FOLLOW me on my popular Twitter feed. Just click this photo! @hbbtruth - David - Common sense on #Politics #PublicPolicy #Sports #PopCulture in USA, Great Britain, Sweden and France, via my life in #Texas #Memphis #Miami #IU #Chicago #DC #FL 🛫🌍📺📽️🏈. Photo is of Elvis and Joan Blackman in 'Blue Hawaii'
Beautiful Stockholm at night, looking west towards Gamla Stan
Taggiga törnen i blomsterängen! Nu hoppar Johanna av Timoteij för att det är ”svårt att jobba med sina bästa vänner”. http://t.co/isEIadL5nH — Nöjesbladet (@ABNojesbladet) April 17, 2014
Jag har beslutat att lämna Timoteij! Tusen tack till alla fina fans för allt ni har gjort och gör! 😘 pic.twitter.com/lTcsjBblSK — Johanna Pettersson (@tweetsbyjohanna) April 17, 2014
Guess this decision means we'll never see that Kom video after all, eh?
That Timoteij vid they filmed recently isn't for a new song. It's for an English version of Kom, which they will release internationally :( — scandipop (@scandipop) August 16, 2013
Sounds completely crazy as an idea, this mixing of Country House and schlager, but brilliant and dynamite as a reality, as heard on Sveriges Radio'sP3Stockholm last Thursday.
Three different people in Sweden I'd never heard from before, separately emailed me this link and their comments since last week, which is very odd to say the least.
One person I can see, maybe even two, but three different people writing me about the same thing that I hadn't already heard about? Now THAT'S unusual. And then, of course, adorable Cecilia Kallin, long one of our personal favorites here at the blog, the lead singer and guitarist of Timoteij referenced it on her very popular Webstagram feed last Friday just minutes after the song aired.
http://web.stagram.com/p/548994119608663496_229925862/ To me, she seemed, in general, like everyone else -astonished that such a creative Mashup even was contemplated and created, as much as pleased by the wonderful reaction it was receiving, since it definitely caused a buzz throughout Sweden in certain circles. All to the good I think as far as creativity goes!
In any case, as crazy and unlikely as it sounds, I think I may've actually first heard about this song -via email- before one of the most well-informed and well-connected people in the world of music in Scandinavia and schlager, Karl Batterbee at Scandipop, http://www.scandipop.co.uk/
He was smart enough to write about it right away, while I've just been sitting on it, trying to think of a good and logical hook for the readers who come to the blog who would might have no idea who or what I was talking about.
But then maybe I'm over-thinking it, since that never stopped me before.
Here's the original version of both songs, in case you forget what's been changed...
AviciiOfficialVEVO video: Wake Me Up (Official Video) by Avicii. Uploaded July 29, 2013. http://youtu.be/IcrbM1l_BoI
Wescertine YouTube Channel video:Timoteij - Kom (Melodifestivalen 2010).
In case you've forgotten the context, the first time you see Timoteij in the Mashup video at the top of today's post, it's the happy moments three years ago when Cecilia Kallin, Elina Thorsell, Bodil Bergströmand Johanna Pettersson were waiting anxiously at their tables for the results to be read, and their absolute delight when their name was publicly announced, telling them and the world that they'd advanced to the Finals of the 2010 Melodifestivalen in Stockholm with "Kom,"
Rolling Stone
How Avicii Helped Aloe Blacc Wake Up and Break Out
Vocalist on smash 'Wake Me Up' chats about his inspirational team-up with the Swedish DJ-producer
If someone in the world can figure out the formula, timing or complementary rhyming scheme to marry the melodies that can make a successful Mashup of Avicci and First Aid Kit, trust me, it will be like Alchemy 2.0, as heads will be exploding all over a few cities and countries I can think of, many of them originating from Country Calling Code 46.
Aftonbladet TV video: Avicii: ”Aldrig meningen att jag skulle göra country” Svenska stjärn-dj:n i intervju om sin nya genre. (Avicii never sensed he'd do Country. Steller Swedish DJ Tim Bergling interviewed about getting into a new genre, Country House.)
