A magical mystery tour through Swedish music

I was upstairs playing video games with her younger brother, also 15 at the time just like me, when she yelled for us to come down and watch a music video that was playing on the now closed down channel ZTV.

With Maria’s blessing I turned to the TV and saw a young man in white converse, rolled up jeans, and a t-shirt that read: Softball Attitude.

Here he was, Håkan Hellström, running around on the streets of Barcelona singing about love, dreams, and escapism - about his life – about my life.

The soundtrack to my high school years had been written and it was called Känn ingen sorg för mig Göteborg. Håkan Hellström released his debut album in the fall of 2000 and not only did he write the soundtrack for many teenagers and young adults in Sweden and Scandinavia, he also made me pick up a guitar and grow a real interest in music.

And this is what this blog is about, music, and more so, Swedish music. Sweden is the third largest exporter of pop and rock music in the world and I will give you a brief introduction of what we have to offer except a man that used to wear a sailor suit.

Let’s start off big - ABBA - our most famous pop group and our biggest brand in the production of fiskbullar (not to be confused with each other) is what most international people think of when they hear the topic: Swedish music. I really understand that because if you manage to get James Bond to sing a duet with an Academy Award winner in a musical based solely on your songs, well you are pretty big.

Knowing me and knowing you I have a sense that we need to switch music genre.

Sweden is famous for bringing out a lot of young and trendy brands and The Hives and Sahara Hotnights are two bands that [at least used to] belong to this category. Indie-pop- and rock with Swedish artists singing in English is what I have been listening to a lot and other bands and artists that are worth to check out are: Mando Diao, Moneybrother, Teddybears, Caesars, The Plan, Broder Daniel, Bad Cash Quartet, and The Fine Arts Showcase.

Another artist that is really famous and big in Japan is Robyn.

With her in mind we jump to the second largest band that has come out of Sweden – Roxette. Why so you might ask. Well, Roxette exists of two people - Per Gessle and Marie Fredriksson, and the latter looks exactly like Robyn with an additional 20 years of life experience.

Roxette has sold over 70 million records worldwide and what many people outside of Sweden don’t know is that their songwriter – Per Gessle – is also a very famous solo artist here in his native home of Sweden as well as the founder of cult band Gyllene Tider.

With Gyllene Tider in mind we take a wide step outside the mainstream music scene and enter the Swedish country side. Raggarrock is a Swedish phenomena and is a music genre that raggare listens to. Raggarrock can be described as rockabilly music and our most famous rockabilly rebel is the late Eddie Meduza. “Raggar”-music is to Swedes what country music is to Americans and the most famous Swedish raggar-band is actually called Rednex. Very, eh, strange.

Now I have given you a concise preface to Swedish music with artists from a wide variety of different genres – but there is so much more to talk about, to listen to, to discuss, and to experience – and this is when you all come in to play.

What I want from you now is that you leave a short comment of your opinion on Swedish music.

It doesn’t have to be a long anecdote like my holistic first impression of Håkan Hellström – it just has to be something – a word or two.

It can be anything from the name of your favorite artist, a song you like, a link to a video you like, or anything alike relating to the topic. Be inspirational!

If I get enough material I will make a playlist based on your input and feedback.

It shall be known as An international taste to Swedish music and might become a Spotify sensation. 

Don’t be shy!

Love one another