Swedish~ Stereo~

Last night results of Rockbjörnen-2011 voting were announced. Veronica Maggio can be considered as the biggest winner of the night winning Best song and Best female artist. As we expected all pop-boys were left without Best male artist and it's gone to Håkan Hellström. The Ark, Mando Diao and Daniel Adams-Ray were another Swedish winners. Below you can check whole list and some live performances - mini-gigs of Danny and The Ark, Salem al Fakir in his new music project Earpony, Amanda Mair singing canidates for the Best song nominee and Magnus Carlson with his recent cover of "Från och med Du".

Seems like we've found our another favorite of True Talent show.
Emma Fällman who participated in Idol-2006 together with Danny is back into the spotlight on True Talent show where Danny is in a role of judge.
Emma who sang Robyn's Indestructible has completely won over us with that sort of loud emotional rock vocal we use to fall for.
Another last episode's participant Emilie Irewald wasn't just ex-Idol but actually Danny's love back in school. You can check her performance here, we remember Emilie from Idol very well and liked her so looking forward what she'll be up with.

Yesterday Patti Smith and Kronos Quartet received year's Polar Music Prize awards.
Every year some Swedish artists are invited to perform covers of a honoured artists and this time it was Veronica Maggio, The Ark, Anna Järvinen and First Aid Kit who have managed touched Patti to tears. Evening has turned quite warm, sentimental and orchestra has brought some special charm we enjoyed last time on a Royal Wedding concert year ago.
You can check whole concert here and separate performances below.

Anna Järvinen - Distant fingers

Erik Hassle's song "Last Rider" from last autumn's "Taken EP" that we didn't expect to be promoted after Erik's newest album "Mariefred Sessions" was out has got a new life in a mix of quite well-known abroad Swedish DJ John Dahlbäck.
Hard club mix under the title "One Last Ride" has left its dreamy base of Erik's vocal line and got a proper explosive chorus that we enjoy a lot. Track was featured in DJ Tiesto's "Club Life" radioshow getting attention of international audience and you can check it below right now.

Annika Norlin has become quite famous and beloved in Sweden in the last few years under two artistic names - Hello Saferide and Säkert!
Initially Annika Norlin has come out into the highlight as a host on the radio and journalist, Sweden has got first sneak peeks of her own music in 2005.
Inspiration flow was quite massive and Annika's creative activity has gone in two flows - she performed her Swedish stuff as Säkert! and she was working as Hello Saferide in English that resulted in loads of music awards and 3 Top-10 albums.
Tomorrow Annika will release compilation of Säkert!'s songs in English "Säkert! På Engelska" and the first single she presented is "Can I" which has got simple but quite enjoyable video with very interesting idea. "Can I" is right that sort of melancholic acoustic pop you can expect from Annika so if you'll like this I recommend you to check her previous albums.

New Swedish discovery of TopDJ Records label Alaa El-Bechlaoui presents solid debut single "Keep Believing" - house-record with a big emphasis on expressive beautiful female vocal-part, gentle club-sound this label's DJs use to explore and radio-friendly quality.
Alaa is newcomer who previously worked mostly as remixer on collaboration single of Alex Sayz and Sibel "United As One" as example. Now he gets a mixing help for "Keep Believing" from Alex, you can check whole tracklist of single here and listen to radio-version below.

It has taken whole year to get a video for Wrethov's single "Runaway" Anderz has started his solo-career last summer with.
Probably to give this track reboot was right decision after promotion Anderz has got in media releasing "One Love One Goal" (Sweden's anthem at FIFA Women's World Cup if you've missed).
Though "Runaway" is quite delicious combination of RedOne pop and 80s rock feeling to our ears, video has got emphasis on a rock-side with long-haired guys, guitars and shaking camera in a beat of the drums.
I also recommend to check nice mix of "Runaway" from Denniz Jamm.

Earlier this summer Teddybears presented another single "Cho Cha" featuring Cee Lo Green and B-52's from "Devil's Music" album - pleasant purring track quite recognizable for both Teddybears and Cee Lo Green.
Recently this track has got a video - dark, creepy but filled with a nice batch of irony making it quite enjoyable. Here you can check it yourself.

