"En kyss vid grinden kan vara mycket bättre sex än allt vad Don Giovanni fick när ljuset hade släckts"
- INTRODUCTION by Joel Larsson
- AMERIKA
- KAOS
Bo Kaspers Orkester, BKO for short, formed in 1991, with Bo Sundström (vocals) as the most essential band member, but with Fredrik Dahl (drums), Michael Malmgren (electric- and double bass), Mats Asplén (keyboards) and Lars Halapi (guitars), with occasional help by saxophonist Per Johansson, as the constant instrumental section. Halapi quit sometime just before the release of I Centrum.
BKO began, and has remained, a counterpoint to the
rather commercial stuff which has been played on the radio, and they're sort
of an antithesis to rock. Thus, they play a soft kind of jazz, sometimes with
a touch of pop. In the very beginning, they got a pretty big public among
students, but their second album, På Hotell, now with a little
bit more poppy music, sold gold, and their public horizon grew. Within time,
they established listeners from retro teenagers to conservative elders,
and everybody in between, and they're probably the band with the most diverse
public.
The band's fourth output, I Centrum, is their most
best-selling album ever, not that either Amerika or their
latest album, Kaos, has sold bad in any way, though.
The band has always got pretty much help from the radio stations, and a track
called "Undantag" from I Centrum became a pretty
big hit, um, very big hit, and I Centrum probably
got a lot of help therefrom.
The band, or rather Bo Sundström, has always written very innovative
and resonantic lyrics about life in general, mostly either love or booze or
both, though. Their lyrics has always been some sort of a trademark for the
band, besides of the music and Sundström's peculiar voice. Um, that was a
lot of different trademarks...may I say that they're a VERY peculiar band?
Almost nothing has sounded like this in the 90's, they're that kind of band
whose music just wasn't made for these times. The thing with them, though,
is that this nostalgic touch to their music is just what attracs so many listeners
in Sweden, and I'm pretty certain that, if they just tried, they'd become
pretty big even outside our borders.
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I don't know if the band thought of recording an album
when they formed in 1991, but obviously, they came to the state when they
got their chance, and they got this album recorded. The songs are all neat
little compositions, well-worked and all that (great melodies!), but what
excepts BKO from other of the better 90's acts is their very peculiar jazzy
style, which is really retro, but still pretty progressive, they sound like
something new. That's one thing. The other is that Bo Sundstöm
(alias Bo Kasper) is a hell of a great lyricist/vocalist, or rather, a great
lyricist and a vocalist who knows how to use his voice in a great way, kinda
like Ozzy Osbourne, to take an example in another genre.
The band really catches a commonday, resonantic sound, and this
album is just awfully well-suited for playing when reading the newspaper,
making some food, having a break, or just whatever. It's probably your next
jazzier purchase too, if you can find it.
"Det går en man omkring i mina skor" is a quite speedy tune with a cool atmosphere, a great bass line and some other great saxes and some keyboards accompanying Bo Kaspers' pretty monotonous vocals. It's genious! You'd better hear it, of course!
"Söndag i sängen" is slower and more retro, with gorgeous saxes by Per Johansson, and there's some of that background noise which are always present on old records, you know, that noise which seems to come from somebody blowing in a microphone or something. Anyways, if you understood me or not doesn't really matter, does it? One thing which I can explain in a clear way, though, is that this song is really nostalgic, and then it's good for me. By the way, it's written by the band together with Wille Craaford from Just D.
"Köpenhamn" is another slower tune, but this time with more drums and a repeated sax/keyboard line. It's pretty laid-back and nice, but the reason why I chose it as worst song is that it gets pretty boring after a while, as it seems as if the whole song is a repeated loop.
"Kyss mej" is rather energetic, though. It's
actually some sort of generic energetic jazz, 'cos this certainly isn't
as one-of-a-kindisg as the rest of the tracks. There's the jazzy drums,
the jazzy bass, the jazzy saxes, a jazzy guitar solo...generally, it's pretty
much like a swing number, and wtf, the song might not be a pure BKO tune
but it's definitely a great tune! Gotta love Bo Kaspers' wailing in falsetto!
