Shazam around the world: Swedish pop’s unstoppable rise.
Having Sweden as main hub, Scandinavia is becoming a new Mecca for popular music. Be it leftfield indie, Chamber pop, Balearic Beats or 80’s retro infused electrodance; there’s not a single week passing without a new artist or DJ being discovered and joining a growing list of critical favourites such as Lindstrøm, Tough Alliance, jj, Air France, Studio or Annie. Here’s a look at a few recent releases coming from Swedish shores.
The most popular of them is Victoria Bergsman’s latest project Taken By Trees. The former singer of The Concretes – also the female voice in Peter, Bjorn & John’s whistling great ‘Young Folks’- released ‘East Of Eden’, the second album under her new moniker, to widespread acclaim. In one of the record’s highlights, she even dares to cover what’s probably 2009′s most iconic song, Animal Collective’s ‘My Girls’, changing its genre to ‘My Boys’ and turning it into a tropical feast.
The Male duo seems to be one of the preferred formations in the new Swedish pop. The latest of them is The Sound of Arrows, formed by Stefan Storm and Oskar Gullstrand, a couple of friends from Gävle, who began their project trying to write a Christmas song but failed to deliver on time due to lack of recording knowledge. The pair persevered and released a first EP in 2008. They glimpse at 80′s synth pop in a similar way to bands like The Tough Alliance. ‘Into The Night’ is their promising first UK single, anticipating the arrival of their first full-length work.
Covering more experimental ground, Wildbirds and Peacedrums are a married couple from Gothenburg, Mariam Wallentin and her husband Andreas Werliin. Mariam’s vocals are often compared to Björk’s; while they claim to have a wide palette of influences from blues and alt country to drone, avant-jazz or the weirdest psychedelic folk. Their second album ‘The Snake’ was released in 2008, but its unique qualities have helped it to still being discovered all around the world. ‘My Heart’ is the latest single taken out from it.
And the best kept secret within the lot, mainly due to the fact that they sing in Swedish, is [Ingenting]. This six-piece band from Stockholm already have three albums in the market; the latest of them, ‘Tomhet, idel Tomhet’, is an spectacular exercise on lushly produced pop that combines the band’s penchant for classic indie-rock influences –Velvet Underground, epic Phil Spector wall of sounds, Pixies, Beach Boys – with the chamber pop values of artists like Camera Obscura or Ed Harcourt, with whom they share producer Jari Haapalainen. The record’s stand out track, ‘Halleluja!’, is a bona fide pop classic that could make the band transcend the boundaries of their country, whilst still being faithful to their native language.