Season of summer open-air tv-shows is over and as we've missed some really nice performances we're gonna summarize them all before Swedish tv will offer some new music autumn goodies.
Linda Pritchard's performance at Lotta på Liseberg was a real highlight of this season, girl could easily blow stage's roof away by her incredible voice singing her Melodifestivalen song "Alive", Christina Aguilera's "Show me how you burlesque" and classic hit "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going" from Broadway musical Dreamgirls.
As newcomer Linda has hard times proving she deserves love of Sweden but coming out on the stage she gives 200% of her own and it can't be left unnoticed by the audience.

Oh my God!!! We're so incredibly excited to announce that the most original and talented participant of Idol-2010 Linnea Henriksson is finally back right before the start of a new season.
Last autumn we've come from "wondering what this nice jazzy girl will show us" attitude to "it's the most crazy (in all possible senses) mix of talent and originality we've seen on Idol" delight. Linnea was our ray of light every Friday and now she has prepared something really delicious with the first single "Väldigt kär/Obegripligt ensam" that will be released already tomorrow and which is the first track from upcoming album to be out in the beginning of 2012.
"Väldigt kär/Obegripligt ensam" is written by Linnea with not less than Orup and produced by Carl Wikström Ask who was involved in a work on the latest Daniel Adams-Ray's and Veronica Maggio's albums. Result screams to be compared with Veronica Maggio's music but I can't, with Linnea's intimate vocal manner it's something closer to September's covers on Så Mycket Bättre, but it's a one wild and original piece of pop incomparable with anything we've heard in Sweden (it was supposed to be so with Linnea, right?). You can check full version of single below.

Loads of news things happen in Vincent's private life and in music.
First of all new album "Godspeed" will be released on Wednesday (we've already heard 5 of 9 tracks from it) and Vincent describes it as a turn from 60s, raggae and ska to acoustic and folk-rock.
Talking about private life currently Vincent and Agnes get a flat to live together still denying possibillity of collaboration though constantly being asked about in interviews.
Today Vincent has visited Nyhetsmorgon with his previous single "The Moment I Met You", just released one "Put your money where your money is" and brand new song "Little Boy"

Seems like since last year's "Ta Min Hand" we didn't have any bunch of Swedish artists gathering to perform some charity song so we've got such case now.
Tove Styrke, Amanda Jenssen, Daniel Adams-Ray, Jasmine Kara, Timbuktu, Pauline, Petter and many other artists united as Kedjan have recorded song "Ringar på vattnet", all income from sales will go to Somalis suffering from famine catastrophe in the Horn of Africa.
Talking about "Ringar på vattnet" it's nothing more that just a pleasant calm hip-hop track with soft melodic choruses but with its emotional background story it turns worth checking.

Viktorious is back from summer holidays with a bunch of new creative ideas and series of music videos presenting songs from his recently released EP "Best Of Viktorious Weekends" that is still one of the most interesting Swedish releases of this year in our list.
We're gonna tell you later about some amazing Viktorious's tracks we've missed here on blog and now you can check "Scandalous" summer cut and acoustic "Killing The Fun" video made with participance of Sugarplum Fairy/Le Kid Jonas. It's just a first of five Viktorious weekdays summer sessions, more to come here.

We were trying to run and hide from this release, it's not that sort of music we usually fall for, not because it's bad - just minimalistic electro isn't what our pop-soul really needs but there's something really magic in it bringing us back to listen to it over and over again.
Emma Nylén under artistic name Emmon has appeared in Swedish electronic music in early 00s being mentioned by local radio, performing on many festivals and making remixes for bands like The Knife and Melody Club. However her debut single "Wake Up Time" was released only in 2006 with 2 albums to follow.
New Emmon's album "Nomme" is another delicate electronic work with pretty special sound presented well with two singles "Distance" and the latest "Ghost Dance" - mysterious melodic track with quite hypnotic dark video that you can check right below.

Stockholm-based Tantrum to Blind has presented brand new video for the latest single "Liar Lines" and we fall for it immediately.
Tantrum to Blind was officially founded in 2008 but started to release their music only this spring. First single "Get Get Get" has shown the band as Swedish answer to Paramore and debut album "Walk Out" has proved that first impression. It's alternative rock with a huge dose of punk but much more melodic, less screaming and vocally pleasant sometimes making me think about All Ends but definitely not so heavy. "Liar Lines" is exactly one of those steps from Paramore line to alternative female-rock side. Truly refreshing stuff!

