Roxette
Roxette is a
Swedish pop/
rock band that consists of
Per Gessle and
Marie Fredriksson.
For a brief period of time in the early 1990s, Roxette stood among the top bands in worldwide sales and fame, brandishing a simple yet effective blend of pop with a slight edge and occasional hints of dance. The group claims influences ranging from
The Beatles to
Blondie to
new wave music to
Joni Mitchell and
Aretha Franklin.
There was a time in 1991 when Roxette could command an arena filled with tens of thousands of fans in places as diverse as Buenos Aires, Frankfurt and Sydney. The 1992 release
Tourism: Songs from Studios, Stages, Hotelrooms & Other Strange Places exemplifies this temporary but impressive hold
Per Gessle and
Marie Fredriksson had.
Though there is no firm figure, Roxette has worldwide sales of over
75 MILLION copies of their albums and singles, no minor achievement for any pop act! The group's success in the United States alone was arguable. While seemingly not interested in doing so, even by default Roxette could not associate its image with the now-iconic
ABBA, another Swedish pop group that struggled for recognition in America while still intact in the late 1970s, but that managed, through revisionism beginning in the early 1990s, to grow into something more intriguing as a legacy.
ABBA did have some
Billboard Top 10 singles and one No. 1 in the 1970s. Even though Roxette couldn't ultimately leave behind the same legacy, the group did outperform
ABBA on the singles chart, achieving
four No. 1 hits on the
Billboard Hot 100 between 1989 and 1991. Roxette also had two No. 2 singles and a few other Top 40 peaks until falling out of sight of the
Hot 100 in 1994. Even so, by that token, Roxette can be considered a highly successful singles act. The group has been certified by the
Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) with two platinum albums and two gold singles -- "
The Look" and "
It Must Have Been Love."
In Sweden the group has had 17 Top 10 hits, and Roxette has developed a large following throughout South America and South Africa.
Roxette's music is best summed up by the title of its 1995 greatest-hits album:
Don't Bore Us - Get to the Chorus! Mostly written by
Gessle and produced by
Clarence Öfwerman, the songs were melodic pop, what
Stephen Thomas Erlewine, senior editor of the
All Music Guide, called "extremely catchy and simple hooks and melodies that are sweet but not saccharine." Single releases tend to oscillate between lead vocals by
Gessle and
Fredriksson -- whose grainy, throatier delivery can be heard on "
Listen to Your Heart" and "
It Must Have Been Love," among others.
Though they have claimed that the original aim of Roxette was to apply
Gessle's pop compositions to
Fredriksson's vocals, they also claim that the spontaneously-written and -recorded "
The Look," the group's worldwide breakthrough hit, came as a surprise with
Gessle taking lead. Perhaps the claim can be questioned in light of the fact that the first single
Gessle and
Fredriksson released in Sweden in late 1985, "Neverending Love," was a full-on duet (similar to "
Dangerous"), as were several other single releases before the group's reach expanded beyond its home country.
By the time singer/songwriters
Per Gessle and
Marie Fredriksson came together officially as Roxette, both were established artists in Sweden. They met in 1979 while in separate bands. Over the years the two encountered each other repeatedly in local music circles. In 1981,
Fredriksson sang for the first time with
Gyllene Tider on stage and was featured as a background vocalist for a Swedish-language album the band released in 1982, which brought Gylenne Tider its first
Rockbjörnen award as a Best Swedish Group, and for a Swedish-language solo album
Gessle released in 1983.
While working on her first solo album,
Fredriksson performed more background vocals for
Gyllene Tider's next album,
The Heartland Café, what some fans consider to be the first Roxette project. According to liner notes written by
Gessle on a 1990 re-issue of the album, the group's first English-language release was in response to interest expressed by
Capitol Records, an American label affiliated with
Gyllene Tider's parent . Though
Gessle had written one English-language song that appeared on a 1982 album by ex-
ABBA singer
Frida, it was, in fact, music set to a
Dorothy Parker poem. Writing songs in English for
Gyllene Tider was an attempt to reach into the lucrative American market.
The 11-track
Heartland Café was released in February 1984.
