Off the swedish version of Dancing With The Stars:
C’est quoi le délire avec Betify ?
5 months ago
Showing posts with label Sweden. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sweden. Show all posts
2010-02-13
2009-11-05
Big Budget Tikitech
Me (on Google Reader): *slaps forehead*
Boima Tucker: Ha!
Rachel: sigh. oh radioclit. explorers pwnt by the natives? vid was wack even before the kalashnikovs, cannibalism.
Wayne: DJ livingstone, i presume?
Me: I think I should just put it up, really. Oh dear.
2009-07-11
2009-06-06
Vote, dammit, vote
I'm preparing a post about my ambivalence to the idea of party politics, but right now I'm too far gone into this campaign to be able to say anything other than this. Would you please go ahead and vote for the Feminist Initiative in the European Parliament elections? It's the clearest and most decisive statement against the growing tides of far-right ideology sweeping over Europe. If you can't find our ballots at your particular polling place, you can take an empty ballot and write "Feministiskt initiativ" on it. Nothing else, no names, or the vote won't count!
But, you're thinking, what is the soundtrack going to be like? You obviously pick a political stance according to your taste in music, and I don't blame you. Well, in a bizarre turn of events we've suddenly gone completely poptimist, after Benny from ABBA donated a million crowns (additional link link link link in Swedish) for a last-minute ad campaign. Now everyone is going around humming ABBA tunes in Sweden's most radical mainstream party - a beautifully ironic juxtaposition against the self-righteous prole-hate of the 70s progg movement, who denounced ABBA as reactionary.
You can be safe in the musical context as well. Please go right ahead: lay or your love on Fi.
But, you're thinking, what is the soundtrack going to be like? You obviously pick a political stance according to your taste in music, and I don't blame you. Well, in a bizarre turn of events we've suddenly gone completely poptimist, after Benny from ABBA donated a million crowns (additional link link link link in Swedish) for a last-minute ad campaign. Now everyone is going around humming ABBA tunes in Sweden's most radical mainstream party - a beautifully ironic juxtaposition against the self-righteous prole-hate of the 70s progg movement, who denounced ABBA as reactionary.
You can be safe in the musical context as well. Please go right ahead: lay or your love on Fi.
2009-03-17
Specularis: National Offense
(Okay, I'm gonna lay off the mock Latin after this post.) As an interesting mirror to my last post where I looked at people's fascination with being gawked at, here's a bunch who obviously aren't quite as happy to be observed. The Eurovision song contest this year is being held in Moscow, and the Swedish national finals included a intermission segment in which a pair of comedians did a "Russian" version of a (made up) dansband song which has been a running gag in the semifinals. It's absolutely bursting with bad clichés and stereotypes, which is probably the point: there are Balalaikas, pumping techno, the Red Army choir, nesting dolls, women who look like prostitutes, gangsters, a bear, even Tetris. See it minus accompanying sketch from the 4:25 point below:
The Russian embassy is not happy. Not happy at all. The choice quote is probably:
I'm considering the idea that it's an issue of power dynamics somehow, but while something like the Entropa squat toilet controversy can be put down to a national inferiority complex, it's hard to imagine Russia feeling inferior to Sweden. Generally, this kind of humour (and it was a riff at Russia, whatever Schlager Ronnie says in the article above) is acceptable between equals, but gets uncomfortable when the butt of the joke is oppressed. Imagine the above joke with the English, and no-one would mind. Imagine it with Arabs, and it starts to feel decidedly less funny. But surely Russia is big enough to take it lightly? Perhaps it represents an insecurity or feeling of offense from an earlier era in which slavs where indeed considered inferior.
(But I'm just speculationg here. There's obviously a cultural difference going on. Another possible factor I think might be included is insularity - many of the governments I can see being insulted by this tend to be rather inward-looking.)
What do you guys think? Is Russia right in being offended? In that case, are those that aren't offended by this sort of thing wrong?
The Russian embassy is not happy. Not happy at all. The choice quote is probably:
“We do not react to eccentricity by some lunatics whose Russophobia should place them in an asylum rather than on Globen’s stage.”Which leads me to reiterate my point about various reactions available to touristic attention.
