Melodifestivalen 2009 Update - 8 participants announced

SVT (broadcasting channel of Melodifestivalen) has announced 8 of the participants for Melodifestivalen 2009 that will start in February:

* Alcazar - Stay the Night (Anders Hansson, Mårten Sanden, Andreas Lundstedt, Tess Merkel och Lina Hedlund)
* BWO - You're Not Alone (Fredrik Kempe, Alexander Bard, Anders Hansson)
* Caroline af Ugglas - Snälla Snälla (Caroline af Ugglas, Heinz Liljedal)
* Emilia - You're My World (Emilia Rydberg, Fredrik Figge Boström)
* Jennifer Brown - Never Been Here Before (Jennifer Brown, Peter Kvint)
* Lasse Lindh & Bandet - Jag Slåss I Dina Kvarter! (Lasse Lindh)
* Måns Zelmerlöw - Hope & Glory (Fredrik Kempe, Måns Zelmerlöw, Henrik Wikström)
* Sarah Dawn Finer - Moving On (Sarah Dawn-Finer, Fredrik Kempe

So it seems that the rumors of Alcazar, BWO, Mans & Sarah performing at this years festival are true. Alcazar will participate for the 3rd time while BWO is now participating for the 4th time. Mans & Sarah are both trying their luck for the second time.

Sanna, Shirley & Sonja

Apparently not only Charlotte Perrelli is releasing a Christmas album this month as her Swedish colleagues Sanna (Nielsen), Shirley & Sonja decided to team up and record a (all English) Christmas CD which will be released in two weeks time. It is called "Our Christmas" and includes 12 well known Christmas tracks:

1 Another Winter Night
2 All I Want For Christmas Is You
3 Oh Holy Night
4 Ave Maria
5 My Grown Up Christmas List
6 Christmas Song
7 Have Yourself A Merry Little X-mas
8 This Christmas
9 Driving Home For Christmas
10 Light A Candle
11 Silent Night
12 First Noel

Crush on David

This week I have been listening to American Idol winner (of the 7th series) David Archuleta. I must admit when hearing his first single Crush a while back I wasn't convinced at all. Though this week his album has leaked onto the internet and I thought why not give him another chance? I'm glad I did so cause I found out that Crush doesn't sound so bad after all, and even better; the album includes some amazing tracks.

Most of the songs remind me of the record What's Left Of Me by Nick Lachey. Especially David's songs Desperate & A Little Too Not Over You are definitely tracks in the same genre as What's Left Of Me and I Can't Hate You Anymore.
The album is being released November 11th featuring the below cover which, besides some great tracks, is another reason to buy it:




The regular edition has 12 tracks, the Wall-Mart edition includes a bonus track. On Itunes (and probably other digital stores) a deluxe version is available with a few bonus tracks.

Rimfrostjul tracklist

The tracklist of Charlotte Perrelli's forthcoming Christmas album has been revealed:

1 Rimfrostsjul (The Christmas Song)
2 Snöa på, snöa på (Let It Snow)
3 O helga natt
4 Hur kan man leda en kung (Who Would Imagine A King)
5 Mitt hjärta slår för dig (Little Drummer Boy)
6 Ave Maria
7 Mitt önskebrev till dig (Grown Up Christmas List)
8 Sen kom en vinter (Miss You Most At Christmas Time)
9 En släde för två (Sleigh Ride)
10 Som i en julnattsdröm (I'll Be Home For Christmas)
11 Dagen är kommen
12 Känner din värme (Maybe This Christmas)
13 Låt julen förkunna (Happy Christmas War Is Over)

This looks quite promising :) I can't wait to hear all the tracks!

Kylie re-releases X

On other CD news, Kylie is re-releasing her 2007 album X this December with a bonus disc. The new package will come with new artwork (though the artwork isn't completely new as it has been used for singles from the album) and will be titled "X Tour Edition". Back in 2000 Kylie also released a Tour Edition of her highly succesful album Light Years which then featured a 9-track bonus remix disc. Australia also got an additional bonus track (cover of the famous track Physical). The only interesting thing about the X Tour Edition is neither the cover art nor the tracklist but the fact that there will be released 2 different versions. For as now there will be an Australian Edition featuring the artwork of the UK In My Arms Singles that includes a 10-track bonus remix disc. Nothing spectacular, but always nice to have. I actually prefer the Australian Tour Edition cover art more than the original album art. Besides the Australian version of the X Tour Edition there will be an Asian edition featuring a picture from the photoshoot for the Australian single release of WOW. It will not include a bonus remix disc as with the Australian release but a bonus dvd including videos for 2 Hearts, In My Arms & Wow + behind the scenes for all three. So again; nothing spectacular, but always nice to have. That is when you are a bit of a fan... I mean why do you need an additional version of X when there are no new songs but only remixes already released on CDS & Itunes? Though I must not forget to mention that the Asian edition will feature four (already released on either singles or Itunes) bonus tracks/mixes. And then I also must mention that everyone connected to the internet or buying singles already has those tracks. So in the end I am wondering what is the point in buying this tour edition? And why did I already do so....