"I botten på glaset" is again calmer, smooth-going and with
a string section. It's another tribute to the old times, with that gorgeous
little jazz guitar and all. It's your average great tune.
"Hål" is an interesting little thingy about having problems finding money to get yourself going, sung with a big portion of humour. The music is pretty funny too, with a swinging bass/drum accompaniment plus some more swinging things like some organ and piano themes and a nice sax solo.
"Under balkongen" goes in the same veins as "I botten på glaset", withing which I try to say that it's calm, smooth, retro, has a string section and is just great. It's that kind of tune you can find on some soundtrack to a 50's movie where the loving couple goes and has a dance over at the jazz-dent, and when the orchestra chooses the music just to accompany this certain couple. I guess you know what I mean, at least you'll do whenever you hear the song.
"Simtur" is another upbeat tune, with a neat organ/sax line, and, um, well, everything is just excellent about the song. Yeah, the lyrics as well, about physiotherapy, and it's in general a very optimistic tune, and I like optimistic tunes.
"Hennes syster sa" deals with the situation which might arise when some girl's boyfriend leaves her when she becomes with children. The tune is still upbeat, though, with lots of claviatures and saxes. It's also that kind of song where everything feels just right. All this perfection about the album makes me wonder if this really is their debut? I mean, I (almost) don't know any other band whose first album sounds this consistent! Guess I'd better go do a research about it...Anybody should have this album in their collection, and then one may understand Swedish or not, that doesn't matter too much, since this still sounds like nothing else. Oh wait...there's "Jorden snurrar" on here, too - a calm, darker tune about a drunkard when his drunken friend dies. And again; you SHOULD have this!
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Söndag i sängen became a pretty big hit a year earlier. I guess there was some need for this kind of music, 'cause, you know, otherwise it wouldn't sell (how difficult to come up with that line!). Anyway, when it was released, it wasn't at all a certainty that it would be a successful record, so it probably came as a surprise to everybody that these retrospective guys managed to become popular even among younger listeners back then. However, the album had to be followed up, right? So the band sat down, wrote some tracks, decided that they were a smart band, and made the tracks sound/seem smart. The concept turned out to be successful, and they sold even more albums.
You got it? The songs are really good, but their "cleverness" disturbs. It's not as gorgeously jazzy as before either, it's more pop. The tracks are still very well-worked and carefully written, though - after all, didn't they intend to be smart? - even more than before, actually. And, what the, it IS a pretty great album!
The album opens with "Ingenting alls", about being too ambitious and try to do too much. A self-parody?? Um, guess they weren't that smart (to see that they were too ambitious, that is)... The song is poppy, dominated by a strong drum beat. There's actually not much of a melody, there's mostly only some solos here and there. There's some strings as well, and they switch between playing pizzicato and arco. It makes a pretty cool effect.
"Bara din bild" has even more strings, opens with strings entirely, actually, until it smoothly goes over into being a dark-tuned jazz thingy with lots of bass. There's a guitar solo as well, but generally, it's really the bass which helps Bo Kasper with the melody. It's a quite okayish song, but by BKO's standards, it seems quite boring.
"Hem i säng" is rather bluesy, though, with some old-styled guitars and recorded in a way that makes it sound really old. That's cool. The song is pretty funny, about how Bo Kasper manage to get girls home. Yeah, the tune really works.
"Puss" is an advanced jazz tune, similar to Steely dan, actually, with a lot of saxes which plays a couple of notes, it has that Walter Becker-ish bass line, Bo Kaspers' vocals aren't too far from Donald Fagen's, and there's pretty heavy drums plus a sax solo. And as I love Steely Dan (they might even be my favourite US band!) I love this song, too. It DOES sound unnecessarily smart and difficultly arranged, but that's no problem this time. Great song.