I'm considering the idea that it's an issue of power dynamics somehow, but while something like the Entropa squat toilet controversy can be put down to a national inferiority complex, it's hard to imagine Russia feeling inferior to Sweden. Generally, this kind of humour (and it was a riff at Russia, whatever Schlager Ronnie says in the article above) is acceptable between equals, but gets uncomfortable when the butt of the joke is oppressed. Imagine the above joke with the English, and no-one would mind. Imagine it with Arabs, and it starts to feel decidedly less funny. But surely Russia is big enough to take it lightly? Perhaps it represents an insecurity or feeling of offense from an earlier era in which slavs where indeed considered inferior.
(But I'm just speculationg here. There's obviously a cultural difference going on. Another possible factor I think might be included is insularity - many of the governments I can see being insulted by this tend to be rather inward-looking.)
What do you guys think? Is Russia right in being offended? In that case, are those that aren't offended by this sort of thing wrong?
2009-03-09
Crazy Trumpet Fun
The tiny world of Swedish musicology has been abuzz (in so far as that's even possible, Maria Ljungdahl's link list notwithstanding) over an opinion piece written by famously anti-feminist maths researcher and shit-stirrer Tanja Bergkvist. She's upset over the fact that the Swedish Research Council has issued a 700 000 kr reasearch grant to study "The Trumpet as a Gender Symbol".
Her reaction to the idea can be summed up as "this is ridiculous".
My reaction to reading about the same idea is "this is so cool".
I'm not sure both can't be true. In fact, I think maybe a bit of ridiculousness is a prerequisite for interesting research to be going on in the first place.
I was discussing the issue with one of my fellow Feminist Intiative members, who worried that seemingly silly research would undermine the credibility of gender studies as an academic discipline. On the one hand, those fears are probably unfounded because the research at a detail level seems eminently sensible - it's all about what tonal ranges on the trumpet were considered "masculine" and "feminine" and how that influenced their use in composition, as filtered through the historical military/male function of the instrument. Perfectly regular musicological stuff.
On the other hand, though, I can't see why we shouldn't welcome research with a bit of a crazy bite to it. "The Trumpet as a Gender Symbol", as a title, is a beautiful juxtaposition of the extremes of basic instrument research and post-structural analysis, and just observing how the researcher is going to manage to bring it all together definitely has the potential to be more interesting than just using gender studies to research, I dunno, male violence or something. Again.
I might be biased on this because I'm a journalist and an old philosophy student, but a good, unexpected angle is killer. In journalism, whatever Mr. Bourdieu says, finding a story with a difference will often be promoted. And in philosophy, they practically love their extremes. Would Berkeley, however good he was at writing, still be remembered today if he hadn't held the frankly kooky position that there's no external world? Would Alain Badiou be a star if he didn't deny the existence of objects?
The result or viewpoint might not be true, as such, but does it really matter? It'll spur others to break out of their established routs and re-examine their own life. Sometimes, like with any good writing, that should be the aim of the research in the first place, above any claims to knowledge.
Research should sometimes be as concentrated and sublime as a great piece of art.
Research should sometimes have the snappiness and punch of a good joke.
And maybe that, in the end, is the research that will matter most of all.
Her reaction to the idea can be summed up as "this is ridiculous".
My reaction to reading about the same idea is "this is so cool".
I'm not sure both can't be true. In fact, I think maybe a bit of ridiculousness is a prerequisite for interesting research to be going on in the first place.
I was discussing the issue with one of my fellow Feminist Intiative members, who worried that seemingly silly research would undermine the credibility of gender studies as an academic discipline. On the one hand, those fears are probably unfounded because the research at a detail level seems eminently sensible - it's all about what tonal ranges on the trumpet were considered "masculine" and "feminine" and how that influenced their use in composition, as filtered through the historical military/male function of the instrument. Perfectly regular musicological stuff.On the other hand, though, I can't see why we shouldn't welcome research with a bit of a crazy bite to it. "The Trumpet as a Gender Symbol", as a title, is a beautiful juxtaposition of the extremes of basic instrument research and post-structural analysis, and just observing how the researcher is going to manage to bring it all together definitely has the potential to be more interesting than just using gender studies to research, I dunno, male violence or something. Again.
