Crying Day Care Choir
Today we have a new coworker here on Meadow Music, Morten Frisch. He presents himself like this:
“The first album I ever owned was Extra vol 1. I got the CD for free when I developed photos from my very own disposable camera after a family vacation in France in 1998. The album contains hits like “Öppna din dörr”, Tommy Nilsson and “It’s Raining Men”, Weather Girls. A lot of things have happened since, but my strong interest for music remains. I’m studying now and reading the fantastic book Punken Please Kill Me by Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain for the third time.”
He starts with a presentation of Crying Day Care Choir:
Crying Day Care Choir consists almost exclusively of members from the indie folk band Monde Yeux. On CDCC’s Myspace page you can read the story about four friends escaping Stockholm for the south of Sweden after an eye opening trip to Argentina.
And it’s hard not to draw paralells to the music. Monde Yeux is still in Stockholm while CDCC have taken off their shoes and socks and is playing happy indie-folk music on a southern moor, a late summer’s eve.
I fell directly for the song “July”, and it’s hard not to fall in love with the nice folk-pop arrangement they have created. With guitars and ukulele they create a happy sing-along feeling which stick in my mind.
That the songwriting and sound of Ellinor Skagegård & 5th Season is influenced by 
Recently Born 53 released their album “Foreign Accent”, an album where they serve 15 songs in a soft mix of americana and blues. For me it’s foremost a journey through Dylan-land, and that they present an excellent cover of “Million Dollar Bash” feels quite natural. Strong songwriting and an intimate, open, basic sound with great guitars makes this a very nice experience. Here are the two opening tracks on “Foreign Accent”:
Svedberg & the Hillside Stranglers, with their own mix of pop, americana and jazz, are back with a new EP. It’s called “Such a Lovely Life”, and is a follow-up to the much appreciated 
Sagabond started out as Mikael Ingebäck’s solo project, but turned into a band with a permanent line-up during 2008. Last year they released the album “Strings”, and the album name suggests to some extent what the music is about, as strings, ie cello and violin, play an important part in their music. Together with saxophone, piano and of course bass, guitars and drums, it turns into a kind of orchestral grand pop with a touch of folk music. Listen for yourself here below in two tracks from “Strings”:
The last time 
“My ambition is to always leave someone with a feeling, to be a feeling and to move somone. You should for a moment be able to walk away from normal life and just be inside the music”. The words are Lennart Lindgren’s, and I think that he does a good job at it. For me it means a trip back to my childhood’s troubadours with beautiful melodies and beautiful poetic lyrics.
“We All Die” is the name of New Found Land’s debut album, which was released late spring earlier this year. Initiated by Anna Roxenholt and from the start a duo, the band has grown into a group of sometimes up to 8 musicians.
“Citizen K was born on August 4, 1966. The bastard son of a beautiful go-go-dancer, and a famous rock’n'roll star.”
That I Am You We Are is different from most bands I’ve heard, is clear to me already after a minute or so in the first song “Love Song For the Mob”, from their EP “Masquerade”. An oriental-inspired melody played by transverse flute and accordion turns into something more folkish and Phoenix and Anahitas voices give the song a somwhat different character.
The last thing you could say about Sol Skugga, is that she’s predictable. After her 
The duon Piroth consists of the sisters Nina and Johanna. They are on their way out with the new album “Safe Haven” and you can listen to and download the first singel from the record here below. And on 
I’m listening to Sumie and it’s almost impossible to stop. Her low voice somehow gets inside of me and gets all my attention. So soft, so pleasant and with simple melodies that just feel right. It would have been easy to compare Sumie with contemporary singer/songwriters like for example 
There is something captivating, authentic about Le Days, aka Daniel Hedin, which I can’t explain. The first track I heard with Le Days was “Hotspot”, which gave me a sensation of 
In October I wrote 
Svedberg & the Hillside Stranglers was formed in 2007 in Stockholm by Niklas Svedberg, vocals and Erik Svensson, guitar/banjo. Today the band has 5 members and they have just released their selftitled debut EP.
We all need some breathing space somtimes, a moment where we can sit down and just look out the window, maybe daydream a little, maybe just watch what’s happening outside and just be. I find this space when i listen to Lovisa Samuelsson. Maybe it also helps that two of her songs are called “Andrum” (”Breathing Space”) and “Fönsterplats” (”Window Seat”). :-)
After listening to Best-of Christmas albums too many times, too many Christmases, I thought it would be nice to find some new favourites. And why not start looking among all the artists we have presented here at Meadowmusic?
Already after a few beats in the first song, I’m caught by Nina Christensens emotional vocals. She gives a full expression to the music, strongly, playfully and stretches the melodies to new forms.
There’s been too little reggae in this blog, no doubt about it. Hopefully we will have new writers in the future to write about great swedish reggae artists. Even if I don’t listen that much to reggae myself, I couldn’t help to fall for Kultiration. I at least haven’t heard this mix of reggae, folk and jazz before.
I thought it was time for some blues again. This time with the blues veteran Brian Kramer, who have recently released the album “Live at Club Stampen” under the name Brian Kramer & the Nights of Blu-topia. Brian invites us to an intimate and soulful performance in the company of great musicians like Mats Qwarfordt, “Iron Hand” Mike Haglund, 
The Örnsköldsvik citizen and the singer/songwriter Lars Ekengren plays a number of instruments when he creates his beautiful Americana-inspired music. The acoustic guitar is used frequently as well as the piano, but I think his strongest instrument is his voice, that seems to be made for this music. Sligthly rough like from one of the finest sandpapers and a soul-bluesy softness and feeling that makes it sound great. It’s obvious that he’s influenced by American music, and one of the sources of this is of course him living there for more than five years:
Behind this bandname hides Petter Hillström, who released his debut album “Hillström & Billy” on the 10th of November. If you are one of those that have started using your old record player again, then this release is perfect for you since the physical release of the album is on vinyl.
Here’s a voice that will catch your attention. The music reminds me of classic folk singers like 
I like the close acoustic feeling when I listen to Ulf Ljusberg. My thoughts wander of to a small jazz or blues club, where people in a relaxed way are sitting down, sipping their beer, with their attention on Ulf and his collegues performing on stage. It feels familiar in a way.
People have created fantastic film music throughout the years. I think it’s strange that there’s so few collaborations between musicians/artists and movie creators. A director I spoke with the other day explained to me that he always set aside a rather large sum of money for the music of the movie. But when the movie project takes longer time than expected and other events, unaccounted for, need to be taken care of, this sum of money is used, and compromises have to be done.
As a first project at DI we were assigned to write music for four short films. Every team has their own movie that is supposed to work both as a story that stands for itself and also in a context together with the other three movies. All four films are spun around the same central event which binds the movies together, but from the different perspectives of four people and their unique experience of the situation. It has been a very interesting and fun process to be a part of. My first meeting with the short film I was to compose to, was at a spotting session where I, together with the director, the producer and the others, watched a raw cut of the film where we started discussing how, when and what function the music should have in the movie. When should the music start/end? What’s the emotional style? What’s the musical style, and so on?
Here’s a band that I think is simply irresistable. Punk rock, Balkan music, and well yes, other kinds of folk music too, is it possible to mix that? Yes, obviously!
Here’s some music that hopefully puts you in a good mood. Don’t get fool by the name Heart-Sick Groans, because the ambience is just opposite of what could be expected. Fun.
Even though I’m an old farm boy, she took my country virginity and gave me…a pair of Durango boots!
