Andreas Österberg wondered what everyone is listening to as they ride buses and trams through the cities. He ended up creating a soundtrack to a tramway line in Göteborg, line 11 from Bergsjön to Saltholmen.

The music, both instrumental and with vocals, catches the atmosphere around the stops along the line and is also adpated to the time it takes to ride the tram from the start in Bergsjön to the last stop in Saltholmen.

To the project; Det Mekaniska Undret he calls it (“The Mechanical Wonder”); he’s also added video clips for each distance, filmed riding the tram. A brilliant and skilfully implemented idea you can follow through his blog. Listen more on Bandcamp, on Youtube or on Spotify. Here are a couple of tracks/stops and one of the clips:

Bergsjön
Mariaplan med Svartsjön

It’s finally spring in the air here in the south of Sweden. And the spring is so eager to please that it wants to blow you away as soon as you step outside. Hagaliden is also spring. They came in here and yelled at me:

“Throw out that bloody winter melancholy! Spring is here goddamnit! Out! Get out of the house and taste the air!”

“But it’s too windy…”

“Cut it out! Do you see that spot of grass over there? Go sit down with the others and have some beer and smoked herring, and when you’re finished you can join the choir and sing along. There’s already eight of us and there’s always room for one more.”

It’s pop and it’s Göteborg and it’s springtime. Here are a couple of songs with Hagaliden and if you’d like to hear som more you can visit Hagaliden’s Soundcloud page or their Myspace page. You can also find them on Facebook.

Det gör ingenting
Hagaliden

Eddie Wheeler is and has been a quite busy man. He has toured extensively, not only in Sweden, but also in England, Australia and in the US. Many recognise him from the Swedish TV show Raggadish, which followed him on an international tour in 2006. Besides the concerts Eddie is also a frequent speaker in schools, conferences and other events.

Sofar he has released a couple of EP:s and is just about to release another one, which will be celebrated with a concert at Pustervik the 20th of November. The EP is a taste of the coming full length album, to be released in spring.

The 2nd of December is the opening night for the Eddie Wheeler Christmas show at Kontiki in Göteborg, Sweden. A live club where independent artists will perform every Tuesday during three weeks in December. Eddie Wheeler himself in the company of Jacques Labouchere will be the first acts.

Here you can get to know Eddie Wheeler’s music in a couple of tracks. I think acoustic rock is a good description of his music. And it is a naked form of rock, with a mellow ambience, gripping and in some kind of way honest. Listen for yourself:

How Far
The First

Visit Eddie Wheeler’s site or his Myspace page to listen some more.

The band Skuggan is a new pleasant musical acquaintance. This is a band that has started over afresh, they made a control-alt-delete, as they themselves describe it, from the roots in the previous band Shade Tree. Below, you can listen to “Rör vid mig i igen” (“Touch Me Again”), a melancholic, beautiful, atmospheric, pensive song – expressed by Carl Jönssons light and soft voice.

At their current restart they have been mentioned on several other good music blogs, such as jacksoncage (in swedish) and skivgrisen (in swedish). Check them out.

What is perhaps equally interesting about Skuggan is how one can follow them on their journey on their web site, which is in blog format. They purvey a feeling of movement, a sense of who they are through what they write about. One can follow the development of the songs from early scetch, to rehearsal demo to the version you can listen to here. One can read about the band, personal thoughts and what they see and feel. Compared to traditional band sites where there are long bios and a separate news section, one can create one’s own image of who they really are and where they are going. And they are there with you, as they are only a comment away. I hope that more artists realize the strength of this concept and follow their example. (note: Their blog is in swedish)

Other songs you can listen to at the site, in different versions, are “Västergatan” and “Buena Vista” – the latter with pleasant Joni Mitchell vibes in my ears. And it is most likely that, by the time this piece is written and published, you will find new tracks to listen to, new stories to read and new reflections to take part of.

Visit Skuggan on their homepage

Rör vid mig igen

(translated by Clint Hell)