I might be biased on this because I'm a journalist and an old philosophy student, but a good, unexpected angle is killer. In journalism, whatever Mr. Bourdieu says, finding a story with a difference will often be promoted. And in philosophy, they practically love their extremes. Would Berkeley, however good he was at writing, still be remembered today if he hadn't held the frankly kooky position that there's no external world? Would Alain Badiou be a star if he didn't deny the existence of objects?
The result or viewpoint might not be true, as such, but does it really matter? It'll spur others to break out of their established routs and re-examine their own life. Sometimes, like with any good writing, that should be the aim of the research in the first place, above any claims to knowledge.
Research should sometimes be as concentrated and sublime as a great piece of art.
Research should sometimes have the snappiness and punch of a good joke.
And maybe that, in the end, is the research that will matter most of all.
2009-02-03
RIP Sune Jonsson
I'm usually quite sceptical of documentary photographers but I've always loved the work of Sune Jonsson (1930-2009). Of all the potential excuses for a middle-class person documenting the life of a subaltern Jonsson hit an unusually well-rounded jackpot: He came from the village life he was depicting. He lived and worked with the people involved during shoots. He had a clear ideological agenda supporting his subjects. He was preserving a way of life on camera that was fast disappearing. He was a trained ethnologist working for a museum. He famously always insisting on thorough written explanation texts for all his pictures. And he posed people simply and straightforwardly, looking into the camera.
Not to mention, of course, that his work is brilliant - capturing an image of poverty, pride and remnants of pre-modernity in the most remote areas of northern Sweden. There's a surprising tenderness to a lot of shots, a tacit approach to nature and agriculture. And then there are the interiors, that dominate a lot of his shots and speak as much as the people. It's perhaps an irony that this poverty-stricken rural landscape should have such beautiful places indoors, poverty achieving the same scaling-down, preservation and simplification as the most skilled of designers!
Or perhaps it's an aesthetification? The woman in the picture below posed underneath the telephone station that is her labour space, yet with the long-outmoded machine taking up the space with its antiquarian curiosity and bricolage composition. The subjective eye of the photographer, seeking beauty, has posed her there. Photography is a wiley business, and even a master like Jonsson can't escape its burning ethical questions.
2008-11-08
One year on, I've moved
I've been blogging for a year now. Since it feels like I just had a big celebratory post (#100), I thought I'd do an update of what my life looks like instead, and make it an annual, November 8 me-post.
Well, apart from solidifying my musicology student identity and messing about with the usual interpersonal relationship issues, the one big thing I've done recently is moved. So I thought I'd do a quick presentation of my new neighbourhood, Kista.
View Larger Map
Kista is a suburb of Stockholm. Because I know that I have many American readers, I'd better explain that this means it's considerably poorer than the inner city. Although not technically part of the Million Programme, it is surrounded my areas built in the sixties and early seventies, and shares many of its features. However, it is also a strange, dynamic boom town. Stockholm is growing, and verging on becoming the kind of multi-centred city that is practically standard with cities of two or more million inhabitants, and Kista is often touted as the potential "northern centre". People come here rather than leave here during the day.
As such, it has two large draws, neither of which is particularly pleasant for the residents. The north-eastern part is Sweden's equivalent of Silicon Valley, full of high-tech companies and tech-oriented university campuses. (It's practically a dead area to walk around in, though.) Cutting us residents off from the office zone is an enormous, lengthwise oriented mall, one of the biggest in Stockholm. (Which makes shopping and eating out nearby expensive and annoying.)