Capitol took six of the tracks and released an extended-play (EP) record in the United States with an abridged title,
Heartland, but the company insisted on a different name for the band.
Gessle and the other members of
Gyllene Tider (Swedish for "Golden Times" or "Golden Age") chose the title of a 1975
Dr. Feelgood song, "Roxette."
The Heartland Café sold 45,000 copies in Sweden, which is considered a minor success. It proved even less so internationally. The newly-named Roxette issued one near-invisible hit in the United States, "Teaser Japanese," whose video reached
MTV's studio but received no rotation to speak of. It and subsequent singles fared better in Sweden, and
Gyllene Tider briefly toured the country to support the album. However, "the album died soon enough and the international career died before it even started,"
Gessle wrote. "We decided to put
Gyllene Tider to rest... until further notice..."
|
Cover of the (French) single for "Neverending Love" |
Gessle recorded a third Swedish-language solo album, released in 1985 and again featuring
Fredriksson on background vocals, and
Fredriksson recorded a second solo album and received 1986
Rockbjörnen award as Best Swedish Female Artist . Upon the advice of their mutual record company, the Swedish subsidiary of ,
Gessle and
Fredriksson joined to record an English-language single. "Neverending Love," credited to Roxette, was released in late 1985 and reached the Swedish Top 10.
Gessle and
Fredriksson quickly recorded a full-length album, using songs
Gessle had written originally for his third solo album. With the release of
Pearls of Passion in October
1986, Roxette became an even bigger success in Sweden with singles such as "Soul Deep" and "Goodbye to You."
Pearls of Passion was followed by a compilation of re-mixes of those same songs, titled
Dance Passion. Some of the releases originally from
Passion reached European radio outside of Sweden.
In 1987,
Fredriksson released and publicized her third solo album and won 1988 Swedish
Grammis Award as Best Female Pop/Rock Artist and two
Rockbjörnen Awards: for Best Swedish Album and as a Best Swedish Female Artist. Meanwhile, Roxette released a single, "I Want You," in collaboration with
Eva Dahlgren and Ratata. Later in the year, Roxette released "
It Must Have Been Love (Christmas For the Broken Hearted)," a holiday-themed song that received some attention and kept Roxette's name alive on some European radio as
Gessle and
Fredriksson prepared the next album.
Gessle has said that the single was Roxette's first ernest endeavor to reach beyond Sweden toward markets such as Germany, though EMI Germany decided against releasing the single.
The full-length follow-up,
Look Sharp!, was released in Europe in October
1988, two years after
Pearls of Passion.
Gessle and
EMI Svenska chose to highlight
Fredriksson's singing and released the uptempo "Chances" and "Dressed For Success" as the first singles.
After "Success's" run on Swedish radio emerged "
The Look," a novelty song highlighted by synthesizers and a clangy guitar line as well as esoteric lyrics sung by
Gessle about a woman "walking like a man, hitting like a hammer."
Fredriksson can be heard in the recording mirroring the chorus' main line, "she's got the look," and singing harmony.
Roxette lore has it that, while studying in Sweden, an American exchange student from
Minneapolis, Dean Cushman, heard "
The Look," then one of the most played songs on radio, and brought a copy of
Look Sharp! home for the 1988 holiday break. According to
Gessle, Cushman "badgered" a Minneapolis radio station, KDWB 101.3 FM, to play the song. Based on positive caller feedback, the station's program director copied the song and distributed it to other stations, and within weeks the song became very popular.
In reality, KDWB was not the only American station to pick up on the song, and
EMI officials had already planned to release and market the single. The "Dean Cushman story," as some longtime Roxette fans call it, made for good press. For many years,
Gessle and
Fredriksson told this as the story highlighting the beginning of their international success.
In short order, through the winter of early 1989,
EMI issued "
The Look" to American record stores and radio stations and pressed copies of
Look Sharp!. "
The Look" reached No. 1 on the April 8, 1989,
Billboard Hot 100, where it remained for one week. At the end of the year, Billboard named "
The Look" one of the 20 biggest Hot 100 singles of the year.