Via my newsdesk subscription I received an interesting press release on Thursday from Universal Music Sweden. Well, the long story short, plus what I know and can share with you, is that 24-year old Swedish DJ Tim "Avicii" Bergling has written music history, becoming the first Swedish artist to ever hold the top three spots on the Swedish singles charts, something that neither ABBA or Roxette ever managed to accomplish, though I think it's a bit unfair to compare the pre-digital era with the current one, due to the much-easier system of logistics and distribution that exist now. All three songs are from his new album, "True, " which is currently number five on the U.S. albums chart. Those three songs of his that are taking Gold, Silver and Bronze right now in Sweden are: 1. "Hey Brother"
Nobody but nobody can smile as often when she speaks and with as much appeal as talented and vivacious lead singer and guitarist Cecilia Kallin of Timoteij.
*This post was updated with additional videos and text at 11:55 p.m. Does it really matter what Cecilia was asked about here at the Helmia car show in Arvika?
Not really.
Cecilia's friendly and infectious smile just knocks me out every time I see her in an interview, even one as semi-awkward as this. She's such a charmer!:)
Also seen in the top video in Arvika: bandmates Bodil Bergström, fleetingly: Elina Thorsell, and, rather abruptly: Johanna Pettersson. Uploaded April 21, 2013. After they sang a few songs, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hm0I6JzzMGI and had finished signing autographs at the record signing, Cecilia and Bodil, separately, were among a number of passengers in a rally car driven by 22-year old Swedish professional rally driver Pontus Tidemand,which resulted in some great photos of him, Cecilia and the band -and a very smart and well-produced video that's definitely worth checking out.
PTMRacing YouTube Channel video: Pontus Tidemand Videoblog EP09 Helmia Show-driving in Arkiva, Sweden. Event was on April 20th, Uploaded April 22, 2013. http://youtu.be/pVWknesYt0I Above, you can see a truly striking-looking Bodil getting into the car at 1:15 and then the whole band from 1:31 to 1:38, with Cecilia happy and clearly relieved to be standing on her own two feet again and Bodil looking calm and cool. From 2:08 to 2:15, Bodil is recounting the experience to Elina, standing next to her, sipping a drink. There's a great photo of a smiling-but-nervous and helmeted Cecilia in the rally car on her blog page on the group's website at http://www.timoteij.se/2013/04/22/det-svanger-om-arvika/ where she admits that for at least part of the ride, she had her hands directly in front of her face and was peering thru her fingers, while, not surprisingly, 'driving' and 'braking' with her feet. Here's the photo of her and the band on Pontus' wonderful website and Instagram account: http://instagram.com/p/YVYMIqiw0R/
*I received a link to the below-the-radar video at the top of this post courtesy of an eagle-eyed reader of the blog living in -wait for it- Sweden, who wanted me to see it and share it with you all, but remain anonymous. Tack så mycket, Anonymous! On Saturday the band will be performing in Cecilia's hometown of Falkirk, so I'm sure she will be snapping lots of photos that will soon be appearing on the band's always amusing blog and her Instagram page at http://www.timoteij.se/ andhttp://statigr.am/ceciliakallin Timoteij tour schedule: http://www.timoteij.se/turne/ Pontus Tidemand's official website, which is very attractive and , well-designed, is at: http://www.pontustidemand.se/
Summer 2012 is officially here as Timoteij's new album, Tabu, drops today. And they also celebrate a new-and-improved website that's delightfully more-colorful, engaging and pleasing to the eye -and more intuitive!
The top of the new website, which changed slightly from the original template a few weeks before their participation in the 2012 Melodifestivalen two months ago, now sports new photos for both the website and the blog, and I must say that in the week since I first saw the photo of the new album over at Swedish Stereo blog in Damian's description of the songs and their order, http://swedishstereo.blogspot.com/2012/05/timoteij-tabu.htmlwhich seems to be fresher, more upbeat and dance-friendly but with all of the Timoteij folk and authenticity trademarks we love, I've been eager to see what it looks like in a new and improved online environment.
