A Swedish memento

The Melody Festival is a Swedish music contest, organized annually by the public service network SVT. While the contest is nominally about selecting the Swedish entry to the international Eurovision Song Contest (ESC), it has become something of a pop culture phenomenon in its own right. The most well known band ever to participate is, of course, ABBA. Another name associated with the Melody Festival is Bert Karlsson, the successful record-company owner who virtually controlled the commercial circus around this "public service" event for decades. He even used his popularity to run for public office on a right-wing populist platform.

As for the Festival itself, most Swedes quite literally grew up with it, hardly surprising since it has been held almost every year since 1959. I have faint memories of the 1979 festival, won by Ted Gärdestad and his classical pop song "Satellit". Another memorable moment was in 1990, when Sweden's largest TV mast went off-line for about one minute *exactly* during controversial singer Carola's performance. No evidence for sabotage was ever found, but, come on...

Yet, at some point the contest became too boring and predictable, until SVT decided to restyle the entire event in 2002, introducing heats, semi-finales and more modern songs, making the ratings go up like crazy - these days, almost half the country watches the grand finale in Stockholm. The Festival also became less formal, with crazier moderators and interlude acts - in 2010, Dolph Lundgren was both show host and self-ironic star in several comic skits. Have you ever seen Dolph dressed as a little girl trying to sell cookies? Or enter a gay bar to the tunes of "Slave to the Rhythm"? I have. And you wonder why we're watching this stuff every goddamned year, LOL.

But yes, Bert Karlsson has tried to hang on as long as possible. Thus, this first official Melody Festival CD from 2002 was released by his record company, Mariann. Nobody was surprised.

As for the 2002 CD itself, I like most of the songs, but I admit the Melody Festival isn't exactly American chart music. The songs represent a bewildering variety of genres, ranging from vaguely ABBA-esque pop to multi-ethnic hip hop and "American" rock. Many songs are comprehensible only to a Swedish audience, such as the traditional schlager of Kikki, Bettan & Lotta, or the freak song "Sluta", featuring a guy from a popular reality soap! And no, he couldn't sing.

The Melody Festival can't really be captured on an album anyway - you have too see it live, or *live* it. The tabloids naturally had a field day when the event became bigger and better, featuring "come out" interviews with whoever had addiction problems or had been a centrefold girl. The Festival also repeatedly shows what a small country Sweden really is - in 2002, one of the contestants was a former TV host, while two other performers turned out to be sisters! Some of the performing artists also participated in 2003 or 2004...

But I'm analyzing too much. For a Swede, this brings back almost nostalgic memories. To an American, I suppose it could be good as cultural studies! Three-and-a-half stars.