"Dressed For Success," featuring
Fredriksson on lead and
Gessle singing short parts for accentuating, was the second single in the United States, and Roxette went on its first world tour. The single peaked at No. 14 on the
Hot 100. "
Listen to Your Heart" was released thereafter. A power-ballad, the song managed to garner listener interest even though it differed from the synth pop of "
The Look" and the pluckiness of "Success," instead resembling the guitar-heavy ballads of
Heart. The single, the first ever to be released in cassette-only format without a 45 RPM 7" vinyl alternative, spent a single week at No. 1 on the
Billboard Hot 100 for the week ending Nov. 4, 1989.
A fourth single in the United States, "
Dangerous," was released at the end of the year, entering into the
Hot 100 at the end of December. A full-on duet between
Gessle singing the first half of each verse ("you pack your bag/you take control...") and
Fredriksson singing the second half ("hey, what's your work/what's your game..."), the single ultimately spent two weeks at No. 2 on the
Hot 100 in February 1990.
Look Sharp! won Gessle his first Swedish
Grammis award in a category Best Composer. Roxette also received two
Rockbjörnen Awards for Best Swedish Album ('Look Sharp") and as a Best Swedish Group. Fredriksson also won her third in a row
Rockbjörnen as a Best Swedish Female Artist.
It was around this time that
Touchstone Pictures approached
EMI and Roxette about contributing a song to the soundtrack of the upcoming film
Pretty Woman starring
Richard Gere and
Julia Roberts.
Gessle has claimed that "
It Must Have Been Love," by then a 2-year-old recording, was chosen because Roxette didn't have time to compose and record a new song while touring through Australia and New Zealand.
Gessle and producer
Clarence Öfwerman took the old recording, had
Fredriksson replace a single Christmas-referenced line in the song, added some instrumentation and background vocal overlays, and gave the song to the soundtrack producers, who
Gessle claimed turned it down.
Gessle also claimed that, after re-editing the film before release, the producers re-requested the song, and it was added to the soundtrack.
Pretty Woman was released in March 1990 and went on to make more than $178 million at U.S. box offices and more than $460 million worldwide, becoming the most successful film of the year. The soundtrack went on to be certified three times platinum by the
RIAA. Though not the first single released from the soundtrack, "
It Must Have Been Love" would prove to be the most successful, spending two weeks at No. 1 on the
Hot 100 beginning in the June 16, 1990, edition.
The song had staying power on the chart, spending two additional weeks at No. 2 after falling from the perch, a total of nine weeks in the Top 10, and a then-impressive 17 weeks in the Top 40.
Billboard named "
It Must Have Been Love" the No. 2 Hot 100 single of the year behind
Wilson Phillips' "Hold On." The song would prove to be Roxette's most successful single release, peaking at the top of the singles charts in many countries and No. 3 in the
United Kingdom, the group's highest chart position there.
In Sweden, Roxette collected their second
Rockbjörnen as a Best Swedish Group and Fredriksson won her fourth in a row
Rockbjörnen as a Best Swedish Female Artist.
As 1990 wound down, Roxette completed its tour and returned to Sweden to record its full-length follow-up to
Look Sharp! The 14-track collection, titled
Joyride, was released in March 1991, peaking almost immediately at No. 12 on the
Billboard 200 album chart. Group's European success was reflected in their nomination for Germany's
ECHO Award (equivalent of
Grammy) in
1992 in a category Best International Group of The Year. They also won Swedish
Grammis Award as a Best Pop Group, and two
Rockbjörnens: for Best Swedish Album ("Joyride') and as a Best Swedish Group.
J.D. Considine of
Rolling Stone magazine reviewed
Joyride: "By emphasizing its sense of personality, Roxette delivers more than just well-constructed hooks; this music has heart, something that makes even the catchiest melody more appealing."
The
title-track single took off quickly, bearing a similarity to "
The Look" and featuring
Gessle whistling and singing lines like "Hello, you fool, I love you," which he claimed his girlfriend left in a note to him one day. "
Joyride" the single reached No. 4 in the
U.K. and spent a week at No. 1 on the
Billboard Hot 100 in the May 11 issue. The single also achieved a huge success in Canada which resulted in Roxette being nominated in 1992 for
Juno Award in a category Best Selling Single by a Foreign Artist.