"Hon är så söt" has some neat piano, VERY neat, and together with the vintage-soundinging drums and Bo Kaspers nice little vocals melody, the song becomes the most sensual the band has released so far. At least until 1994. The lyrics is the only thing that bugs me this time, about some guy who predicts his separation from his girlfriend. It's just too smart. Too smart-sounding, at least, which isn't necessarily the same thing.
"Satsa några kronor", on the other hand, is probably the most energetic song they had recorded at this time in their career. The lyrics works this time, about being gambling-mad or something. It's a speedy, pretty jazzy tune which I'desitate to call jazz-rock, but almost. Everything's working together, the guitar, bass, drums, saxes, keyboards, saxes, vocals...the vocals are unusually energetic, by the way - much more straining than what we're used to. REALLY great song.
"Mindre smakar mer" is too smart, but it has a cool melody, with a whistle/guitar interplay and cool drums. It's smooth and soft, quite weird, but charming, and that's good, isn't it? The lyrics aren't really bad either, them be too smart or not. They fit the song.
"Håll dig till den du har" is ALSO too smart, lyrically. It has a cool double-bass line, though, and the bridge in the middle with a bursting piano really rules. There's some noises in the background at some state of the song which sounds like the hummingbirds in that famous Donald Duck movie where he's photographing birds in the jungle, you know...The ending part with it's Deep Purpish organs rules, too. The instrumental parts rules, that is, while the sung parts are somewhat worse.
"Snäll och dum" is a generic jazz tune, with strained saxes and stuff, neat melodies and stuf, though with pretty too smarty lyrics. Besides of the lyrics, though, it's a really great song with a mighty piano, sax, bass and whatever. So great, actually, that I gladly ignore the lyrics and dig the music. Usually when dealing with BKO, I listen to the lyrics and music equally, but not with this tune. Just wanted to share with you how I use to listen ay BKO. Sorry if you got bothered.
"Vi tar in på hotell" is a laid-back, soft, pretty fusion-sounding tune. Um, that's it. Great album, but too smart, especially the lyrics. If you don't know Swedish you won't bother, of course...
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Alright, På Hotell sold way better than Söndag I Sängen, but the guys realised that their self-proclaimed clever lyrics didn't work, so this time the lyrics works better. However, the songwriting is worse than before, and the synthesizers plays a too big role in many of the songs. The songs are, um, less distinctive, with few brilliant arrangements. This brings the music closer to fusion, a genre that I DO like a whole lot, but fusion just doesn't suit BKO very well. There's more electric guitar here for the album's own best, and the guitar dissonates with the fusion as well. The guitarist Lars Halapi quit after this album was released, so I guess neither he were too satisfied with the final result. Well, the album sold even more than På Hotell, so I guess this little change of genre didn't matter after all...at least not commercially. That's pretty weird, actually, since this album is probably their hardest to get into, and so I'm pretty certain that if they would have continued in thius style, they wouldn't be as hugely popular here in Sweden as they are. They boys in the band eventually realised this as well, so they changed style once again on I Centrum, this time for the best, though. I'll come to that part, too, don't worry.
Well, the whole thingio opens with "Vi kommer aldrig att dö", a really fusion-ish tune with a "blooping" synthesizer theme in the background, and that synth does some hissing noises as well. Other than that, the song is a smooth and certainly ear-pleasant tune with cool lyrics about how to be remembered forever. I agree that it's dangerously mainstream-sounding, but as long as it is of good quality, I don't mind.
"En ny skön värld" is smooth as well, and more laid-back. It's mostly drum-driven with some sax notes after each chorus. The choruses has some female choir, too. Oh well... Anyways, the song increases somewhat in loudness, with this "loudness" mostly consisiting of saxes, and there's a neat sax going solo at the end of the tune. It's a really nice tune, though not up to "Vi kommer aldrig att dö."
"Ett & noll" has a nice acoustic guitar and a similarly nice piano. The verses are really neat as well, but the chorus quite disturbs, though I don't know why...probably because of the abrupting effect it has, since the song is so smooth that even this little non-offensive chorus acts disturbing with its change of key and melody. Besides of this little chorus, though, the song works really good. And the chorus is really "little".
