing first two of them and "Champion". Remix for "Bittersweet" is another pleasant surprise for Amy's collectioners. Check some latest public performances of Amy promoting her "Greatest Hits" below.

This week Rebound visited "The Ana Gina show" and recorded music video with one the funniest and sweetest Swedish Internet-charecters these days - Khadidje.
Ana Gina is young and very popular Swedish blogger making some funny parodies in her vlogs and one of her featured charecters is Khadidje - muslim woman with some very traditional views on life in Sweden and as Ana has palestinian roots it can't be taken with anything but smile and no way as making fun of muslim part of Swedish population.
Video turned to 2 minutes of hurricane joy and fantastic energy of these three adorable persons. Time to re-name Rebound and Rekbound? Or Krebound? However guys need to work with Khadidje more!

Måns Zelmerlöw's album "Christmas with Friends" will be released already tomorrow!
This weekend single "December" written by Jörgen Elofsson, Andreas Carlsson and Niklas Strömstedt was premiered on the radio and TV. What to say about the song, it's jazzy retro-pop smelling 50ies and bringing joy of old good Christmas feeling. Would you say it's written by Swedish hit-monsters Jörgen Elofsson and Andreas Carlsson responsible for tonnes of Swedish export-music? I wouldn't. Seems like team just forgot about all commercial part of work and decided to just enjoy by creating their little Christmas music miracle. And we're gonna enjoy it with them as the song sounds like real hit with chorus catching from the first listen and soulfull warmth that won't let fans get cold this winter.
For peformance at Nyhetsmorgon Måns took whole band, pack of happiness and huge bunch of charisma. You can enjoy it and studio version below!

Viktorious premieres his first video for debut single "When We Were 10" and happily it's using those shots used in teaser presented earlier with some impressive images and though teaser looked more concentrated around tortured in some really original ways Viktor with a very toxic look here he's shooting all around with every bright image director's imagination is able for. The song was already mentioned by Popjustice and hopefully can become noteable hit outside of Sweden, finally it has everything - beautiful and catchy melody, fresh synthpop sound combined with some accessible pop-rock elements and Viktor's voice feels like international class so why not?
You can also check video from his release-fest, it's using studio version of "When We Were 10" with video of Viktor's performance but it's still interesting. Due to those who visited this event people say that Viktorious played 5 songs from upcoming album "I am Hope" and in common they sound in a style of the first single, that seems like really promising news!
Few days ago Viktorious performed as opening act for Adam Lambert's concert in Stockholm.

After brand new song "Still Love You" recently presented at Carola's site singer confirmed that she is going to release tribute-album to Elvis and Barbra after shows she was around last Summer. Great news for Carola's fans but not as great for those who want to get some really new stuff from the singer. So our dear schlager-songbird provides us with some new music pieces!
This week Carola appeared at Skavlan show performing with amazing Norwegian artist Sissel Kyrkjebø single "Velkommen hjem" from her album. Unfortunately it's released in solo-version by Sissel but still we can enjoy live-version of this Christmas beautiful ballad, Carola looks better and better with time, don't you think?
Project Sweet Chariots consisting of well-known musicians Niclas Frisk and Andreas Mattson is releasing re-edition of the album "Beat Based, Song Centered, Spirit Led" (2000) with 5 new tracks and among them first version of old Carola's hit "You+Me" entered her album "My Show" in a bit different and poppier one. But that version is pretty charming with its retro-pop feeling so you can listen below and judge yourself. Thanx for interesting information to Carola International blog.

Next episode of Så mycket bättre show turned participants to another artist's tribute and this time it was schlager-veteran Lill-Babs. Ex-husband Lasse Berghagen has made calm retro soul-smelling version of "Är Du Kär I Mig Ännu Klas-Göran?". Christer Sandelin also decided not to go too far from original 50s version with cover of "April april". Thomas Di Leva from happy covers turned to slow half-acoustic "När vi älskar". Plura had as usual calm guitar-pop cover of "Snurra Min Jord". Petter who released already 2 singles from the show and both are currently in Top-10 on iTunes presented probably his most enjoyable cover of "Tuff brud i en lyxförpackning". September who's also going to realese successful cover of Petter's "Mikrofonkåt" performed again dance-version of "Leva Livet" but in a colder electro-sound with different tune in chorus-line. There are three cross tribute-shows left (not sure about theme of the 8th one) - for Plura, Christer Sandelin and September, I wonder if September's going to sing cover for Christer's biggest hit "Vill ha dig" in Style that Petra did in the beginning of her career? Hope so as it was brilliant!