Few weeks before TV4's classic autumn Idol show TV3 starts its own chase for fresh artists in new programme True Talent. The concept is pretty different comparing with Idol but pretty similar to a new The Voice show becoming popular worldwide. It's all about a vocal, first of all members of jury (Danny, Pernilla Andersson and Tommy Körberg) have chosen candidates by sent demos and yesterday it was a turn of public separated by three sectors (of different age categories - 9-19, 20-49, 50-100) and voting for every of performer to decide how true these talents are.
Personally we were positively shocked to see Anna Nordell (Engh) among performers, we're completely in love with this artist and though yesterday Anna was crying from happiness more than singing, we forgive these emotions and wish loads of luck to her!
Among other candidates we also liked Gonzalo Yanez, Sofia Olsson and Sara Kreft a lot. You can check whole show here.

Third Vincent's single "Put Your Money Where Your Money Is" from the second album is unleashed and presented on artist's soundcloud page.
"Put Your Money Where Your Money Is" follows the line of two previous singles, particulary it feels like a sister-track of "The Moment I Met You", it's a small lovely tune that doesn't scream to be a hit and not that poppy as songs from the first Vincent's album but is lovely on its own.
Though this year's Vincent's singles initially were not accepted directly by audience singer was touring all the summer and songs were played well on the radio so there's a chance this time new Vincent's formula will work better.

Peter Jöback never leaves his fans without new releases longer than for a year. New Peter's album "Livet, Kärleken och Döden – La Vie, L’Amour, La Mort…" that will be released on October 19th is a compilation of French songs covered with Swedish lyrics written by Säkert and Andreas Mattsson (album will also contain 3 original tracks).
Peter has presented the first sneak peek of the album - cover of old French song "Comme d'habitude" (known also as "My Way" in Frank Sinatra's performance) at Allsång på Skansen. Song has got a title "Precis Som Vanligt" in Swedish and it sounds like you could expect Peter Jöback's ballad in orchestral arrangement (we're sure it won't be miles away in studio version), it's beautiful and classy with a taste of old musicals. You can also check another cover of Jacques Brel's "Jacky (Jacques Brel song)" - "Jackie" to appear on "Livet, Kärleken och Döden" on Peter's site.

Roads of Johan Becker and Star Pilots have diverged few years ago soon after a big breaktrhough with some big hits like "In the Heat of the Night", "Higher" and Chesney Hawkes's cover "The One And Only".
This year Johan has started working on his solo-career as Bekker. To our great pleasure first single "Runaway" that was written by such a great names like Didrik and Sebastian Thott and Sharon Vaughn has become a great dance-record in a vein of Agnes's "Release Me" (Sharon was one of songwriters behind "Release Me") but still with Johan's vocal leaving a feeling of a new Star Pilots's song.
Now we get another single "Right On Time" and again it's absolutely brilliant dance-track but this time Star Pilots's dramatical verse's line meets pure joy of Timoteij/Suzzies orkester's "Dansar i månens sken". Listening to the track you can catch yourself on a thought about lack of that recognizable beat template that appears in all Star Pilots's songs but at the same time it gives a nice refreshing effect to a whole concept.

Le Kid presents new (fifth!) single from upcoming album "Oh Alright" and this time we're delighted to say it's our most favorite track - "We Are the Drums".
Since Le Kid's arrival band had a hard fight for its future in Sweden, all of Le Kid's hit-strikes were pretty tough and a new album looks like a one big pop-gem and it's gonna be out just in two weeks (yes, we said it like thousand times but it was postponed again and again and though band has 6 tracks more as potential singles before album release we do hope "Oh Alright" will be out in September).
"We Are the Drums" is a real pop-dynamite exploding from the very beginning of the track, flirting with a listener in a verse and growing to a huge sing-along chorus of recognizable Le Kid's ultra-sweet style but at the same time incomparable with any other band's tracks. It was born to be a hit and we keep our fingers crossed for it to happen!

We don't use to write about this sort of acoustic pop-stuff a lot but I feel like we ignored this singer too long so it's time to tell you about her.
Melissa Horn is relatively new Swedish artist who has come to the spotlight just a few years ago but has managed to make Sweden fall in love with her calm lovely guitar pop and to give Top-10 to both of her albums. Latest one has got a golden status and was nominated to Grammis.
Third Melissa's album will be out in September and new single "Under Löven" which is already in the top of iTunes chart promises a lot for a new stage of young artist's career. "Under Löven" is quite Sonja Aldén-breathing track, just a bit more melancholic and lacking high notes but we really get this song's charm and recommend it to you as well.