Well, in my opinion, the new features and photos really POP off your computer screen in a way that the old pinkish/purple ones really didn't after awhile because... well, we just got so used to them. http://www.timoteij.se/
The new group photo for the website now is, left-to-right: Elina Thorsell, Johanna Pettersson, Cecilia Kallin and Bodil Bergström, and the photo is the same as the album but in the header photo, you don't see their instruments, while the header above the blog text http://www.timoteij.se/category/timoteij/is a variation of that: Cecilia, Elina, Johanna and Bodil.
I also saw that last week's news also had this great teaser: Buy the new album and enter a contest to have Timoteij perform at your home/place of work -in Sweden: http://www.ginza.se/product/timoteij/tabu-2012/11863/
Correct, it's remarkably similar to what the amazing Full of Keys (Anni Bernhard) did on her tour in February for her winning fan, Victor: http://fullofkeys.com/blog/?p=228 I was so envious!
On Monday, the girls were still busy promoting the new album and swung by the Sveriges Radio (SR)studio in Skovde, and fortunately for us, the folks at P4recorded a bit of what happened, which is how I can share it with you here now:
Not to give away too many teasers about some future posts you'll be seeing here soon, but as some of you reading this particular post already know, I actually have hopes of seeing these talented ladies perform -as well as the fabulous Florrie, whose new album drops next week- in a few months in their native habitats, though I'm still working on exact dates and logistics.
My original killer post about Timoteij and Melodifestivalen 2012, scheduled to run the morning of the Second Chance competition, with a complete recap about what happened to them and other acts like Molly Sandén during the competition, was actually killed by a freak power outage one night when my electricity didn't come back on for quite a few minutes, and Blogger lost what I'd written.
Hours of work down the drain! I was so beyond frustrated!
Below are some odds and ends from that the draft of that post which I'd thought to save to an email draft before I started trying to finish up and the electricity went kaput, my post going adios! Obviously, there were lots of what I thought at the time were some well-chosen words, photos and videos that ought to be below but which aren't.
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Today is D-day for Timoteij and its fans: Clear sailing to next week's Melodifestivalen Finals in Stockholm, or, Stormy Seas? (Stormande Hav)
It's the day we've all been waiting for... "Andra chansen." The second chance. One last chance to make the grade for the chance to represent Sweden at Eurovision.
Yesterday the band posted this short acapella version of them singing an excerpt of Stormande Hav in one of their hotel rooms onto their official YouTube Channel.
Like many of you out there, I've wondered, too, why they and the record company still hadn't posted a HQ copy of their performance at the Second Heat as good as the one that uris1 posted two weeks ago, or done a series of occasional updates on their YouTube Channel since then on their preparations the past few weeks, a variation of what they've been writing on the blog. But now at least, somebody finally decided to do something positive.
uris1 video: Timoteij - Stormande Hav. Second Heat of Melodifestivalen 2012 in Göteborg, Sweden. February 11, 2012. http://youtu.be/Nw73WHckdNY
Fans of the band may want to start looking at this page to see what's also being written about them on Social Media: http://whotalking.com/flickr/Timoteij
Wall Street Journal: Norwegian landscape photographer Terje Sørgjerd has released unique footage of the extended sunrises and sunsets that occur just prior to the arctic summer. He explains how he captured the images. Originally published June 8, 2011. http://youtu.be/5xEssyTHVMs I originally planned to post this video on June 23rd, but because of some interesting posts with photos that I received late yesterday afternoon, it's probably for the best that the video stayed in Blogger Draft for the past three weeks.