Early Christmas

It is going to be an early Christmas this year as the wonderful Charlotte Perrelli is releasing (an all Swedish) Christmas CD next week! Charlotte, most famous for her hits "Take Me To Your Heaven" & recently "Hero" only just released her latest studio album in April. About two years ago I bought a Swedish Christmas album by Magnus Carlsson ("Spar I Snon", if I remember correctly) which I totally love (when it is either Christmas or snowing of course), so this news is quite exciting I must say. It would be cool to see what Charlotte will come up with, only one more week to go!

Expensive months

As probably everyone knows, December is one of the most expensive months in the year. Christmas says it all. It is about dining and drinking (lots and lots of both) and spending money on gifts. Besides that there's also New Year's Eve with lots and lots of firework (and drinking?) which makes the month December even more expensive. On top of that we have another celebration in the Netherlands in December, called Sinterklaas. It is similar to the famous Santa Claus, which by the way we also celebrate). Sinterklaas is also about giving presents and lots of candies to each other (meaning spending lots of money AGAIN!).

Besides all of these, a lot of singers are releasing their new records during the last three months of the year. Of course I can not resist buying them all immediatly. Luckily I found out that Play.com is selling CDs for a very reasonable price compared to other internet sellers as you pay no shipping costs at all. Anyway here are some CDs that I recently bought and that are really worth the money:

Sugababes - Catfights & Spotlights
At first I wasn't really sure what to think about this since it is different from their previous records, though some songs of their last record Change come close. The lead single "Girls", which samples the famous track "Here Come The Girls" I think is a great track. Quite surprisingly it wasn't a no.1 hit in the UK Singles Chart as it only reached no. 3. The new album features a lot of ballad style songs which I must say is nice for a change. I can still remember the babes releasing "Stronger" a few years ago which had a huge impact on the charts. Unfortunately after ballads like "Too Lost In You" & "Caught in A Moment" it was all about the up- or midtempo tracks. A lot of songs on Catfights & Spotlights are recorded big warm ballad style making this new album great to listen to in dark winter times.

Sonja Aldén - Under Mitt Tak
I have always been a fan of Swedish music, which explains the posting about Melodifestivalen. Sonja Aldén is one of many Swedish artists who have been performing at this music festival. Sonja was born in St. Albans, United Kingdom, a town which I happened to visit in August this year though I did not know at that time that Sonja was born there. In 2006 she performed at Melodifestivalen for the first time with a great uptempo track followed by a ballad in 2007. The album she then released wasn't appealing enough for me. Last month however she released her second CD "Under Mitt Tak" with some amazing uptempo and ballad tracks. All is sung in Swedish of course, but what does it matter when the melodies are great?

Will Young - Let It Go
Never been really into Will to be honest. I must say Switch It On and Your Game are great tracks (only discovered those a few months ago) and his 3rd album Keep On has some good songs. But those are nothing compared to his latest release Let It Go. The first single Changes is a great track which failed a bit in making a big impact on the charts. Strangly it was voted no.1 on London's Capital 95.8 FM's London 10 Most Wanted for several weeks. Hopefully his second single Grace will do better. It has an amazing melody and great lyrics. There also is a Freemasons produced track on the album ("I Won't Give Up") and a very cool over-6-min track called "Love". Great album to listen to, but no good for dancing.

These records are only 3 of probably 10 I bought this month and there are still some cool ones being released over the next few weeks. I will have to make sure that I make enough hours at work to pay for all these extra costs...

Anyway that's it for now. I've had some very busy days the last week so that would explain why I did not post at all. Hopefully there'll be more time this week.

Melodifestivalen 2009 Update - Alcazar

I just noticed that the following message was posted on the official website of Alcazar about two weeks ago: "Stay the Night by Andreas, Tess, Lina, Anders Handsson and Marten Sandén is one of the 28 entries in next year's Melodifestivalen".

As I see it, there is now no doubt the song Stay The Night definitely will be sung by Alcazar in February.