The rest of Ulrik Munther's debut album "Ulrik Munther" has leaked on youtube and if you've missed all previous series of this long leaking story you should check all of Ulrik's album tracks below.
Talking about last two tracks to come out - "King Of Our Days" is undoubtedly one of the best Ulrik's songs in "Since You've Been Gone" explosive teen pop-rock manner with especially charming pre-chorus part, "Heroes In Defeat" is a darker pop-rock song with another lovely building tune, not the best track but too good to be a filler as well.

Eric Saade celebrates new victory - his summer single "Hearts In The Air" has become golden hit in Sweden.
Autumn is full of new plans for Eric is the second part of his latest album will be out very soon, there's no exact release date yet but you can already order signed copy of it.
Though official release of "Hearts In The Air" hasn't got any mixes two Russian DJs - Ivan Martin and Tom Chaos have come up with a brand new mix that sounds pretty epic and utterly infectious. We wish it could be released officially!

In the middle of 00s The Cardigans' Nina Persson and music producer Gudrun Hauksdottir have decided to create a band for a big Dolly Parton tribute concert as one-time event.
Unexpected success has pushed this new country-band Dollykollot consisting of Nina Persson, Cecilia Nordlund, Lotta Wenglén, Helena Josefsson and Gudrun Hauksdottir to arrange more gigs around Sweden and perform on different festivals.
This spring Swedes could watch documentary about Dollykollot "Jag är min egen Dolly Parton" in cinema and now it's out on DVD with a compilation "Dollykollot" that you can check here and watch girls' performance in Skavlan earlier this year.

If you're big fan of Swedish pop and gonna be in Sweden this Christmas you should know that Sanna Nielsen plans new Christmas tour Stämningsfullt around Sweden in November-December, it's gonna be acoustic, very intimate and it's the first time for the recent few years when Sanna doesn't take her friends (Shirley and Sonja), this time only Sanna's boyfriend Joakim Ramsell is going to join her.
We don't know if it means we'll get Sanna's acoustic compilation soon but below you can check how it's gonna sound live.
Did I promise that you won't manage to miss Swedish Christmas pop before I'll get back to news about another season? Here we go!

Yesterday SVT had a premiere of "Gäster med gester" classic tv-show's new season.
Two celebrities camps are invited to play charades with every their member to step out on the stage showing some phrases.
Biggest highlights of this night for us were Nanne and Lena Philipsson, you can watch Nanne showing "Tough feminist reluctantly attracted to plump male chauvinist in tanga in tango" and Lena with "Lady Gaga rots in a meat dress and sew blisters from lettuce" below - it's too weird to be sure I've translated it right but funny enough not to care about it. You can watch whole show here.

New Roxette's "Speak To Me" video is out and just like the video for the latest Swedish single "Way Out" it's another documentary cut.
To be honest this track deserved much more, in Bassflow version it has become the biggest music highlight of Roxette's comeback to us and we expected single to get a heavier promotion and proper music video.
However band has released "Greatest Hits" compilation in US recently and currently records songs for another album being on tour so probably guys save resources for a new stuff.

Here I've got something perfect for your Saturday night, guys!
What can happen when epic club hit with completely alright but not properly epic vocal line meets another hit with crazy good vocal line performed by one of Sweden's best singers?
Something much poppy and catchy than the first one but more epic and dancey than the second one. One of the best mashups I've heard in recent weeks.

Sommarysset finishes its season with performances of two Melodifestivalen winners and popular Swedish divas Lena Philipsson and Jill Johnson.
Jill Johnson performed new track "Flirting with disaster" from upcoming album to be released this September and Lena has chosen two of her old hits "Månsken i augusti" and "Jag ångrar ingenting". This summer we watch every Lena's live performance as degustation of what (or to be exact - how) she's gonna present at new season of Så Mycket Bättre and during performance at Sommarkrysset Lena's gonna be on fire of Swedish folk's love this winter as it was all sorts of amazing!