Its follow-up, "
Fading Like a Flower (Every Time You Leave)," a power-rock song similar to "
Listen to Your Heart" but uptempo with
Fredriksson on lead, spent a week at No. 2 on the
Hot 100 in July. It was then that Roxette embarked on an even more ambitious tour, eventually reaching more than 1 million fans in 108 concerts, including a few dates in the United States.
But it was at this time, as
Per Gessle has contended, that
EMI's American subsidiary made personnel changes that resulted in a downturn in the publicity for Roxette. Though
Gessle has never fully explained, Roxette fans and close watchers could easily see that the momentum in America was slowing down dramatically. Though
Joyride was certified platinum and made impressive worldwide sales, surpassing
Look Sharp!, subsequent singles from the album failed to reach above the No. 30 position on the
Hot 100. The same can be said for the UK chart, where "The Big L." (another bouncy pop-rock song), "Spending My Time" and "Church of Your Heart" failed to reach even the Top 20.
Some longtime Roxette and
Per Gessle fans have contended as well that Roxette was not able to compete, especially in the American market, with the changing tide of popular music. The
Billboard Hot 100 singles and
Billboard 200 album charts were showing an increasing dominance toward the end of 1991 by new or emerging genres such as new jack soul and grunge. Groups like
Boyz II Men,
Color Me Badd and
Nirvana were sitting at No. 1, and harder-core rap and hip-hop showed signs of their eventual rise to prominence, pushing aside simpler, more commercialized pop with which Roxette's music had seemingly blended perfectly.
Despite the lag in publicity and sales and airplay in the United States, Roxette maintained a respectable showing pretty much everywhere else and continued with the
Join the Joyride tour through the end of 1991. Instead of releasing a brand-new full-length album,
Gessle and
Fredriksson re-mastered older recordings, including several slated for but not included on
Look Sharp! and
Joyride. They also recorded some of their live performances, recorded a country-and-western-inspired version of "
It Must Have Been Love" in a Los Angeles studio, and recorded new material in various locations around the world and compiled everything on to the album
Tourism: Songs from Studios, Stages, Hotelrooms & Other Strange Places, released in October 1992.
Gessle has said that the album was meant to "capture the energy within the band," especially in the spontaneous performance of songs such as "Here Comes the Weekend" and "Never Is a Long Time."
The first single off the album was "How Do You Do!" followed by the ballad "Queen of Rain" and an electrified version of the song "Fingertips," originally recorded acoustically for the album and re-titled "Fingertips '93" for single release.
Tourism barely dented American radio and record stores but gave Roxette its first Top-20 single in the UK in over a year with "How Do You Do!" (#58 in the U.S.).
It was also in 1992 that
Marie Fredriksson released her first solo album in Swedish in five years, titled
Den Ständiga Resan (The Eternal Journey). It brought her her second Swedish
Grammis Award, this time as an Artist of The Year.
In early 1993, Roxette became the first non-native-English speaking artists to be featured on
MTV's
Unplugged series, though the songs from the performance were never released on an official
Unplugged album. At home, Roxette won the last
Rockbjörnen Award - as a Best Swedish Group - in their career so far. They would get nominated for
Rockbjörnen few more times in later years but fail to win.
It was also in 1993 when Roxette recorded and released "
Almost Unreal," a song originally slated for the film
Hocus Pocus starring Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Nijimy. However, the song was moved to the soundtrack to the film based on the Nintendo video game
Super Mario Bros. starring Bob Hoskins, John Leguizamo and Dennis Hopper. The film, which cost more than $40 million to make, earned only $20 million at the box office. Supported by an expensive video and ultimately receiving respectable airplay, "
Almost Unreal" managed to briefly reach the lower end of the
Billboard Hot 100 but reached the Top 10 on the
U.K. singles chart, the group's first time there since "
Joyride" two years before.
A yet second re-issuing of "
It Must Have Been Love" managed to reach the UK Top 10 at the end of 1993 as well.
In 1993, Roxette received their second
ECHO Award nomination for Best International Group of the Year.
