Release Me

Sorry for the disappearance. Its been a bit non-stop since I've been back. Its all a bit odd actually, I've just slipped back into life here, and feel like I've picked up where I left off. Like Finland never happened. Its hard to think I'm going back again in just a few days. But its nice to know life doesnt move too fast here, and that I havent missed much while I've been away, that my friends are still here for when I come back.

As for my birthday, it was a lot of fun. Well, actually, the friday night out with my friends was great. Saturday morning I woke up with a hangover and a stinking cold (what is it with me and colds this year, I swear I'm never normally this bad), and then there was the bizarre behaviour of my cat leading to a trip to the vets, and the news that I may not make it to Russia as planned due to a few problems with the Visa. But I decided to try and forget all that for my actual birthday on the sunday, for which I went for a carvery at a posh hotel in the country :) Ate way too much and was in bed by 5pm though! Really feeling my age then :p

Anyway, as for the post title, I just saw Agnes' video for Release Me on the box (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSb6e3grdL8). I heard she was releasing stuff over here, but hadnt heard the song before. I had seen it around but thought it was Leona Lewis :/ I paid better attention this time though, and am pleased to see her doing quite well over here with this song. Its a funky song, and deserves to do well.

All the battles I lost and the battles I won, this will be the one

Just how perfect is Hope & Glory as an acoustic ballad? Gosh I've been so madly hyper all day, but this has just taken me by surprise and calmed me down and I'm swaying along. Beautiful.

General Musings on Life and Melodifestivalen

The last few days have been quite confusing for me. Potentially exciting, but still my head has been a bit all over the place. Its been quite a week in limbo as such. I returned from Lapland and went pretty much straight back to work. the result of this was having a nice long nap yesterday afternoon, before then staying up till 5am! And then today has been tidying my room in an attempt to locate my missing Finnish sim card so that I can do my laundry and think about repacking for my trip to Tallinn and Riga next weekend! Yes, I am a busy bee indeed. Its great though, I feel like the time is really ticking away. I'm already dreading having to leave this beautiful country. Really, I'm loving it so much. Even if it can be a little lonely at times...

Aaaaanyway. In other news, Måns Zelmerlöw is going to be in the second semi for Melodifestivalen this week. I have never watched it before, but I love Måns very much, and am excited about the new material that should be getting a release very soon. Hopefully before my return to Stockholm around July :) The song is called Hope & Glory, and you can listen to a clip of the song here. I have to admit I was a bit dissappointed on first listen, its not quite as 'cool' as Cara Mia, but actually after a few more listens I've decided its rather catchy, and just unashamedly poppy. I just hope that when I hear the whole thing along with the performance it will blow my socks off, hehe.

As for last weeks Melodifestivalen, I still haven't got round to listening to the songs that have actually made it to the final, but instead had a listen to Marie Sernaholt's and Jonathan Fagerlund's songs. Marie's is rather cool funky pop, and I like it. Jonathan's is more along the lines of the unashamedly cheesy pop, but I love it. It gets stuck in my head a lot, so will no doubt keep listening to it for a while yet. In fact, here's the performance...

Afraid to take a chance and join you in the light

I know its old, but I've become just a little bit obsessed with this song...



I mentioned him earlier in a post about Melodifestivalen. He's in the first semi this week, but then so are a lot of other good (and more well-known) artists. I won't be near a computer to watch it anyway, so will just have to wait to hear what happens. Good luck Jonathan!

Melodifestivalen... Could be interesting...

My laptop is being rather disagreeable lately, but lets see if I can do a bit of updating. Before I get into the third Finnish esc selection show, I want to say a few words about Melodifestivalen. I've never really followed it before, but after hearing that both Måns and E.M.D. would be taking part this year, I thought I'd have a little look around the website. I have learnt many things in the last 30minutes. Some good, some haunting to the very core of my being...

* The favourite to win is a chap called Marko oolio (I believe he's favourite... just. With Måns in close second). Anyway, he's from Lahti! He's a Finn. Haha, he should so win. That would make me laugh. Except of course, I want Måns to win :)
* Måns's song (is that the right punctuation? who knows) sounds like it will be awesome. Am very excited :) In fact anything new from Måns can only be a good thing :)
* I'm also intruiged by a bloke called Jonathan Fagerlund... He looks Finnish to me, but apon googling, it seems he is most definitely not. Either way, he seems to have a good voice. No match for Måns mind you :)
* E.M.D.'s song (again with the stupid punctuation!) actually doesnt sound as bad as I was expecting. Not that I was expecting bad, but the title of the song (Baby Goodbye) makes me think of Friday Hill's song everytime. Thankfully its supposed to be an uplifting song, so I'm guessing a 'You're no good for me, I'm breaking up with you, goodbye' song, not a 'I'm so sad we're breaking up, boo hoo, insert chav rap, more boo hoo' type song. Ahem.
* However the most disturbing thing I learnt was with regards to a miss Amy Diamond. She irritates me without even listening to her music, which just tips me over the edge. So I was sad enough to learn she is entering again this year. More disturbing however, was to find out that she spent many years growing up in Bishop Stortford, Hertfordshire. Yes, thats right people, she was growing up in my beautiful home county of Hertfordshire, a mere 15minutes drive away! It gives me chills just thinking about it. I used to think Bishop Stortford was a nice place. This news has tarnished it for me now. It will never be the same again :(

But yay! Måns! :) :) :)

(Can you tell I'm excited about Måns?)