As for the residential portion, roughly the south-western third, it's all condominiums (unlike the surrounding areas, where it's mostly rental). This means that, while it's still considered an immigrant area, it's the "middle-class immigrant area" - where the residents are still close to the cultural centre/run-down banlieue of Rinkeby, while being safely tucked away from the welfare class. The closeness to the IT campus also attracts a fair number of students (like me, though I don't study there) and IT professionals, and it's thus supposedly one of the best-integrated areas in all of Sweden. I've not noticed it much myself (beyong seing all kinds of people down at the shop), but then I've only lived here a month.
On the other side of the residential area is, thankfully, nature, in the form of an old military excercise field turned barely used green belt. Great place for walks.
So that's where I live. I'm going to give a shot at discovering the local music life as soon as I have time, but we'll see. Strange as it may sound for such a dynamic, price-rising area, there's almost no feeling of actual life.
2008-09-19
Diaspora inna de Märsta
I think I finally found some reasonably interesting diasporadic music up in cold, cold Sweden. I've always been jealous of other countries with their fun minorities, but now there's a scene here as well: the Swedish-Kenyan music scene. Don't know very much more at the moment than what I get through the (occasionally fascinating) Kenya Stockholm blog, but I'm determined to find out more. I think I'll send out some e-mails.
Africa Unitez - A-A
J-Jay - Microphone Playa
I do find it slightly amusing that two of the principal artists are both called JJ.
Africa Unitez - A-A
J-Jay - Microphone Playa
I do find it slightly amusing that two of the principal artists are both called JJ.
2008-06-05
The Sincerest Form of Flattery
It doesn't matter where in the world, as long as the country or community is small enough. It doesn't matter who is the target, or who is the artist. It's always going to come with a scent of success.
I'm talking about artists who come in to a culture from abroad and try their absolute best to fit into it. Nothing, it seems, makes people happier than someone foreign paying attention to our scene, to our country, to our culture, and loving it to the extent of wanting to join in. Great recent example is MC Gringo in Brazil - he's really immersed himself in his host culture, studied it's forms, tried his hardest, and they love him for it. He may not get it, not completely, but his very effort is pride-inducing.
This pattern of the hard-working foreigner is surprisingly common. And it doesn't seem to matter who is receiving who.
Here in Sweden it's a few years since we had any serious contenders, mind. But we still talk about them to this day. In the early fifties pioneering black vocal group The Delta Rhythm Boys, famous for bridging the transition from smooth jazz and rough rhythm & blues, did a tour of Sweden and were persuaded to record a couple of Swedish popular songs. They struggled through them phonetically (they never learnt Swedish), but the recordings were an instant success and the Deltas returned again and again to record and tour here. The songs were always very popped-up, but people really leapt at these old favourites redone by a proper, American jazz group! Here's a typical number, here with an unusual translation included:
In the sixties another group (that you might have heard of) had a huge success with a re-recording of a traditional tune, again learned phonetically: The Osmond Brothers. Had they not gone on to a hugely successful career in their native US (as The Osmonds) they might have become the rock era answer to the Delta Rhythm Boys.
Since then Sweden hasn't really had a huge success in this vein but we have exported one, to Thailand of all places. Jonas Anderson came to the country as a child and fell in love with Lukthung, traditional thai country music. Eventually, he started performing in the idiom and has become an enormous star in Thailand, performing lukthung in the original language as well as he knows how. Some say he doesn't have the right feeling, it is a kind of pop-lukthung, but people still love his trying.
My other country, Hungary, has another recent addition to this crowd: Nigerian Oludayo Olapite, who performs housed-up traditional Hungarian "folklore" pop songs under the name Fekete Pákó ("Black Paulie"). Again, a huge success, and a major star in the Hungarian tabloids.
Unfortunately he presents himself as a bit of a buffoon figure, a self-propelled racial stereotype that leaves a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. He's obviously very media-savvy and intelligent, but pretends not to be in order to get publicity, and his relationship with the tabloids is extremely self-destructive. For instance, this video where he seems to be praising Hitler and making prejudiced remarks about the roma got him enormous attention - only it was all staged and scripted beforehand. No wonder his relationship with the African diaspora in Hungary is very complex indeed.
This problematic last issue aside (and the related issues of representation and image in other similar examples), I still find this kind of cultural dedication (whether done for money or out of love) an interesting and encouraging practice. I'd love to hear of more similar examples!