Roxette took a turn with the 1994 release of
Crash! Boom! Bang!, an ambitious set of music both loud and, at times, somber. Bryan Buss of the
All Music Guide wrote, "To go from the painfully pretty '
Fading Like a Flower (Every Time You Leave)' on
Joyride to the apathetic 'Vulnerable' to the haunting and powerful title track of the same name on this album shows a serious downward slide.... Though the two have an edge on this album, they almost seem to have become a bit bored."
Though considered successful throughout Europe, the full 15-track set of
Crash! Boom! Bang! tanked in the United States despite a successful campaign by
McDonald's, which advertised and sold a 10-track "favorites" compact disc. The "favorites" CD reportedly sold more than 1 million copies, ranking as one of Roxette's most successful releases in the United States.
Moreover, the first single release from
Crash! Boom! Bang!, the distortion guitar-heavy pop hit "
Sleeping in My Car," managed to grab attention, reaching the
Billboard Top 50 and the UK Top 20, as well as returning Roxette to No. 1 in Sweden after several years. Subsequent releases, including the title track, "Fireworks," and "Run To You," made chart showings worldwide but not in the United States. They did each make the Top 30 in the UK Roxette embarked on another, albeit scaled-down, worldwide tour, skipping the United States in the process. It was during this tour that Roxette became the first Western band invited to tour China since
Wham! in 1985.
Despite the effort,
Crash! Boom! Bang! would be the last Roxette release
EMI would issue in the United States.
In
1995, Roxette released the greatest-hits compilation
Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus!, which featured new songs released as singles as well, including the ballad "You Don't Understand Me," co-written by
Desmond Child. The song managed to hit the Swedish Top 10. Also that year, a compilation of singles-only (B-side) recordings, alongside some of the 1993
Unplugged material, was released in Japan and parts of South America under the title
Rarities.
In 1995, Roxette received their third
ECHO Award nomination for Best International Group of the Year.
In
1996, Roxette took instrumental masters of many of its ballads and recorded translated Spanish lyrics over them, released on the album
Baladas En Español, which sold well in Argentina, Chile and other parts of South America. Also in 1996,
Marie Fredriksson released another solo Swedish-language album,
I En Tid Som Vår ("In a Time Like Ours"). And
Gessle reunited with
Gyllene Tider for what turned out to be a wildly successful tour in Sweden that brought the band two
Grammis awards - Best Artist and Best Song ("Gå och fiska") - and
Rockbjörnen award for Best Song.
Per Gessle released a solo English-language album,
The World According to Gessle, in 1997. One song "I'll Be Alright," featured
Fredriksson singing background. Jason Damas of the
All Music Guide wrote, "
Gessle's gravelly voice and full-throttle guitar attack [were] always the reason why Roxette stood out from their peers in the early '90s, and it's the same reason why
Gessle's first English solo album does just the same.... At its best moments,
The World According to Gessle sounds like
The Cars in their heyday, and that's quite a complimentary comparison." That same year,
Gessle released a greatest-hits compilation of his Swedish-language solo material,
Hjärtats Trakt.
Gessle and
Fredriksson reunited in 1998 to record material for a new Roxette album,
Have a Nice Day, which was released in March 1999. Containing elements of techno and house music,
Have a Nice Day produced singles that returned Roxette to the upper half of the Swedish singles chart. The first single, "
Wish I Could Fly", came as close to the UK Top 10 (no. 11) as any single Roxette had released since 1993. It also became the most played song on radio in Europe of 1999. Damas of the
All Music Guide called
Have a Nice Day "an effort to encapsulate Roxette's trademark sound with Brit-pop and electronica, and, by gosh, it works." He called one of the tracks, "You Can't Put Your Arms Around What's Already Gone," "quite possibly the best song (
Gessle has) ever written." Sales were brisk in South America as well, but there was no U.S. release of
Have a Nice Day.
In 2000
Fredriksson released her own greatest-hits compilation of her Swedish-language material, titled after one of her songs, "Äntligen" ("At Last"). The album went on to be a big seller in Sweden, peaking at No. 1 for three weeks, sold respectably abroad, and resulted in a successful tour. Meanwhile, Roxette signed a U.S. distribution deal with
Edel Music, which re-released
Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus!, replacing some non-U.S. hits with songs from
Have a Nice Day, including "Wish I Could Fly," which received some airplay on American adult contemporary radio stations.