"Amerika" is dangerously mainstream, just as the first track, but this time they go a little bit over the edge, and the drum-machine-sounding drums are pretty monstrous. The keyboard solo sucks. The repeated sax line is boring. Oh. This is not too good. The lyrics, about a dude who spends his last money on a ticket to America, aren't too exciting either.
"Lika rädd som du" has got ar everbed guitar, sounding like a really slow Hendrix rip-off. It's a ballad, over 5 minutes long, which is pretty unusal for being a BKO song, and that gutar pretty much ownes the whole thing. The lyrics suck arse, just as that electric guitar and the awfully thick, gelatinous atmosphere. Ugh. Not even Bo Kaspers' usually nice vocals sounds good, and then we're really low, by BKO's standards. To be frank, the tune is probably the worst tune by BKO I've heard so far.
Thank my goodness that "Kvarter" comes rightly after! It's an upbeat little jollytune, similar to some of the older tunes. This time EVERYTHING works, in opposite of the earlier songs, even the slide guitar which plays some glissandos sounds OK. And you know what - it reminds me of "Perpetual Motion Machine"! That excellent tune on Klaatu's Sir Army Suit! That's a great standard, 'cause that Klaatu tune beats the shit out of almost anything poppy! Well, in order to return to "Kvarter"; it has some jolly lyrics about how crazy Bo Kaspers' neighbourhood is, it has that great, mood-lifting atmosphere and keyboards which makes it similar to "Perpetual Motion Machine", and it has got a guitar that works, for the only second time on this album. This sounds great.
"Är det där vi är nu" is another ballad with lots of guitars and poorly written lyrics (I really hope these lyrics are meant to be a parody on something else!) and it's so, erm, unpeculiar. It could've been recorded by ANY balladeering artist after Elton John got famous, it could've been "The Rose", "Tears In Heaven", "Cryin'" - you name it. It's generic. And it sucks.
"En världsomsegling under havet" is pretty moody, with some weird-sounding saxes during the chorus. The post-chorus piano sounds like a "Stairway To Heaven" rip-off - cool or what! Well, a moderately great tune, since it has its charm but isn't really something close to "Kvarter."
"Du kan" is a Steely Dan-ish fusion tune. Ignore Bo Kaspers' voice and you've got it. The vocals are what makes it special, though, Bo Kasper is a god within the jazzier genres! There's almost no melody besides of the vocals, and as a whole, the tune is your averagely nice fusion track. It whets the appetite, though - these guys would become a really good Steely Danny band if they tried.
"Gott nytt år" is a typical BKO album closer, calm, soft, charming. It sounds really nice.
In order to end this review in some way; where the heck has those old-sounding jazz drums gone???
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Well, Amerika sold even better than På Hotell, but smart (!) as the guys are, they realised that the music had some severe lacks on the last album, even if the lyrics usually worked. So this time around, they've come up with great music and good lyrics. So what could go wrong, you might ask. Um, I don't know really, but it feels as if there's too much filler tracks on the album. The difficult thing is to decide which are filler and which are not, though...Alright, there's probably some filler in every song, I guess. Some more in some, though - there's still that feeling that the album is built up around "Undantag" and a couple of other really fantastic tunes. Ah well, judged by the pattern so far, they'll probably improve on Kaos, the nextcoming, so there should be no reason to worry.
Anyway, the guitarist Lars Halapi quite the band after he realised how poor Amerika sounded, so nowadays the keyboardist Mats Asplén picks up the guitar besides of his keyboards.
The album brought the band a Grammis (yeah, the Swedish version of Grammy!) for best band, or if was album. Some of the tracks were pretty successful as singles as well, especially "Undantag", which even got played a whole lot in the radio. And, as usual, the CD sold even better than Amerika. The big question is whether Kaoswill sell better than this one, though - I've got a very little feeling that the band might have reached their album-selling peak...it'll become clear within time, I suppose - after all, we should give Kaos some time to reach as many listeners as possible first.