I'm talking about artists who come in to a culture from abroad and try their absolute best to fit into it. Nothing, it seems, makes people happier than someone foreign paying attention to our scene, to our country, to our culture, and loving it to the extent of wanting to join in. Great recent example is MC Gringo in Brazil - he's really immersed himself in his host culture, studied it's forms, tried his hardest, and they love him for it. He may not get it, not completely, but his very effort is pride-inducing.
This pattern of the hard-working foreigner is surprisingly common. And it doesn't seem to matter who is receiving who.
Here in Sweden it's a few years since we had any serious contenders, mind. But we still talk about them to this day. In the early fifties pioneering black vocal group The Delta Rhythm Boys, famous for bridging the transition from smooth jazz and rough rhythm & blues, did a tour of Sweden and were persuaded to record a couple of Swedish popular songs. They struggled through them phonetically (they never learnt Swedish), but the recordings were an instant success and the Deltas returned again and again to record and tour here. The songs were always very popped-up, but people really leapt at these old favourites redone by a proper, American jazz group! Here's a typical number, here with an unusual translation included:
In the sixties another group (that you might have heard of) had a huge success with a re-recording of a traditional tune, again learned phonetically: The Osmond Brothers. Had they not gone on to a hugely successful career in their native US (as The Osmonds) they might have become the rock era answer to the Delta Rhythm Boys.
Since then Sweden hasn't really had a huge success in this vein but we have exported one, to Thailand of all places. Jonas Anderson came to the country as a child and fell in love with Lukthung, traditional thai country music. Eventually, he started performing in the idiom and has become an enormous star in Thailand, performing lukthung in the original language as well as he knows how. Some say he doesn't have the right feeling, it is a kind of pop-lukthung, but people still love his trying.
My other country, Hungary, has another recent addition to this crowd: Nigerian Oludayo Olapite, who performs housed-up traditional Hungarian "folklore" pop songs under the name Fekete Pákó ("Black Paulie"). Again, a huge success, and a major star in the Hungarian tabloids.
Unfortunately he presents himself as a bit of a buffoon figure, a self-propelled racial stereotype that leaves a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. He's obviously very media-savvy and intelligent, but pretends not to be in order to get publicity, and his relationship with the tabloids is extremely self-destructive. For instance, this video where he seems to be praising Hitler and making prejudiced remarks about the roma got him enormous attention - only it was all staged and scripted beforehand. No wonder his relationship with the African diaspora in Hungary is very complex indeed.
This problematic last issue aside (and the related issues of representation and image in other similar examples), I still find this kind of cultural dedication (whether done for money or out of love) an interesting and encouraging practice. I'd love to hear of more similar examples!
2008-05-12
Poland, Netherlands, Sweden, Ukraine, Czech Republic, Germany: Cosmopolitan pop?
There's been a lot of discussions and speculations what this year's Eurovision trends might be, and I've certainly heard novelties (which isn't true) and rock mixed with pop (which kinda is, see my next Eurovision post). But if I would have to name one trend that's more substantial than all the others, it's the shift towards standard mainstream, well-produced pop. Besides the six countries in this post there's also (conservatively counting) Russia, Greece, Malta, Armenia and Hungary - that's a quarter of all the entries in a fairly tight genre field.
Now, this might not seems surprising in a competition based on audience voting, but Eurovision has been notorious for lagging behind even the most stale mainstream pop. All the entries in this post, on the other hand, basically have the qualities of production (not necessarily song writing and performance, though) to do fairly well in the charts even outside the competition. If there's anything at all to set them apart it's little touches of slight national flavour in all the cosmopolitanness. But maybe, guys, it's not always the country you expect.
Take, for instance, Isis Gee. She's American, the song is American-produced, and whaddyaknow, it sounds American. Like an album track by Mariah Carey or something. Bright, overloaded with strings, slightly larger dynamic range than most European pop... It's not going to work, because Europeans can sense a straight import when they hear it (witness the failure of a similar strategy by Cyprus in 2006).