Room Service followed in
2001 to some critical raves. "Probably the best Roxette album since
Joyride," wrote Leslie Mathew of the
All Music Guide.
"Room Service is an exciting, immediate, high-gloss pop gem that contains very little filler indeed." The first single, "The Centre of the Heart," emerged as a result, hitting No. 1 in Sweden and making a slight dent in the United Kingdom. It was followed by "Milk and Toast and Honey." Roxette again went on tour.
After that came another set of compilations,
The Ballad Hits in late 2002 and
The Pop Hits in early 2003. Each set contained a separate CD with material previously available only on CD singles. The single "Opportunity Nox" was released from
The Pop Hits in 2003.
In 2001, at the
Grammis ceremony Roxette received a Music Export Prize from the Swedish Government, and in 2003, they won the
World Music Award as the Best Selling Scandinavian Artist of the Year.
In June 2003,
Gessle released what had originally planned to be a small side project: his first Swedish-language solo album in 18 years. One of the tracks, "På Promenad Genom Staden" ("Strolling Through the Town"), featured
Fredriksson singing back-up. Titled
Mazarin ("Cupcake"), the album ended up solidifying
Gessle's legacy in his home country, reaching No. 1 on the Swedish album chart and eventually going five times platinum (300,000 copies shipped). The album brought Gessle four
Grammis awards: Best Artist, Best Male Pop Performer, Best Composer and Best Song ("Här kommer alla känslorna (på en och samma gång)"). He also won three
Rockbjörnen awards, Best Swedish Male Artist, Best Swedish Album and Best Swedish Song, and
Guldälgen (The Golden Moose) Award for Best Song.
In 2004,
Gessle and
Gyllene Tider reunited for a 25th-anniversary celebration that included the band's first album in 20 years,
Finn 5 Fel!, and another wildly successful tour in Sweden. By the end of the tour, the band had played to almost half a million (492,252) fans, resulting in the second biggest tour in Europe that year. As a result, the group was honored with two
Grammis awards for Best Pop Group and Best Music DVD, and two
Rockbjörnen awards for Best Swedish Group and Best Swedish Album.
Meanwhile, in September 2002, after a fainting spell,
Marie Fredriksson was diagnosed with a brain tumor, which was subsequently removed in surgery. It was during her recovery that she wrote and compiled songs for her first-ever English-language solo album,
The Change, which was released internationally but not in the United States in October 2004. Inspired by
Fredriksson's brush with mortality and made mostly in partnership with her husband, Mikael Bolyos,
The Change was a far bluesier and melancholic set of songs than anything Roxette recorded. The album entered the Swedish chart at No. 1, reportedly selling 30,000 copies in its first week. The first single, "2:nd Chance," entered the Swedish singles chart in the Top 10. The album to date has sold more than 350,000 and has seen several other international radio releases, including "All About You" and "A Table in the Sun."
In 2005, Belgian dance group
D.H.T.'s trance-cover of "
Listen to Your Heart" became a worldwide club hit. Originally released in Belgium in 2003, the various mixes of the song reached U.S. clubs in late 2004. By the mid-summer of 2005, the song reached the Top 10 of the
Billboard Hot 100, peaking at No. 8 in August. Throughout 2005, several songs were released as re-mixes and covers. Among them: two prominent versions of "
Fading Like a Flower" hit the dance floors, one a trance cover by German group Mysterio and one a sampling by
Dancing DJs that reached the UK's dance chart, and a "white label" (independent, unauthorized) release, "Joyride 2005" which clubs in the United Kingdom picked up.
On Nov. 23, 2005,
Per Gessle released his first English-language solo album in eight years. Titled
Son of a Plumber, the album opened to generally good reviews in Sweden, though the daily newspaper
Aftonbladet ("The Evening Sheet") called it weak.
Son of a Plumber immediately shipped platinum in Sweden (60,000 copies). The first single from the album was double-A-sided, meaning two songs were released to radio: "C'mon" and "Jo-Anna Says."