Can Anyone Hear My Song?

So, I've been really slack on the blogging front lately. I guess it feels like time is running out, so have been spending as much time as possible hanging out with soon-to-be-departed friends. When I have been home though, I've been spending a lot of time listening to the new CDs I purchased in Stockholm. Here is one song I've been listening to a lot...

Will I Ever Be By Your Side?

So while I was out of the loop, there have been a couple of new videos added to the hard2beat website, home of Basshunter, September and Sash!. It appears that Mr Basshunter has a new video out. And he actually features in it alot! The girl is back, but the boyfriend has been ditched, which means Mr B can make his move - oh er. The latest single will be Angel in the Night (a brand new track, not a remix of a Swedish original as far as I can tell). First impressions were of a remix of a busted song, but after a few listens it becomes quite catchy.

To see it on the hard2beat website, click here. If you have a look around the site you can also find a rather cool competition to meet Basshunter at a gig in Austria.

Also on the website though is the new video for Sash!'s latest single, Raindrops. Me and Rach had the pleasure of seeing Sash! back in February (unfortunately no interview though), and he was very good with a strong back-catalogue of music. Bit disappointing then to find that the new single samples Encore En Fois rather than being a completely new track, but perhaps this is just to remind people who he is?.. Anyway, its quite a good track, and the video is very... wet, shall we say.

Lay Your Love On Me

I was just thinking yesterday about how I was neglecting the Swedish music a bit lately. Then today I switch to Smash Hits, the good old cheesy pop music channel. This week is their Perfect Pop Week apparently and lo-and-behold what are they playing - BWO! Hurrah. Sadly I only caught the end, but it always makes me happy to see them on the telly. In fact I first came across BWO on British music channels (possibly Smash Hits) when I watched the video to Chariots of Fire. I've since seen Sunshine in the Rain on their too. If only more radio stations/music channels were willing to show stuff from popular foreign acts. If other channels played BWO then I'm sure their popularity would really grow over here. Anyway, here's the video for Lay You Love On Me;

All I Ever Wanted Was You And Me

Lookie at whats been put up on the Hard2Beat website - its a video of Basshunter performing All I Ever Wanted in London a couple of weeks ago. Hopefully the rest will follow soon :)

Our Evening With Basshunter

Ah, what a night. As I've already mentioned, I had no idea what it was all about, and it wasnt made much clearer when we turned up. After a good 30mins in the reception area (being hassled by a indie-girl with a hand-held camera and bombarded with glowsticks), we were shown down to the studio. Speaking to the guy from Hard2Beat that organised it all, he said loads of people had phoned up and dropped out, which meant we would all get the chance to meet and chat with Basshunter but also meant they dragged a load of children of the street to make up numbers.

We were taken down to the main studio where there was a little square stage surrounded by camera's and lights. We were given a safety talk (dont stare into the lazer! - enough to rival Charlotte Perrelli) and then Basshunter came on, looking lovely. He performed All I Ever Wanted... and then did it again. This was the routine for the evening. Do a song, do it again, touch up the make-up, do another song, then maybe do the first again. He did five songs in total; All I Ever Wanted, a new one I dont know the name of, I Can Walk on Water, Now Your Gone, and Please Don't Go. Obviously Now Your Gone was a highlight, but the new one was also really good.

I can safely say that Basshunter is a complete nutter. It didnt seem to phase him that the crowd resembled a school field trip as apposed to the usual rave crowd he's probably used to seeing. And between songs he was chatting a joking about all sorts of things, and even tried to teach us some Swedish. He went through about 4 outfits (it was so hot in there) and he looked equally gorgeous in each.

The final costume change was for the Question & Answer session, where most of the questions came from the kids. But we did learn that as a teenager Basshunter discovered sneezing on a girl is not the best chat up line, and that he's still scared of the dark... aww. After the Q&A sesh, he signed some photos for us to take home. The kids immediately snatched them from him and left happy while the rest of us then each got to sit with him on the sofa for a while, take a pic and some also asked him to talk into their phones as they recorded a little video of him. Rach and I didnt bother with that, but instead asked if he had plans to enter Melodifestivalen this year. Sadly not, he seems to think theres too much political voting (yawn) but said maybe in a few years. Could you imagine - Basshunter at eurovision, haha.

All in all, a very bizzare evening, but definately one to be remembered. Basshunter is actually a pretty cool guy. Very laid-back and willing to have a chat and muck about. I guess it was pretty intimate so he was more relaxed, but you get the impression he wouldnt let anything pahse him. Apparently the edited version of the evening will be on the hard2beat website in a couple of weeks, so will definitely link it when its up.

Basshunter in London

Thanks to a tip-off from EQ about a competition to win tickets to a secret Basshunter gig, I will be off to see him tomorrow night. Its all a bit mysterious - 6pm? Studio? Willingness to be filmed? I wonder what its all for. Well I'll know within 24hrs. Also makes a good excuse to hang out with Rach in London for the day. What could be better!

Oh Brother

I do enjoy a bit of Swedish stuff along with all the Russian music I listen to and one of my favourite Swedish artists is Måns Zelmerlöw. A long time ago I came across an acoustic version of Cara Mia, which came on the iPod today and made me want to find it again (I lost a lot of the music on my iPod when my last laptop died). Searching youtube, I came across a studio version of it (which you can listen to here) but I also found an acoustic performance of Brother Oh Brother, which I'm liking even more. So here it is;