Anything she wants

One of the best things to happen recently for those of us who love Swedish music is Cutting Room's decision to open a blog documenting all the work they're doing, mainly on the technical production side of music (like mastering). They've been the first place to go to read about new singles from Nanne (a cover of Tomas Ledin's "I nätt ar jag din"), Linda Bengtzing ("Victorious"--so it's in English?!), Brolle ("Anything She Wants"), and many others. If you're not checking the site regularly, I recommend starting to do so now (though I've also been tweeting some of the highlights).

#74 Brolle, "Solo I Stockholm"

Jag är solo i Stockholm
Utan mening, utan mål
Solo i Stockholm
Och jag minns det som igår
Vi hade varann, två själar som brann och stan låg öppen för oss då
Solo i Stockholm

Elvis-like Brolle should count himself lucky that I write up this list in January and not, say, June. My original love affair with the Swedish power ballad-like "Solo I Stockholm" was in the first quarter of 2008, when I was constantly treading through snowy northern Sweden. The fact that we've been in winter storm mode here recently has once again brought "Solo I Stockholm" back into "season"--it's not a song for sunny summer days at all. In fact, there's no image that better sums up this song than the moment in the video where Brolle, walking and then running towards the camera in a snow-covered landscape, falls to his knees is despair, hands reaching up towards the sky pleadingly, and shouts that killer climax.

And oh boy, is it a killer climax. Remember how much I adored Martin Stenmarck's half-spit-out delivery of the peak of my favorite song of last year? This song has a moment in it that works in the same way for me. The sweeping strings and guitar drop out for a moment and a military drumbeat kicks in while Brolle continues singing and then, Brolle, no longer able to hold it in, shouts out "Jag är solo i Stockholm" (complete with the return of the regular instrumentation, of course, only amped up even more) in this epic wailing key change-y way that has him turning "Stockholm" in a giant dragged out word that suddenly seems completely crushing as well as completely amazing in the powerful adrenaline rush way that only pathos can give you. Love it. I swoon every time.

Incidentally, the video may be cheap, but the art direction for his covers this year was pretty great. I'm still kind of madly in love with the album cover (and title too, come to that):



In retrospect, "Det är hon" really should have made this countdown, too.

Find it on: Ett Hjärta Som Glöder, Som En Gång Brann