Gessle told
Aftonbladet's Per Bjurman that the songs on
Son of a Plumber were personal in nature. "I really wanted to do an album that's
me," he said. "The lyrics are mainly about me and my life, and they feel very important.… We never had a target group in mind when we did this album, and that was very liberating."
|
Gessle and Fredriksson at a BMI awards presentation in London, Nov. 29, 2005. Photo taken by Thomas Engström. |
He was still publicizing the album when, on Nov. 29, 2005,
Gessle and
Marie Fredriksson appeared at the Dorchester Hotel in London at a presentation of awards by
Broadcast Music Incorporated, better known as BMI.
Gessle received an award for "
It Must Have Been Love," which, by 2005, had been played on U.S. radio more than 4 million times. He and co-songwriter Mats Persson also received an award for Dance Song of the Year for
D.H.T.'s cover of "
Listen to Your Heart." The single was certified platinum the previous month by the
RIAA.
The ceremony marked the first time
Gessle and
Fredriksson had appeared in public together since before the onset of
Fredriksson's brain tumor and subsequent surgery in 2002. When asked by an
Aftonbladet reporter if there would be a Roxette reunion,
Gessle replied, "We haven't decided yet. No doors are closed.… We're still young".
In an interview with the official site of the
Swiss singles chart in
March 2006,
Gessle stated that the group would be releasing a 4-disc "Rox Box" collection in the near future and that plans for the release of an
MTV Unplugged album were still being considered some 13 years after the fact.
Gessle also stated that a future reunion was possible. It has been reported as of late that Roxette will record one or two new songs in the summer of 2006 to coincide with the release of the Rox Box collection, which will also feature a DVD. The release is tentatively scheduled for October 2006.
In April 2006,
Fredriksson announced that she plans to release a new album in May 2006. Titled
Min Bäste Vän ("My Best Friend"), it will be a collection of covers of classics from her formative years.
This past summer, Roxette released to radio "The Rox Medley" to promote the forthcoming "Rox Box" collection. This medley will eventually be the b-side to the new single, "One Wish". The medley includes six Roxette hit singles: "The Look," "Joyride," "Listen to Your Heart," "Dangerous," "It Must Have Been Love" and "Fading Like a Flower (Everytime You Leave)."
In a recent radio interview on Vancouver Island's
CKWV-FM "The Wave",
Gessle shared information about the upcoming new Roxette single and the "Rox Box." "It's four CDs, a DVD, a little bit of this, a little bit of that, outtakes and demos and stuff. It's like a coffee table thing, and it's really, really big [with an] 80-page booklet and stuff."
The interview conducted by Ian SeggiePer also shared his feelings about working with Marie again:
"It was, in fact, wonderful, and emotional of course. But also ... it took about like an hour, and then we're back in the groove. It was the same jokes, the same... everything was like the same. So, even though time has gone by, it feels as if time has stood still for a bit so... It's not like it was before because, you know, Marie is somewhat a changed person because of all that she's gone through. But nevertheless, she still sings very well and, you know, it's just been a pleasure to be able to record these songs. If you had asked me like 2 years ago if this would ever happen, I would definitely would never believed it to have happened. I'm really pleased that we actually could do it."
The new single will be
One Wish, an uptempo song with both Marie and Per.
Albums
Studio albums
The Heartland Café (1984, credited to
Gyllene Tider, though a six-track EP was released in the United States by
Capitol Records and credited to Roxette)
Pearls of Passion (1986, the first album with only
Per Gessle and
Marie Fredriksson appearing as the band Roxette -- reissued in 1997 with bonus tracks)
Look Sharp! (1988) #4 UK, #23 US
Joyride (1991) #2 UK, #12 US
Tourism: Songs from Studios, Stages, Hotelrooms & Other Strange Places (1992) #2 UK, #117 US
Crash! Boom! Bang! (1994) #3 UK
Baladas En Español (1996)
Have a Nice Day (1999) #28 UK, #62 AUS
Room Service (2001)
Compilations
Dance Passion (1987, vinyl-only re-mix album of Roxette's first album,
Pearls of Passion.)