New Tove Styrke's track "Call My Name" has arrived on Swedish radio and if you'll ask me how good is it I'll answer it's as good as debut single from new Tove's album should be!
Last time we talked about Tove (that was actually just a few days ago) we've heard some rumours about new Tove's album but there was no (and there's no still) any official information about it or any details of how "Call My Name" will be released but as the song is here we can expect some goodies from Tove very soon.
"Call My Name" is much tougher than any of previous Tove's singles, it's still dancey electronic pop that is actually very Kylie-smelling, it's a disco on steroids and this time we can say confidently - girl is ready to conquer the pop-world!

Earlier this year Johanna Elkesdotter has presented brand new track "Can't Stop Loving You" that we've mentioned talking about their fantastic duo with Anderz Wrethov "Hardcore Love".
We still really enjoy this wonderful summer tune with recognizable Wrethov's dance-production and lovely Johhana's voice a lot and were really glad to get its live acoustic version slightly breathing with acoustic "My Heart Is Refusing Me" - very beautiful and dramatic.

This week The Moniker has got not the most desirable awards appearing in black list of Café magazine as one of the worst dressed Swedish celebrities of 2011.
But still Daniel enjoys his Melodifestivalen fame and visits different TV-shows coming to Sommarlov today.
Besides his biggest hit "Oh My God!" he also performed another nice track "I'll Drag You Up" from "Maktub" album.

Gravitonas's debut album is planned to be released already this year around October but before it we've got a bunch of songs guys have delivered to soundtrack of new Swedish movie "Jag Saknar Dig".
Soundtrack compilation consists of three songs from SoFo Records' rock-band AiluCrash ("Together", "Turn The Tide (Cilla Turns)" and "Jag Saknar Dig") which are gonna be released as well at their upcoming album in September and three songs from Gravitonas ("One Day", "You're Killing Me", "I Miss You") which can sound quite unusual for those who can expect them to be follow-ups of dark misterious synth-pop we've got used to. All songs have prevailing acoustic rock-ballad sound, they're pretty light by mood and only Andreas' voice won't let you get a doubt that it's not Gravitonas.
We've started this day with a thought that it's not a single stuff but still quite good and finally we think that "One Day" and "You're Killing Me" are really great songs, unexpected for Gravitonas but if you'll forget about original band's style you'll realize how cool these tracks are on their own. Here we've made a small sampler for you to check.

Last winter electronic artist Firefox AK has presented brand new single "Boom Boom Boom" that we've caught into the spot and still enjoy so much.
When new album "Color The Trees" was out one week ago we expected this work to be heavily synth-based, melodic and partly dancey. The only thing we guessed right is that it's very melodic, every tune is passed through the heart, polished in the studio and delivered in all its beauty. But it has turned to be not so electronic, melancholic pop-rock component feels much better and relaxed vocal manner of Firefox AK sounding a bit like Nina Persson leaves impression of The Cardigans experimenting with electronic music.
Today Firefox AK was singing two tracks "The Wind" and "Running On My Own" from the album in Nyhetsmorgon and showed quite good what you should expect from new album.

Few days ago we told you about new Eric Amarillo's single "50 kvm" that raised loads of our nostalgic feelings connected with The Attic's masterpice album "The One" (re-released also as "Remember Tomorrow"). Now we've got a premiere of new Eric's video.
Video is just a cut from ordinary day of Eric walking round the city, singing in the studio and performing some open-air gig, it all goes with a light sadness feeling, actually as a track itself but those dramatical keys will always stay very special and delicious part of The Attic's concept we adore so much.

Protégé of Hitworks label (Neo, Anniela) Ida Pihlgren aka I.D.A presents her new single "Sha La Laa" and documentary of making process of upcoming album "Pink Explosion".
We've noticed I.D.A back in 2009 when she has released pretty amazing single "Dangerous", to be more exact we've hopelessly fallen for electro rock mix that we really recommend to you. Ida is not newcomer though, she participated in the last Fame Factory season with Linda Bengtzing, Alexander Schöld, Sandra Oxenryd and Sailon and for the latest few years has managed to release the album and few singles.
Now I.D.A's back after a short break and new track "Sha La Laa" sounds as awesome as we expected with its aggressive mix of rock and electronic music that is a bit like Anniela meets P!nk to us. You can also check interesting video of I.D.A in studio and get a taste of new album that will be out already next week (Hitworks never wastes too much time on promotion and multiple singles before albums releases and as listeners we actually appreciate it).