Or why not the Netherlands? Like Estonia (whose track is in some sort of fake-gibberish Croatian) the Netherlands have tried to analyse the recent win series of Eastern Europe and created something pseudo-Balkanic. I detect the rocker roots of this one unfortunately in the walking bass part that's a little to hard mixed and especially the wispy freakbeat drums, so it might not work too well on all audiences (especially with the fairly uneventful vocal performance). Still, it could do okay - people are, after all, flattered by imitation.
And then there's us (by contrast, since obviously you can hear it's Swedish, right?), and it's as well-crafted as anything we've sent of in the past few years. But I still don't like it. It feels squashed, somehow, slightly over-compressed (especially in the second verse) and there's something about the diva vocals and high-end synth riffs that reminds me unpleasantly of E-Type. Plus I've got little affection for Perelli. Still, I can easily see this breaching the top ten. But let's not dwell on it, shall we?
Ukraine, on the other hand, have everything but a very silly song title going for them. There are strong superficial similarities with Perelli's track - closer to dance music than anyone would dare do in the US, strong vocals, lack of dynamic range. But the detail work is immense, with great synth sounds, a brilliant and very modern-sounding bass line, and enough eastern flavour to work as both a cosmopolitan and a local number. Somehow, if there's anything that can be described as European pop as a contrast to America, it's this. And it's great. Top 3, if not the winner?
Another really strong entry I think. Hanson meets Timbaland meets traditional Eurovision and it actually works, it's got that coasting I associate with good-quality modern production. And it's even got a fake rewind! Still, I doubt anyone with a bit more taste will be as enthusiastic as me, so It'll probably end up in the lower half of the final.
And then there's Germany which sounds like a second-rate sleepy All Saints song and is all round snore-inducingly awful. (The secret is in the tempo or in charismatic performers, guys.)
There. If you think I'm rushing through these it's because there's only just over a week left, and I'm dead set on reviewing every track by then. Two posts to go...
Now, this might not seems surprising in a competition based on audience voting, but Eurovision has been notorious for lagging behind even the most stale mainstream pop. All the entries in this post, on the other hand, basically have the qualities of production (not necessarily song writing and performance, though) to do fairly well in the charts even outside the competition. If there's anything at all to set them apart it's little touches of slight national flavour in all the cosmopolitanness. But maybe, guys, it's not always the country you expect.
Take, for instance, Isis Gee. She's American, the song is American-produced, and whaddyaknow, it sounds American. Like an album track by Mariah Carey or something. Bright, overloaded with strings, slightly larger dynamic range than most European pop... It's not going to work, because Europeans can sense a straight import when they hear it (witness the failure of a similar strategy by Cyprus in 2006).
Or why not the Netherlands? Like Estonia (whose track is in some sort of fake-gibberish Croatian) the Netherlands have tried to analyse the recent win series of Eastern Europe and created something pseudo-Balkanic. I detect the rocker roots of this one unfortunately in the walking bass part that's a little to hard mixed and especially the wispy freakbeat drums, so it might not work too well on all audiences (especially with the fairly uneventful vocal performance). Still, it could do okay - people are, after all, flattered by imitation.
And then there's us (by contrast, since obviously you can hear it's Swedish, right?), and it's as well-crafted as anything we've sent of in the past few years. But I still don't like it. It feels squashed, somehow, slightly over-compressed (especially in the second verse) and there's something about the diva vocals and high-end synth riffs that reminds me unpleasantly of E-Type. Plus I've got little affection for Perelli. Still, I can easily see this breaching the top ten. But let's not dwell on it, shall we?
Ukraine, on the other hand, have everything but a very silly song title going for them. There are strong superficial similarities with Perelli's track - closer to dance music than anyone would dare do in the US, strong vocals, lack of dynamic range. But the detail work is immense, with great synth sounds, a brilliant and very modern-sounding bass line, and enough eastern flavour to work as both a cosmopolitan and a local number. Somehow, if there's anything that can be described as European pop as a contrast to America, it's this. And it's great. Top 3, if not the winner?