Rarities (1995, released in Japan and South America)
Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus! - Roxette's Greatest Hits (1995) #5 UK
Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus! - Roxette's Greatest Hits (2000, revised version released under Edel Records in the United States)
The Ballad Hits (2002) #11 UK
The Pop Hits (2003)
* Roxette Hits (COMING OCTOBER 18th 2006) # UK, # US
* RoxBox (4 cds and DVD compilation) (COMING OCTOBER 18th 2006) # UK, # US
Hit Singles
* 1986 "
Neverending Love" #NR UK
* 1986 "
Goodbye to You" #NR UK
* 1987 "
Soul Deep" #NR UK
* 1987 "
I Want You" (with Ratata and Eva Dhalgren) #NR UK
* 1987 "
It Must Have Been Love" #NR UK
* 1988 "
I Call Your Name" #NR UK
* 1988 "
Dressed for Success" #54 UK
* 1988 "
Chances" #NR UK
* 1988 "
Listen to Your Heart" #62 UK, #1 US
* 1989 "
The Look" #7 UK, #1 US
* 1989 "
Dressed for Success" #18 UK (1990), #14 US
* 1990 "
Listen to Your Heart" #6 UK (double A-side with Dangerous, 1990 release in the UK), #1 US
* 1989 "
Dangerous" #2 US
* 1990 "
It Must Have Been Love" #3 UK, #1 US
* 1991 "
Joyride" #4 UK, #1 US
* 1991 "
Fading Like a Flower (Every Time You Leave)" #12 UK, #2 US
* 1991 "
The Big L" #21 UK
* 1991 "
Spending My Time" #22 UK, #32 US
* 1992 "
Church Of Your Heart" #21 UK, #36 US
* 1992 "
How Do You Do!" #13 UK, #58 US
* 1992 "
Queen of Rain" #28 UK
* 1993 "
Fingertips'93" #NR UK
* 1993 "
Almost Unreal" #7 UK, #94 US
* 1993 "
It Must Have Been Love" (re-issue) #10 UK
* 1994 "
Sleeping in My Car" #14 UK, #50 US
* 1994 "
Crash! Boom! Bang!" #26 UK
* 1994 "
Fireworks" #30 UK
* 1994 "
Run To You" #27 UK
* 1995 "
Vulnerable" #44 UK
* 1995 "
You Don't Understand Me" #42 UK (1996)
* 1995 "
The Look" ('95 remix) #28 UK (only)
* 1996 "
June Afternoon" #52 UK
* 1996 "
She Doesn't Live Here Anymore" #NR UK
* 1996 "
Un Dia Sin Ti" #NR UK
* 1999 "
Wish I Could Fly" #11 UK, #57 AUS
* 1999 "
Anyone" #NR UK
* 1999 "
Stars" #55 UK
* 1999 "
Salvation" #NR UK
* 2001 "
The Centre of the Heart (Is a Suburb to the Brain)" #NR UK
* 2001 "
Real Sugar" #NR UK
* 2001 "
Milk and Toast and Honey #58 UK
* 2002 "
A Thing About You" #67 UK
* 2003 "
Opportunity Nox" #NR UK
* 2006 "One Wish" (COMING SEPTEMBER 20th 2006)
Roxette - Sweden Live! (1989,
LaserDisc &
VHS Japan, VHS
South Africa)
Look Sharp Live! '88 (1989, VHS)
The Videos (1991, LD & VHS)
Live-Ism (1992, LD & VHS)
Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus! - Roxette's Greatest Video Hits (1995, LD & VHS)
Crash! Boom! Live! - The Johannesburg Concert (1996, LD & VHS Japan, VHS ROW)
All Videos Ever Made & More (2001, DVD,
PAL only)
Ballad & Pop Hits - The Complete Video Collection (2003, DVD)
*
List of Swedes in music*
List of best selling music artists*
Official Web Site*
Roxette.net*
The Daily Roxette - Fresh Roxette news, daily.
*
Run to Roxette*
R2R Forum*
Roxette Brasil*
Roxette & Related Multimedia*
Roxette House*
Marie Fredriksson Online*
Gyllene Tider*
Traducifra - Roxette Chords
