Popular music in Sweden
Swedish popular music, or shortly Swedish pop music, refers to music that has swept the Swedish mainstream at any given point in recent times. After World War II, Swedish pop music was heavily influenced by American jazz, and then by rock-and-roll from the U.S. and the U.K. in the 1950s and 1960s, before developing into dansband music. Since the 1970s, Swedish pop music has come to international prominence with bands singing in English, ranking high on the British, New Zealand, American, and Australian charts and making Sweden one of the world's top exporter of popular music by gross domestic product.[1]
History[edit]
Post-war[edit]
With the influx of American G.I.s into Europe in the 1940s, styles of American music seeded themselves into Swedish culture. Many Swedish dansorkestrar ("dance orchestras") played jitterbug, foxtrot, and swing music and other jazz-derived tunes for people to dance to. In the 1950s early rock and roll, as well as country music and German schlager also infused the market, influencing Swedish musicians to build upon these styles, gradually moving them away from jazz, which was turning more toward the avant garde.
Styles[edit]
Dance music[edit]
Ace of Base had the world's best-selling debut album with 23 million in sales for Happy Nation.[37] They achieved major success in the 1990s with popular songs such as "All That She Wants" (1993), "The Sign", "Don't Turn Around" (both 1994) and "Cruel Summer" (1998). All four songs reached the Top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100; "The Sign" spent six weeks at number one.
In the early 1990s the Swedish dance scene was very vivid. Denniz Pop was Sweden's most wanted producer of that time . In 1990 he produced Dr. Alban's first record "Hello Africa" together with Leila K. The song became a hit in mainland Europe peaking at No. 5 in Germany.
In 1992 Denniz Pop produced the second album by Dr. Alban, One Love which includes the worldwide hits "It's My Life" and "Sing Hallelujah".
.[38] That same year Leila K released her hit single "Open Sesame" (UK #23, Germany #5). This was followed in 1993 by a cover version of Plastic Bertrand's "Ça Plane Pour Moi" (Germany #13).
1994 saw the release of Dr. Alban's third album Look Who's Talking; the title track was a big hit throughout Europe (Germany #3).[39]
Rednex had several hit songs mixing country music and eurodance. The song "Cotton Eye Joe" was an international hit in 1994 reaching number one in the UK. The ballad "Wish You Were Here" was released in 1995.
The Hellacopters, a garage rock band that was formed by Nicke Andersson, was also formed in 1995.
Swedish pop music[edit]
In 1996 The Cardigans released their third album, First Band on the Moon. The song "Lovefool" was included on the soundtrack of William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet by director Baz Luhrmann. It found international success peaking at No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart. The following album, Gran Turismo (1998), was more electronic in style and contained the hit singles "My Favourite Game" and "Erase/Rewind".
"You and Me Song", by Swedish group The Wannadies, was a huge radio hit in the UK and Ireland in the mid-1990s. This song also ended up featuring on the Romeo + Juliet soundtrack.
Robyn was 17 years old when her pop singles "Show Me Love" and "Do You Know (What It Takes)" were released in 1997. Both singles were Top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100.[40]
In 1998 Meja's second album Seven Sisters was released. It contained the radio hit "All Bout The Money", which was peaked at No. 12 in the UK. In 1999 she recorded the duet "Private Emotion" with Ricky Martin, which reached No. 9 on the UK singles chart.
Eagle-Eye Cherry released his debut album Desireless in 1998. Propelled by the hit single "Save Tonight" (UK #5, US #6), the album sold over 4 million copies worldwide.
Emilia Rydberg is well known for her 1998-1999 international hit "Big Big World".[41] The song peaked at No. 5 in the UK.
Andreas Johnson had a UK #4 hit in 2000 with "Glorious".
Swedish songwriters/producers Denniz Pop and Max Martin have written worldwide hits for pop artists like Britney Spears, Backstreet Boys and later Celine Dion, Kelly Clarkson, Katy Perry, P!nk, Avril Lavigne, Leona Lewis and Jessie J.
Sweden has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 61 times since making its debut in 1958, missing only three contests since then (1964, 1970 and 1976). Sweden is the most successful competing nation at the Eurovision, with a total of seven victories in the contest, even to Ireland:
Sweden is the contest's most successful country of the 21st century, with three wins from ten top five results. In total, Sweden has achieved 27 top five results in the contest. Since 1959, the Swedish entry has been chosen through an annual televised competition, known since 1967 as Melodifestivalen. Sweden has hosted the Eurovision Song Contest six times and is the only country to have hosted the event in five different decades, three times in Stockholm (1975, 2000, and 2016), twice in Malmö (1992 and 2013), and once in Gothenburg (1985).