I've been realizing that within the past few years my music collection is not only growing in the anglophilic way but in a Scandinavian (scandinavilic?) way as well. I've been amassing music from all four corners of Scandinavia, especially in the genres of electro and jangle pop. Oddly enough, as much travelling as I've done in Europe, I've never been to any of the Scandinavian countries, but I always have this image in my mind of clean, progressive places where post-secondary education is free and society is more open. And everything would be . Up until about four years ago, I hadn't really thought of Scandinavian music at all. Sure, I liked the Danish Raveonettes and Norwegian Sondre Lerche, and I didn't like the Swedish Hives, and I was well aware of the disco behemoth ABBA, the music video prowess of a-ha, and the fact a lot of pop tarts and boy bands had their songs written by Swedes, but I didn't really think about how many truly exceptional bands and artists come from the Nordic countries.
Sweden, especially Gothenburg, seems to dominate the music scene in what would seem a rather disproportionate way. In fact, it's such a prolific scene that there's an MP3 blog dedicated just to Swedish music: Swedesplease. The sheer amount of material coming out of that country deserves its own IKEA storage system, and I will not attempt to give any comprehensive look at Swedish music, let alone all Norwegian, Danish and Finnish music as well. For a start, you can visit specific record labels that focus specifically on Scandinavian artists (at the moment Labrador, Despotz and Cosy Den come to mind). Scandinavian artists pillage older genres like Motown, surf rock, synthpop, and jangle pop to come up with some of the tweest and memorable pop tunes. At the other end of the spectrum, Scandinavian countries also seem to produce a lot of death metal. I don't like death metal.
Sweden, especially Gothenburg, seems to dominate the music scene in what would seem a rather disproportionate way. In fact, it's such a prolific scene that there's an MP3 blog dedicated just to Swedish music: Swedesplease. The sheer amount of material coming out of that country deserves its own IKEA storage system, and I will not attempt to give any comprehensive look at Swedish music, let alone all Norwegian, Danish and Finnish music as well. For a start, you can visit specific record labels that focus specifically on Scandinavian artists (at the moment Labrador, Despotz and Cosy Den come to mind). Scandinavian artists pillage older genres like Motown, surf rock, synthpop, and jangle pop to come up with some of the tweest and memorable pop tunes. At the other end of the spectrum, Scandinavian countries also seem to produce a lot of death metal. I don't like death metal.
(Relatively Random Tangent: I also think Scandinavians have created the patent for visually striking blonde-brunette duos, starting with ABBA, but continuing through The Raveonettes and The Deer Tracks.)
Because I had so many Scandinavian artists, I decided to make this mix a bit of a megamix with 28 tracks. Of course Sweden has the lion's share of artists featured (The Knife, Alice in Videoland, Zeigeist, The Tough Alliance, Air France, The Radio Dept., The Deer Tracks, The Cardigans, Twig, Peter, Bjorn and John, Elenette, Blind Terry, Irene, Pelle Carlberg, The Mary Onettes, The Sound of Arrows, El Perro Del Mar, Club 8), but there are also bands from Norway (Don Juan Dracula, Lorraine, a-ha, Bedroom Eyes, Sondre Lerche), Finland (Viola, Cats on Fire) and Denmark (The Raveonettes, Mew, Windermere). You get your electropop from the likes of The Knife, Alice in Videoland and The Tough Alliance while you get some truly airy and pretty tunes from The Deer Tracks, The Radio Dept. and Mew and some wonderful C86 from Blind Terry, Bedroom Eyes, El Perro Del Mar and Irene. And check out the Edwyn Collinsesque vocals of Twig. So put on your cultural stereotype hat, grab some meatballs, quickly assemble a chair to sit on and take a listen. I'll call this mix No Death Metal.
You Take My Breath Away - The Knife
Candy - Alice in Videoland
Sad Eyed Disco Dancers - Viola
No Control - Don Juan Dracula
Pressurized Chamber - Zeigeist
Touch Me - Lorraine
Living a Boy's Adventure Tale - a-ha
1981 - The Tough Alliance
Collapsing at Your Doorstep - Air France
Pulling Our Weight - The Radio Dept.
Slow Collision - The Deer Tracks
Am I Wry? No - Mew
Here Comes Mary - The Raveonettes
Lovefool - The Cardigans
Indigo - Twig
There's a Sun - Windermere
(Here's One For You) Underdog - Bedroom Eyes
The Chills - Peter, Bjorn and John
Jag hatar män - Elenette
The White Mantled King - Cats on Fire
When Prefab Sprout Wrecked My Mind - Blind Terry
Baby I Love Your Way - Irene
1983 (Pelle and Sebastian) - Pelle Carlberg
Void - The Mary Onettes
A Very Sad Song - The Sound of Arrows
People - El Perro Del Mar
Track You Down - Sondre Lerche
The Girl With the Northern Soul Collection - Club 8
Weekly Mix #33 (Megaupload)
4 comments:
the link done broke.
@gab
I done gone fixed the link now. Thanks for the heads up.
@JC
I hadn't thought of The Wannadies (probably because I don't own anything by them), but they would also definitely be a good choice. I probably could have made many months of Scandinavian mixes. Who knows? There might be another one of these mixes in the next few months.
Is there any way you could replace the Lorraine "Touch Me" mp3? They finally put out their album (under the name Black Room, available on iTunes) "Touch Me" didn't end up on the album, and I've been hunting for it for ages. PLEASE help me out. Thanks
I'm looking for Lorraine's Touch me too.
PLEASE help us..
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