Here I'm gonna give you tips about some brilliant latest performances at Doobidoo as every year it provides some brilliant collaborations and this year is not exception.

Nina Söderquist came back to the spotlights at Doobidoo collaborating with actor Kim Sulocki, very soon Nina is going to give a birth to her first baby and to see her huge performance after gorgeous performance on Melodifestivalen-2009 ("Tick Tock" was the best and the most underrated song of the year after "Moving On" in my opinion) is completely amazing as Nina is natural born entertainer, I hardly can name another artist putting as many artistry and expression into any performance. It's completely crazy performance of GES' "En Jävel På Kärlek" and this is so damn lovely!!!

Jessica Andersson with comic Tomas Pettersson performed rock'n'roll version of Roxette's "The Look". Both particiated in Diggiloo tour this year so it wasn't the first experience of performing together and it turned to be as full of life as rock'n'roll can be.

And the third Doobidoo-duet is from Sarah Dawn Finer and Claes Malmberg making cover for Lisa Ekdahl's hit "Vem Vet". And which are the greatest moments of this duet?
1) Trumpet imitating by Sarah. How does she do it??? She could make acoustic concert with only her vocal and trumpet by her voice. She could dig beatbox also and it would be amazing show! Seriously!
2) Flashback to 1994 when Sarah as 13-years-old girl participated in another tv-show with Claes.
3) Sarah by default. Why should I give other reasons when Sarah is so adorable and worthy to see in any live performance?

Few weeks after release of comeback single "Ditt Hjärta" Jimmy Jansson's presenting brand new video!
Video is in nice way let us not only listen but see what is new Jimmy about - so we get more adult and deep image of schlager-Jimmy that we used to see before. It's all about sharp feelings in broken mirrors, Jimmy playing in red light with band and misterious girl leaving Jimmy in love drama.
If you didn't listen this beautiful pop-rock song with Kent's vibes and here's your second chance, not that I'm not give you another one but still you shouldn't miss it this time!

Last episode was devoted to love and all contestants had to sing their covers for someone very special in their life. First one was Andreas Weise who was singing Jackie Wilson's "Higher & higher" for his mom, this time performance was a bit too anonymous mostly because the song didn't suppose any aсcent on personality. Geir Rönning nominated to leave contest already twice performed Marvin Gaye's "I heard it throught the grapevine" for his wife - another complicated song-choise for Geir and though he was vocally perfect as always performance looked also a bit boring. Otherwise Minnah Karlsson got gorgeous Adam Lambert's "Whataya want from me" devoting it to her brother and though maybe it wasn't as brilliant performance as two previous ones but it was emotional, properly dark and beautiful. Jay Smith was singing 3 Doors Down's "Here without you" for his wife who helped him to fight with his drug-addiction so whole story was touching and as expected the song fit Jay's voice perfectly though I still find his performances lacking energy for rock performance. Linnea Henriksson devoted her cover of Nina Simone's "My baby just cares for me" to her boyfriend and made it in the most comfortable for her jazzy style another time showing what a great entertainer Linnea is, it doesn't matter if you love jazz or not it's just tonnes of Linnea in every move and look. Elin Blom was singing Alphaville's "Forever young" for her father and it turned to be her strongest performance in my opinion, she's made this song 100% her own, vocal sounded great and very touching. Finally Olle Hedberg devoted Tom Petty's "Free fallin'" to his brother and it easily can be called another Olle's highlight in his history of the show as it sounded very comfortable for his vocal and Olle looked charismatic as always.
Geir and Andreas collected the least number of votes and Geir has left competition right in his birthday. Due to odds Andreas has the biggest chance to leave this week with Elin and Minnah having equal odds right after.

Arash and dansband, weren't these things created for each other? No?! You're so wrong!
Recently Arash revealed how his music career has actually started! It happened in his previous dansband-project Abdullaz, it was ok that these guys didn't know Swedish enough but their hearts belonged to the most Swedish music genre and they intended to get with these songs straight to the hearts of Swedish girls, and really how charming was that! Unfortunately nothing lasts forever and guys has gone different roads but what if once we'll get this legendary project back? Swedish dansband can finally get a chance to go international with name of Arash, just imagine! Ah, check yourself below.

Ok, seriously, it's another gorgeous scatch from Gabba Gabba, hope no one Arash's fan got heart attack!