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The Local’s top Swedish songs of the month

The Local's resident music guru Paul Connolly is back with a selection of his favourite Swedish tracks to see you through the dark, post-festive days of January.

Published: 7 January 2015 10:07 CET
Updated: 8 January 2015 22:57 CET

The Local's top Swedish songs of the month

Gothenburg-based artist Jose Gonzalez. Photo: TT

1. Jose Gonzalez – Every Age

The Gothenburg-based melancholic is back with his long-awaited third solo album in February and this is a gorgeous taster.

2. Lo-Fi-Fnk – Can U Feel It?

This is in no rush to get anywhere fast. The perfect, chunky, trip-hoppy accompaniment to post-festitve blues.

3. Naomi Pilgrim – It's All good

Mapei and Seinabo Sey may have led the surge in Swedish soul but Ms Pilgrim is not far behind.

4. Wyclef Jean/Avicii – Divine Sorrow

Avicii’s cheesetastic tendencies are leavened by Wyclef Jean’s sublime vocals.

5. Ida La Fontaine – Anthem

Just a light acoustic taster ahead of the imminent full-fat big production version of this song.

6. Amason – Duvan

We tipped this band at the start of last year. They’re only just getting their act together now but it’s been worth the wait.

Watch all this month's videos on YouTube

Follow Paul Connolly's Spotify playlist

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New songs mark sixth anniversary of French star Johnny Hallyday's death

Hallyday, blessed with a powerful husky voice and seemingly boundless energy, died in December 2017, aged 74, of lung cancer after a long music and acting career.

After an estimated 110 million records sold during his lifetime – making him one of the world’s best-selling singers -Hallyday’s success has continued unabated beyond his death.

Almost half of his current listeners on Spotify are under the age of 35, according to the streaming service, and a posthumous greatest hits collection of “France’s favourite rock’n’roller”, whose real name was Jean-Philippe Leo
Smet, sold more than half a million copies.

The two new songs, Un cri (A cry) and Grave-moi le coeur (Engrave my heart), are featured on two albums published by different labels which also contain already-known hits in remastered or symphonic versions.

Un cri was written in 2017 by guitarist and producer Maxim Nucci – better known as Yodelice – who worked with Hallyday during the singer’s final years.

At the time Hallyday had just learned that his cancer had returned, and he “felt the need to make music outside the framework of an album,” Yodelice told reporters this week.

Hallyday recorded a demo version of the song, accompanied only by an acoustic blues guitar, but never brought it to full production.

Sensing the fans’ unbroken love for Hallyday, Yodelice decided to finish the job.

He separated the voice track from the guitar which he felt was too tame, and arranged a rockier, full-band accompaniment.

“It felt like I was playing with my buddy,” he said.

The second song, Grave-moi le coeur, is to be published in December under the artistic responsibility of another of the singer’s close collaborators, the arranger Yvan Cassar.

Hallyday recorded the song – a French version of Elvis’s Love Me Tender – with a view to performing it at a 1996 show in Las Vegas.

But in the end he did not play it live, opting instead for the original English-language version, and did not include it in any album.

“This may sound crazy, but the song was on a rehearsal tape that had never been digitalised,” Cassar told AFP.

The new songs are unlikely to be the last of new Hallyday tunes to delight fans, a source with knowledge of his work said. “There’s still a huge mass of recordings out there spanning his whole career,” the source said.

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