By the way, for the record, Terje Sogjern isalsoTerje Sørgjerd, it's just that different publications and media outlets spell his last name differently because they don't all use use the Norwegian letter "ø" in their keyboards or stories. And that my friends explains why so many people with that same first name have similar videos! Meanwhile, in another part of Norway that's far from the Arctic Circle, blogger Andrea Hegard who lives in Stockholm but who's now elsewhere on vacation like the rest of Sweden, takes a moment out of her rest and relaxation to snap some great photos of the orange sunset she just saw, and trust me, it's well worth checking-out. http://stureplan.se/bloggar/andrea/2011/07/14/sunset Andrea blogs on the hugely popular Stureplan.se blogging platform that I've spoken of here before that gets so many reader eyeballs every day, keeping multi-national consumer product advertisers happy as a clam, and which also includes bloggers like London-based TessMontgomery and Anna Hibbs among others I keep tabs on. Tess is actually back in Sweden for a bit of some Swedish sommar fun now, and has a great sunset shot today, too! She calls it beautiful heaven on earth, if that gives you an idea of the photo: "Vackraste himmelen på jorden!" http://stureplan.se/bloggar/tess/2011/07/14/vackra-vackra-sverige In my experience from reading her for a while, Tess has a real knack for taking photos with her family and friends that are consistently inspired, amusing and sweet, as last year's photos around Christmas almost looked like something straight out of a 1940's Warner Brothers film set, but it was all real. It was really something!
It really, really, really made me envious, too, especially when I accidentally got stuck in traffic gridlock on U.S.-1, a half-mile north of Aventura Mall, when I got distracted by something I was listening to -the great Point of Grace Christmas CD from 1999, A Christmas Story, back when the original four-member band performed.
Everyone who hears it absolutely LOVES that wonderful album.
Having seen POG perform LIVE in Washington, D.C. in 1999, with Amy Grant and the Nashville Symphony Orchestra as part of her holiday tour, when I hear their songs, esp, When Love Came Down, I think back to the concert and... well, the next thing I know, I've missed my turn and am stuck in the line of cars being attracted to the Mall like a magnet.
It took me 20 minutes to navigate my way off the road and make my escape!
(To North Miami Beach, no less, not Shangri La!)
That gridlock was NOT a happy holiday memory!
Almost as envious as I've felt the last few weeks hearing about various friends summer plans on the water, esp. near the archipelago, and going-on and on about the great weather.
Far from the humid and non-breezy 94 degrees your faithful blogger is experiencing hereabouts!
(And not just brutally hot, but brutally boring and repetitive, too, as one day seems like the one before.)
Meanwhile, over there, everyone is relaxing, absorbing sunshine, having fun, jumping in the water once in a while and eating outside, esp. -of course!- strawberries.
Below, in a relaxed moment from July 7th, awesome Cecilia Kallin, lead singerof Timoteij, anticipates the taste of some delicious strawberries while in Lysekil, Västra Götalands län, on the country's west coast, before their recent tour, which they've been blogging about here, http://www.timoteij.se/
Make sure you watch this on a full screen for maximum effect.
En somrig hit? (A summer hit?)
Yes!
It will probably come as no surprise to those among you reading this blog who have an interest in this subject that I've been reading and hearing a lot about the new Timoteij single being released for awhile now.
But the first time I actually heard "Het" for myself -sans video and the rap opening that both jolts you and catches your attention- came last weekend, a few days after it was featured on May 12th P4 homepage for Sveriges Radio'sDaniel Kjellander and Jenny Lindeborg, who host a four-hour morning show.
Obviously, I don't listen to SR all the time, probably more like a couple of times a month out of curiosity, and the truth here is that I simply got a tip from someone I trust and followed it up -and took a listen myself. You may well remember that I previously mentioned here that I'd been having some computer problems and all last week, esp. with my speakers?
In any case, it's just as well that I didn't post about that SR link, because I didn't have access last weekend to thistres charmantvideo and THAT's what really makes this particular song POP and sets it apart!
And didn't Johanna (Pettersson) tell us only on Wednesday, on their blog, how truly sick -"cruel"- it would be when we all saw it for ourselves?
Yes, she did, saying "Den är grym! Såå bra! Hurra!?"
First off, there's a whole lot more going-on in this sweet and catchy -and ingenious- video than seems readily apparent at first viewing -a whole lot more, which is why you have to watch it a number of times on full screen to catch some of the clever touches.
To me at least, parts of both the song and the video have an almost Nashville-centered feel to it, like certain very popular female Country Western acts you and I can both think of.
