written and produced by by Mikael Bolyos

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I’ve taken it upon myself today to construct a page for a song by the

female half of Roxette, Marie Fredriksson, as today—as of my doing

this—is May 30th, and would’ve been her 63rd birthday. Tragically

for all Roxette and solo-Fredriksson fans, though surviving the

assault of a brain tumor that afflicted her in the early 20-00s, and

carrying on her recording career from there (with more solo records and more with Per Gessle, the male half of Roxette), on December 9th, 2019, she succumbed to the cancer she’d grappled with through most of the 21st century.

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Marie was born (Gun-Marie) May 30th, 1958, in Össjö, Sweden. As a child she always knew that taking mere music lessons bored her, that she wanted to be on stage, perform and rock out. But thanks to the lessons she became a finessed pianist, and taught herself to sing by belting along with old soul records her family kept. Her passion for the pop scene never waned, and eventually, everyone knew she was destined to be a soulful star singer—though which genre(s), yet to be determined.

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In ’77 Marie relocated to Halmstad, hometown to an equally young Per Håkan Gessle and Mats Arne “M.P.” Persson (and a couple other young gents these two fellows would eventually team up with to take over Sweden), and they met for the first time. Per and M.P. had met just before Christmas ’76 and formed their first duo, Grape Rock. Marie formed the punk group Strul, briefly taking on Per and M.P. as members, with whom she had an undeniable musical chemistry. Strul was the centerpiece of Strulfestivalen, a music festival featuring the band from 1979 to ’81. Strul eventually broke up in 1981, and Marie formed her next band, MaMas Barn. She reconnected with Per and M.P., who now had become Gyllene Tider with their three additional members, a fiery nation-spread phenom. ’81 was also the year Marie and Gyllene Tider collaborated professionally for the first time, featuring Maries wild spry vocals on a GT split-single track called “Ingenting av vad du behöver” (“nothing that you need”). MaMas Barn continued on to 1982, but without commercial success, and disbanded.

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In 1983, Marie lent more vocals to Per Gessle’s self-titled debut album—also unfortunately unsuccessful, as would be his work for a couple more years to come. But he absolutely insisted that now on her own, she begin a solo career—and who are we to blame him?—and too insisted to record company EMI that Marie was a star on the rise. The label agreed, and Marie got to work on her first solo album. This debut, 1984’s Het vind, spawned a hit single, and also sported a couple tracks co-written by Per. She worked with Per—and Gyllene Tider—continuously along with the way, singing on several songs on GT’s international English album The Heartland Café (also 1984), and Per’s ’85 effort Scener. By this time Marie’s career was taking off, but Per’s was suffering. He needed her far more than she needed him, and as Per began writing (mostly Swedish) songs to send off to other artists, one of the songs—“Svarta glas” (“dark glasses”)—caught the attention of EMI’s Rolfe Nygren. He decided Per should translate this song into English and perform it together with Marie, if only nothing more than a side project. This became the legendary ’86 Roxette debut single, “Neverending Love.”

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When Gyllene Tider attempted to go international, they needed a universally comprehensible name. So they took that of a 1974 Dr. Feelgood song called “Roxette.” However, The Heartland Café (technically the first project billed under the name Roxette) went nowhere, and so in 1986, Per tried his luck with the name again, this time with Marie. The rest, as they say, is history, but Per and Marie always translated their musical chemistry into a magical charisma both on stage and in the studio, as any Roxette fan will attest. They always loved the way their voices blended, and wanted to emulate Eurythmics, with Marie singing lead on the songs and Per writing them and singing backing vocals. Things didn’t exactly turn out this way, but that’s another story for another time.

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In 2004, after surviving the brain tumor ordeal, Marie recorded and released her sixth solo album—and first in English—The Change. “All About You” appears on that record, written by her husband and Dad of her children, Mikael Bolyos. I think it’s (arguably) the most beautiful song on that album, and, yeah, probably my personal favorite. It doesn’t hurt that there’s actually a reference to Roxette in the lyrics. This is another song with a tempo that made me determine I could make two audio-treated versions of it, with two aesthetically pleasing echo intervals. Happy Birthday, Marie, and RIP, 5/30/58 to 12/9/19.

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Have notes to add? Let me know!

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YT:

full version

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Marie’s official website