Independent Music: The Swedish Independent Music Empire

When it comes to indie music, there are a lot of hotbeds of talent but Sweden isn’t normally one you would naturally contemplate. Unfortunately, the music history of that nation appears to start and end with Abba for a lot of individuals, but over the past decade or so, there have been a growing number of performers from Sweden impacting on the indie world.

The most noticeable would be The Cardigans who achieved massive world wide fame with their ‘Lovefool’ single and blend of charming and slightly tween indie -pop. Perhaps as a reaction to their fame, The Cardigans differ d their style, their music got harder and Nina Persson went from blonde to brunette. They might not feature on the radio as much now as they used to but the band still draws a fairly large crowd to any festival they perform at.

If that was all that Sweden contributed to independent music, it would be a poor return, but when you consider the following acts, you will realise just how a lot of of your preferred tracks have hailed from Sweden:

• The Wannadies

• Peter, Bjorn and John

• The Hives

• The Concretes

• Love Is All

• The Shout out Louds

• I am From Barcelona

• Jose Gonzalez

• The Knife

For such a short space of time that’s an impressive list of performers and you may be familiar with some of these tunes :

‘Young Folks’ by Peter, Bjorn and John

You may not know the title but as soon you hear the whistling section of ‘Young Folks’ you’ll know exactly what the song is and recall what a phenomenon it has been at the time. The track came second in the NME’s list of optimum songs of 2006 and fifth in the Pitchfork review of tracks from 2006.

‘Hate To Say I Told You So’ by The Hives

Not many performers may announce themselves as your new favorite band and keep a straight face but The Hives aren’t like many other bands. Filled with a confidence that no other band seems capable of matching this track captured the garage rock revival of the early 2000’s to perfection. The snarling guitar riff and stop-start sections offer the optimum accompaniment to Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist’s trademark yelps and screams.

‘You Can’t Hurry Love’ by The Concretes

Starting off with a guitar riff that might al the majority have come from the Jesus and Mary Chain, it is a shock when the sweet vocals of Victoria Bergsman kicks in and transforms the song into a delightful and melodic upbeat number. The frantic drum build up to the payoff line for the chorus is joyous and although the performer has ploughed on since this 2003 release, they have been unable to match its overall quality.

‘Heartbeats’ by Jose Gonzalez

Although this song has been written by fellow Swedes, The Knife, Jose Gonzalez brought the track to a expansive r listeners. The al most mourning feel of Gonzalez’s downbeat vocals mixed with a quiet acoustic backing ensures this is a song equipped to tug at your heartstrings. Appearing in a major commercial gave the track globally exposure and Jose’s brilliant cover of Kylie Minogue’s ‘Hand on Your Heart’ proved he may take any song and turn it into a downbeat classic.

This is by no means all that Swedish indie has to offer the world but it does offer a fantastic place to start checking this vibrant indie scene in Scandinavia out.