Up North......................

Len captures some northern magic

Accelerating towards total darkness, like I'm looking back from a train once its entered the tunnel. The darkness can get to you if you let it, what gets me the most though is the rain, seemingly endless drizzle that could wash away your mind. Combining the endless night with the rain can break a person, it takes away your energy; it starts to make decisions for you: Me: “shall I go out tonight, round my mates pad, or to the pub in town?” Late November: “Nah, you don’t want to go out in this, best relax, try and finish that book, watch some TV or maybe write a few emails, or just go to bed, busy day tomorrow – unless the weather is shit again, then you may as well stay put”.

The light at the end of this tunnel is too far away to contemplate, this will make things worse. There is always something in this life to look for or to think about. It can come in many forms, just like making the most of those last few days before school started again, or when you manage to speak to someone new on a journey to work, not that this was a frequent event, but when it happens, everything seems better, that is the power of the mind.

When the snow finally arrives for good, that white blanket seems to lift an entire town, whether it’s just the simple natural beauty of freshly fallen snow or the extra light that exists when everything is white. I am craving for a break, to see the snow, to walk on the lakes of ice, to walk on the sea, out to islands that can be miles away. I've even been told it’s possible (although not recommended) to walk to Finland……maybe next year for that one!? But soon I hope I'll get to do these things again, and I hope I see the nordic lights, green and blue (and sometimes red if you’re very lucky) travelling across the sky like they have the knowledge of what it is to be a phenomenon, vague and unpredictable, a little different every time, it amazes me how something like that can be so silent.

2. Being Swedish

If you’ve ever been unfortunate enough to be involved in a discussion that leads off into an ugly patriotic ramble, then you’ll know how stereotypes and opinions can be induced and created, almost always to no beneficial conclusion. There may well be no smoke without fire in some cases, but in many instances these formerly strong views can be completely reversed if you look a little bit harder.

It is true that in Sweden the dull, repetitive tones of bottom league pop karaoke type music is a massive hit, as it is to an extent in every country these days. I have always in the back of my mind wrongly associated people in this part of the world as followers and admirers of music that only really compares to the advert jingle in terms of quality and sense, the type of sounds that only make you smile due to memories of years passed on, being able to label a time and a place with a tune. There of course is no immediate or obvious harm with any of this, but for sometime here I did wonder whether there was anything else on offer??

My original opinions were enhanced one evening when I got invited round a friends place to have small gathering for the traditional watching of the “melodifest”. Ask any Swede about this event, it’s big, very big. The melodifest is a song contest, a pop karaoke style song contest; that simply likes to stew in its own pool of tack. This is low quality in every sense of the phrase, and of course it’s a real money spinner too, as people are encouraged to phone and text in votes for their favourite “artist”. The most unfortunate thing about melodifest as far as being Swedish is concerned is how popular it is, it may all once again appear to be harmless, but to the Swede who doesn’t dig this scene, it is an event not to advertise to any foreigner.

It was a cold October afternoon when I found something different, something that was new and great to me. I always try and keep an eye out for something different, unpredictable, and inventive, and I found it. I queued up with a couple of friends to go into a small room called “the lab” and watch an act called Midaircondo. We were lucky to get some good central seats, but even filled to capacity the audience was no more than a hundred or so, and everyone had a good view. Three pretty girls, all dressed in colourful outfits that were individual and feminine, stepped out onto the stage amongst a mass of electronics and various instruments. The three of them sat with their legs over the front edge of the stage, all holding a microphone and a control box, full of electronics used to sample, playback and repeat whatever sounds they were about to make. I really didn’t know what was about to happen, are they going to sing together? Is someone going to get up and do something else..?...pick up an instrument or go to the laptop or something? I think most of the audience were thinking like me, and we all didn’t want to make a sound, all concentrating on the performance that was about to unfold. It started off slowly, the three of them all making short strange sounds into their microphones, and playing with the electronic box, it was strange at first, but intriguing, and you wanted to hear more. It all built up, continued on, until you could follow a path, almost hear a melody, but it was always far away, they were in control here, steering us somewhere, the whole audience were following, enjoying the journey to wherever it was we were heading.

One of their songs, “Serenade” I recalled the most, mainly for an addictive and haunting piano part, although off the web when I got home I could only find a 3-4 minute version, nothing on the ~20 minute version I had seen them perform, but of course a performance is simply that, and when its good, it can’t really be re-lived or heard to the same level.

The nullifying tones of melodifest may be ever present in Sweden, but it’s so pleasing to see and know that there is something very different and available to those who are either lucky, or look carefully.