Giving a video a real sense of place and reality is very, very smart, actually.
I dare you not to be hooked by the second time you play it, and actually know what to expect with the whole switch in tone at the beginning from the typical rap 'intro' and the appearance of the long white stretch limousine
and paparazzi at the ready, to the looks of, first, dismay
"That's NOT schlager, that's hip-hop!"
and then quickly, delight on the faces of the little girls and boys wearing those popular pink and blue Timoteijskull caps when the band cruise in,
"Here they come!"
emerging from their sweet cherry red Skoda -embossed with their name in script on the hood and a silhouette of them on the sides.
(Johanna didn't have her license yet when they got the sponsorship deal.)
And in case you were wondering, yes, those pink and blue Timoteij-embossed skull caps ARE ridiculously popular, as even a cursory look at many of the photos or video of their touring the past year has made abundantly clear, where you see them everywhere, and NOT just on kids.
I almost bought one of them last year for my youngest niece, aged ten, up in Maryland, and while not naming names, I have some friends in Sweden who bought a lot of them for stocking stuffers and such, even giving some blue ones to their more hard-edged heavy metal male friends and work colleagues as a joke. (But they had to wear them out in public, of course.)
The slower, quieter part of the song that kicks in at 2:30 or so, starting with a shot of Elina (Thorsell), is a great change of pace and really brings the attention back to the quartet's sweet harmonies that these four do so consistently, seemingly, effortlessly.
Here's a video they recorded of their behind-the-scenes preparation for the "Het" music video, and yes, that is Taylor Swift playing in the background; they love Taylor Swift!
This is the quartet's first video on their "official" YouTube Channel. More on that in a minute.
Speaking of summer, or as one person I know who has spent many, many winters in Sweden puts it, the first time you have seven days in a row when it's NOT freezing, here's a short vid from Expressen TVlast August, showing how willing the girls are to indulge the media to get some attention for their self-evident talent -singing while swimming in a pool.
One of the other things I've sort of been waiting to mention here on the blog for a bit, thinking the new single was the time to mention it, was that there is -FINALLY- an official YouTube Channel for Timoteij, even though their fans have been pretty good the past year at uploading videos they shoot of them on tour around the country or even their TV appearances -perNyhetsmorgon, Lotta på Liseberg, Sommarkrysset and Allsång på Skansen.
As it turns out, your faithful blogger and friend Dave was their second subscriber.
For what it's worth, I have actually mentioned to them via an email that I thought that their very amusing videos on their official -not fake- Facebookpage, located at
http://www.facebook.com/timoteij.officialwere full of personality and often hysterical, especially the ones where they were traveling and Elina was acting as cinematographer from the back seat -82 videos as of a few days ago athttp://www.facebook.com/video/?id=286938310265&s=0- and really needed to be shared with more people via an official YouTube Channel they controlled.
Whether or not they will start putting those sort of funny videos up at this new channel, I can't say for sure, but this first one is certainly a good sign and when I hear something, I will share the news with you here.
Timotiej appeared on TV4'sNyhetsmorgon back on April 30th, performing two songs and doing a four-and-a-half minute sit-down interview about what's new with the girls and their new album.
The two singing performances included a mellower version of Kom, performed sans drums and with three of the girls without their trusty instruments, which seems very strange at first, but without the drums, you can really hear Bodil Bergströmon the accordion in a way that you really couldn't in their great Melodifestivalen performance of a few months ago. The harmonies are just perfect, of course, especially towards the end.
In the Kom video, performed as the show was ending, are, from left to right, Johanna Pettersson, Bodil Bergström (on accordion), Cecilia Kallin and Elina Thorsell.
The girls also performed Längtan till landet (Vintern rasat) which I haven't heard in a while. http://www.tv4play.se/aktualitet/nyhetsmorgon?videoId=1.1619474
This is the new TV ad for their new album: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VfowcDq27A0
For more on Timoteij, see their Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Timoteij/286938310265
Their wry and very amusing personal videos can be found at: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Timoteij/286938310265#!/pages/Timoteij/286938310265?v=app_2392950137
