“Spellbound” challenger (“utmanare”) on Svensktoppen!
Posted: December 24th, 2016 | Author: David Myhr | Filed under: post | Tags: david myhr, elo, flykten till framtiden, jeff lynne, powerpop, spellbound, svensktoppen | Comments Off on “Spellbound” challenger (“utmanare”) on Svensktoppen!My last couple of posts have been about my latest single “Spellbound” (release post here, gala premiere report here, official video premiere here). But now on Christmas Eve there’s even more to report!
If there’s one chart that’s classic in Sweden it’s ”Svensktoppen” (“The top of Sweden”). As Swedish Radio P4 puts it (in my own improvable translation): “This is where you’ll hear the Swedish songwriter’s music, international as well as national hits in any language. The chart is voted by a statistically chosen jury and is one of the most important benchmarks of Swedish music”.
In any case, the list has existed since 1962. And through the years all big Swedish artists have appeared, all the way from Lasse Lönndahl (who by the way once heard me entertaining at an after-ski in Björkliden up in the Swedish mountains), Lill-Babs, and Sven-Bertil Taube via ABBA and Per Gessle (of Roxette fame) and recently Laleh, First Aid Kit, and Robyn.
Tomorrow Sunday, yes on Christmas Day(!), the ELO influenced song I wrote together with Jimmy Lagnefors for the movie Flykten till Framtiden after the brief from the director Ulf Malmros will be one of three ”challengers” (”utmanare” in Swedish). Not being quite a house-hold name in Sweden (yet!?) it will obvioulsy be difficult for me to “kick out” national legends like Benny Andersson (of ABBA fame!) and his orchestra , Magnus Uggla and new international star Zara Larsson. Things are not made easier by the fact that the two other challengers Nisse Hellberg and Cajsa-Stina Åkerström both are well-known names with great new songs (Cajsa-Stina’s song is produced by my friend and highly respected colleague Peter Kvint who I’ve talked about here and here).
Funny anecdote: My good friend, Andreas Dahlbäck, who plays drums on ”Spellbound” (and who also played drums on my debut album Soundshine), actually plays on both ”Spellbound” and both the other challengers’ songs. For the last few years I’ve always talked about him as one of the key people in the Swedish recording business, and this certainly proves my point.
Who knows what the verdict from the jury, consisting of 500 people supposedly representative for the Swedish people as a whole, will be. But in any case – no matter what happens after Sunday – I will definitely remember this as a ”mile stone” in my career. Or is it rather just a ”stepping stone”…? Time will tell!
My heartfelt thanks to Ulf Malmros for making a great movie that partly takes place in 1973 and therefore had the good taste of requesting an ELO song, to my close friend, Jimmy Lagnefors who invited me in on the opportunity to write the song (something I talk more about in this Hooks & Harmony interview and in this radio inteveiw with Hawaii radio show Time Machine).
I hope you all are enjoying your Christmas celebrations!!! Probably the perfect time (yeah, right…!?) to enjoy the official video for “Spellbound”:
Happy Xmas – War if Over!!! Let us have a Wonderful Christmastime!
From Wikipedia: Svensktoppen (Swedish: [²svɛnskˌtɔpːɛn]) is a weekly record chart airing at Sveriges Radio. Until January 2003, the songs had to be in the Swedish language. Svensktoppen has aired since 1962, except for the years 1982-1985. The last years before the January 2003 change, the programme was strongly dominated by dansband music.