"Allt ljus på mig" is an easy-going fusion tune, with a repeated keyboard line always there. The drums are pretty heavy and steady, while the vocals are bright as a contrast to the instrumentation. There's a string section, and in the middle of the song is a change of key, similar to what's usually at the end of the most mainstream tune. The song is pretty good anyway, though.
"En jävel vid mitt öra" is a funny, jazzy thingy about what might happen when someone goes to get the newspaper. Lots of unhospitable boozing in this case, told with a big portion of humour. The whole song is an easy-going jazzy one sounding really great. Compared with...
..."Undantag" it's almost nothing, though, 'cos this tune is just awfully excellent. A smooth-going, piano-driven tune, with an acoustic guitar solo, and a bit 'o gorgeous sax...ah, well - you should indeed hear it. It's just a piece of perfect perfection, and it kinda overshadows the rest of the album if you're not careful, but HELL what a great tune it is! 'Nuff said.
"Cigarett" is a friendly little tune with a lot of piano doing something I don't know what it's called in English, but the Swedish word for it is "efterslag", in musical terms. Anyway, the tune has some of those swelling drums which are so nostalgic, and that's nice, since there were nothing of that on Amerika.
"Vissa har det" is more fusion, with lots of different electric instruments, keyboards and stuff, and of course some saxes. The tune is too smart for me, though, about some people being intelligent and some not being ("Some has it.."), and with that fusion-ish music...um, the lyrics are at least OK, so it's probably the music that bugs me. It just doesn't sound good.
"Semester" is a laid-back tune, with some pretty gorgeous organs, vocals, piano, lyrics, you name it. Everything just sounds great. And hey - those louder parts after the choruses with a lot of saxes sounds like Chicago at their best! A little lose of personality, a big musical gain...Ah, this is gorgeous! Almost as great as "Undantag"!
"Fyrarättersmål" is that kind of jazzy tune with acoustic guitar John McLaughlin, Al di Meola and their like like to play. Um, that's it. Except maybe that it's soft and nice in general.
"Innan jag sa hej" has a bass line dominating the thingy, besides of the lots of piano also being there. Um, it feels as if it's pretty filler-ish, and, well, it's among the four worst songs on the album.
"Bröllopsresan" is pretty fantastic, though - a really retro jazzy tune with a woodwind section of clarinets and saxes, some old-time-sounding guitars and drums, and lyrics about a guy who's out on his marriage travel, but is homesick and becoming a nervous wreck. Ah, it's just gorgeous - I love these buddies the most when they're going nostalgic!
"Finnas bättre till" has some nice sax/piano theme and is a calm tune without much of a melody. I guess it works, but in general I don't care much about it. There's a nice sax/brass thingy in the middle which opens my ears somewhat, though it's still too much a filler tune.
"Önska dig en stilla natt" sounds like a soft old Left-progg tune from the 70's, with not too many chords on the guitar or too difficult movements on the drums. There's a neat little slide guitar as well. Some strings are also present. The whole soothing thingy, with the slide guitar and all, makes it sound like "The Last Resort" by Eagles, but wtf, that's no problem with me - I like both this one and "The Last Resort"!
And to round off I should say that the album IS really good, but I hope that they continue improve on Kaos. For instance, we wouldn't need so many pointless fillers. And, as you might have supposed already, when I'm writing this, Kaos has already been released but I haven't heard it yet.
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It was quite a time since the last time - four years since I centrum was released. Understandable - that album both sold and sounded well, and the band got bigger than ever. So when these four years had gone, the band had finally completed a collection of tunes certain to become another triumphal progress for the band. And eventually, it went as it went, and the band got lots of positive critic, sold well, had a pretty big single hit within "Ett fullkomligt kaos", but somehow, the band manages to lose a little bit of themselves, 'cause they WANTED to make this record mainstream, and that's what they worked from. Oh, well, I admit that I don't know with which thoughts in their mind they did the earlier records, but this is where they seem to lose their spontaneity. The songs are well-worked thingys, with mainstreamy hooks, and too often sounding the same, with some exceptions. The lyrics are cautiously written, no mistakes here, and, well, this is a 100% proof commercial success. The horrible thing, though, is that it still sounds great! The guys throws my whole musical creed upside down! Commercial albums should be averagely great at best, but this record reaches the "very good" grade! Whipp-eee, suddenly there's four Britney Spears albums to dig...
