Maia is back in LA and we are back to old routines. For five days we worked twenty-four seven with Maia, and when she left it felt like breaking up a relationship :) It's such a shame she lives on the other side of the world, but we will definitely meet again, and write more great songs, in Malmö or LA.


Today we are in Stockholm writing songs with Peter Kvint and Alena Gibson. We started early by taking the train from Malmö at 6.14!, not our favorite time of the day, and when we arrived in Stockholm we went straight to Peter's studio.

A few more songs and seeds for songs are now waiting to be recorded and finished. We have tomorrow to do that before we go back to Skåne.






Tonight we were invited to an event where Marit Bergman played. We went there, had some food and drinks, and saw Marit play for a bunch of totally uninterested people from the music business. They seemed to think it was more important to talk to each other, than to listen to an artist playing live. Why are they even working with music?
We and some other music lovers crowded up around Marit and got a nice little intimate concert.


Now we are going to bed so that we can make some good songs tomorrow.

Report from the writing session

Ha, ha, ha... inviting Maia Sharp to come and write songs with us turned out to be a brilliant idea. It's not often that you find your perfect match personality wise or musical-reference-wise. Maia is both. During the four days she has been hear we have written three really good songs, and recorded them decently on Maisa's little portable equipment. We have also had time to see the best parts of our town, go to a party, eat Sunday brunch, and drink atleast 40 cups of espresso between the 5 of us, a few of them out in the spring-sun.
Tomorrow is our last day together. It’s a bit sad, but working as hard as we have done, kind of consumes your strength, so we could use a few days of.


Yesterday at dinner we started talking about other artists and idols, and found out that we are all crazy about Sheryl Crow, Feist, the Beatles and Imogen Heap and several other musicians. That’s probably the reason why it has been so easy to write songs, we like the same things.


Can’t write more now… need to work, work, work!

Gold Record!

As we suspected the meeting at Universal was about a reward. Our hard work paid off in a beautifully framed Gold Record, which will be positioned in very visible places in each apartment. A great proof of the support and backup we get from all you wonderful fans out there. Thank you for buying our record. Let’s hope that our next one will appeal to you too.

Recording

We have taken another step towards our second album! Thursday and Friday we spent at Tambourine Studio, to do a test recording of one of our new songs. It's nice, when you have been sitting all by yourselves, writing and arranging songs, to try the new material for real, with an outside producer.

Per Sunding, who produced one of our favourite albums, "Long gone before daylight" with the Cardigans, got to be that producer.
It was so refreshing to work with the songs from another angle, and to get his input on what we do. Per is known for being a good singing coach, and he lived up to that reputation. Everything was very relaxed, and even though you always feel a certain pressure when you stand in front of the recording mike, it was just enough to make you perform a little better.

It feels like Tambourine and Per could be a good alternative for the whole album. We will finish the song next week, and after that we will be able to hear the result.






Today we are on our way to Stockholm to play and have some meetings. Among other things we are meeting with Universal, they have asked us to come up and meet with them. We have a hunch of why, but we wont tell you until tomorrow! It’s probably good news though!

Rufus Wainwright

Went to Ystad tonight to see Rufus Wainwright at the "Ystad Theatre" (which Lisa claims is actually "Ystad Opera", but no one we have asked can confirm that, not even the owner, so the other three of us will keep calling it "Ystad Theatre"). Anyway, the concert was really good and inspiring. It was just he and his piano, and he and his guitar, very simple and intimate.
When he first came out on stage, he looked like any other teenage guy with clogs, a suit-jacket and "pottfrisyr", but when he started to sing he filled the whole theatre, and for an hour he had us all spellbound with his beautiful melodies and classical piano-playing. His voice is so intense and interesting, and it is always nice to listen to people singing their own music. There is a certain nearness in the lyrics, telling us a little about his life and thoughts, and you kind of feel you get to know the artist during the concert.
Hopefully we can go to work tomorrow and write some really good songs after this inspiration boost.


After the concert we had some champagne with Peter Larsson, who books the concerts at the theatre, and got us the tickets for tonight's show. We talked about our possible future gig at Ystad Theatre!
It's us and Rufus ☺

Working at Anna's place

Another day of putting our heads together and crumpling our brains, is to an end. We did an attempt to improve the lyrics to one of our Per Aldeheim-songs. Per is in Malmö to work with us for a couple of days, and we met at Anna's place, where we have built a little studio in the kitchen. (If you're cramped for space you have to use every corner of the apartment ☺)
There was no use starting to record the vocals, since one of the neighbours had decided to rearrange their furniture and drill some holes in their wall, but we managed to record some violin before we called it a day around 7 pm.
Tomorrow we will start again at 10 am. Fingers crossed that the neighbours are finished redecorating.