Another really strong entry I think. Hanson meets Timbaland meets traditional Eurovision and it actually works, it's got that coasting I associate with good-quality modern production. And it's even got a fake rewind! Still, I doubt anyone with a bit more taste will be as enthusiastic as me, so It'll probably end up in the lower half of the final.
And then there's Germany which sounds like a second-rate sleepy All Saints song and is all round snore-inducingly awful. (The secret is in the tempo or in charismatic performers, guys.)
There. If you think I'm rushing through these it's because there's only just over a week left, and I'm dead set on reviewing every track by then. Two posts to go...
2007-11-13
That's My Swedishness And I Can't Take It Off
"My Cool" by Adam Tensta is not just one of the best Swedish singles this year but it also has a peculiar quality: It doesn't sound very Swedish. When I first saw it on TV I had no idea it was made by a Swede, and as far as I can tell on repeated viewings there is nothing in the song or the video that betrays its origins, short of the name Tensta.
You may not find it a particularly noteworthy achievement but musical Swedishness is something that's not very difficult to spot. Even when the language and looks are factored out, it's not hard (I think!) to tell that Arash is Swedish, that Chupa Chupa by El Medico is Swedish-produced or what tracks from the Eurovision Song Contest are written by Swedes.
Yes, I think I can safely hear when a track is Swedish. But I have no idea how. The only study I've seen on the subject is a decade old and centered around rockist music circa 1987, so no help there. Besides a specific factor there's the very real possibility it's just psychological self-deception and it's all in my imagination. Or, more likely, it's a tentative and multifaceted combination of timbre, mixing techniques, production sound, melodic fragments, typical harmonic progressions etc. etc. that's very hard to define. I would definately like to see someone try.
Along these lines, I think I've got a fairly decent feel for Danishness, Norwegianity and Hungarianity. Futhermore, I would hope I can often spot Americanness, Britishness and Jamaicanness, if more selectively. And obviously countries with very strong pop music cultures of their own, like India, Egypt and Turkey, have very distinct sounds one can easily spot. I'm sure you have a different set off countries you can tell music comes from.
One more thing: It's way more difficult to do this if the melody is snatched out of context. I've been listening to a lot of Romanian Manele and 60s Greek Laíko lately and they were both, in two distinct generations, influenced by precisely Arab, Indian and Turkish music. The melodies are often taken straight from the pop songs of those countries. But despite this I often have extreme difficulty telling where a particular melody has come from - stripped of clues from the vocals and production it's much more difficult than one might think.
You may not find it a particularly noteworthy achievement but musical Swedishness is something that's not very difficult to spot. Even when the language and looks are factored out, it's not hard (I think!) to tell that Arash is Swedish, that Chupa Chupa by El Medico is Swedish-produced or what tracks from the Eurovision Song Contest are written by Swedes.
Yes, I think I can safely hear when a track is Swedish. But I have no idea how. The only study I've seen on the subject is a decade old and centered around rockist music circa 1987, so no help there. Besides a specific factor there's the very real possibility it's just psychological self-deception and it's all in my imagination. Or, more likely, it's a tentative and multifaceted combination of timbre, mixing techniques, production sound, melodic fragments, typical harmonic progressions etc. etc. that's very hard to define. I would definately like to see someone try.
Along these lines, I think I've got a fairly decent feel for Danishness, Norwegianity and Hungarianity. Futhermore, I would hope I can often spot Americanness, Britishness and Jamaicanness, if more selectively. And obviously countries with very strong pop music cultures of their own, like India, Egypt and Turkey, have very distinct sounds one can easily spot. I'm sure you have a different set off countries you can tell music comes from.
One more thing: It's way more difficult to do this if the melody is snatched out of context. I've been listening to a lot of Romanian Manele and 60s Greek Laíko lately and they were both, in two distinct generations, influenced by precisely Arab, Indian and Turkish music. The melodies are often taken straight from the pop songs of those countries. But despite this I often have extreme difficulty telling where a particular melody has come from - stripped of clues from the vocals and production it's much more difficult than one might think.
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