The album opens with "Människor som ingen vill se", a dark tune with a reverbed guitar and lyrics about "people which no one wants to see". The chorus, where Bo Kasper sing a duet with himself, computers and multi-track studios, you know, have got a really well-used vocal hook in mainstream pop songs, but the band manages to make it sound good, and there's a sax solo soon afterwards which saves me. Otherwise, it's your general Swedish darker pop tune á la Patrik Isaksson's "Du får göra som du vill" or Uno Svenningsson's "Under ytan". Guess that won't say you much, but, well, some day, maybe...
"Ett fullkomligt kaos" is the opposite - an upbeat, acoustic guitar-driven tune with a string arrangements, a neat electric piano solo, a Southern Europe-sounding bass/guitar melody, nice lyrics and a great vocal melody, especially the great hook in the chorus where Bo Kasper sings a very bright line. Equal and the perfect partner to "Undantag" from the earlier album. Really mood-raising.
"Ett ögonblick i sänder" is a reggae-ish ballad similar to Police's worst stuff, which is REALLY bad. These guys has at least a decent melody in the song, in opposite of most of Police's songs. Still, it's of a dangerously low quality but dressed in satin and ready to go straight to the commercial radio listener.
"Det smartaste jag gjort" is dangerously poppy, with dangerously intigratiating lyrics and a dangerously well-used hook in the chorus, but HECK how great this sounds! Jesus, this is better than the best Dusty Springfield ever got, with a string arrangement and all, plus a laid-back piano line which everybody can remember that they've heard some time before, but still...Oh, oh...
"Kasta något tungt" has a neat piano line, but is too anonymous to make a good single. That mentioned piano might catch many an ear, though.
"En tur på landet" is the most retro tune this time, and is the only song that sounds like something from the earlier albums. It's upbeat and jazzy, with some nice vocals about a guy suddenly gets rich, so he buys an MC and takes a trip with his love to the countryside. Ooh, just like the old days! The little melody after the chorus reminds me of Jethro Tull, by the way! Now THAT is cool! The Tull am rule! (hey! I'm rhyming over 'ere!)
"Det vi tycker om" is a ballad with an unusually bad melody for being BKO. It feels so unharmonic. And the guitar, sax and keyboards, all which tries to sound like Steely Dan, truly misfits the song. It's also another dangerously well-used song, and it probably rips off a song which in its case ripped off another, which ripped off another, and so on.
"Vackert land" is of the weirder kind, though, with a neat melody ripping oof something I just can't recall at the moment, poor at remembering song titles as I am, but I think it might be something cocky American, Kiss, Aerosmith or something, but on the other hand, maybe not. Gee, it is so close to come to my mind, 'cause it's REALLY similar to something else, but played in a folky, Beatlish way - oh wait! Almost got it! The Beatles! Something from their psychedelic period! *listening through my entire Beatles colection* Ah, dangit, guess it'll have to wait till later....still sounds like Beatles, though.
"Det är inte mig det är fel på" has got some interesting lyrics and a really ear-pleasant melody and a nice sax. Um, pretty good song.
"Innan klockorna slagit tolv" is a calm piano/strings ballad. Does that seem familiar? This does really sound like a soundtrack to a sentimental American movie. Hooray, just what I'd like to hear from BKO...
In general, the overall sounds so darn slick, with all those well-dressed rip-offs and everything, and, most importantly - where's the old sound, biys? Not a single song with that brush on the "drum-roll drum" technique (didn't find that word in the dictionary!).
And, at last, I think that it might be time for the band to make a serious change of style, or they'll get worse for each album they may release after this one. Try jazz-rock, dudes, or just whatever, but please DON'T play any more slick pop!
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