Swedish vocals
International relevance: -
Despite my deep disdain for Fria Proteatern, this is such an interesting release that it needs an entry of its own, not being lumped in with other 45s in one of my singles specials. This is a symbol for a lot more than music alone, why the background story is all important.
When José Feliciano entered the San Remo Festival (the Italian forerunner to the Eurovision Song Contest) in 1971, he came in second place with ”Che sarà”, a song written by the two Italians Jimmy Fontana and Franco Migliacci. The song became very popular and was translated to several languages across Europe. The Swedish lyrics were written by ABBA manager Stikkan Andersson, a prolific lyrics translator in his day and one with a certain knack for storytelling, more often with humanist (even feminist) political overtones than the he was acknowledged for. ”Che sarà” became ”Aldrig mer” which means ”never again” in English, a song that dealt with the often debated regional depopulation in Sweden at the time. The song gave Björn Ulvaeus's pre-ABBA band The Hootenanny Singers a huge hit in 1971.
However, the progg movement was quick and happy to mock Andersson's lyrics for being too nostalgic and resigned – ”we can't change what's happening, it's no use trying”. Especially as Stikkan Andersson was the capitalist devil himself to the progg cognoscenti who rather arrogantly thought only themselves to have the ultimate truth at hand. Then, in 1973, Fria Proteatern wrote their own lyrics to it and released it as a standalone single. Their words are clearly based on ”Aldrig mer” but turned the original message on its head. ”Vi blir fler” argues that the more people unite the greater the possibility to stop the negative process. Same song, same topic but coming to the opposite conclusion: you can improve society you get together and fight for it. I don't object to that particular assertien, but I say that both sides make valid observations.
Fria Proteatern of course represented the politically progressive phalanx, but I think Stikkan Andersson's sentiments towards the depopulation problem were closer to what people outside the affected regions thought. The Social Democratic Party governed at the time, and it was their aim to concentrate the population to the large city areas, thus emptying the smaller cities, many of the situated in the north. And I'm afraid a lot of people believed that Olof Palme, then Sweden's prime minister, knew what he was doing and that there wasn't anything that the so called 'ordinary people' could do about it anyway. That's resignation.
We mustn't forget that Stikkan
Andersson grew up in a sparsely populated area and kept his pathos for what happened in such places. I believe that ”Aldrig mer” was a heartfelt lament. Add to
that that ”Aldrig mer” wasn't an exception. There had already
been a significant number of Swedish hits through the decades with
lyrics looking through the rose-coloured glasses of safe nostalgia,
celebrating the good ole days when life was easy (conveniently
forgetting it really wasn't).
But contrary to popular belief,
quite a few Swedish commercial songs in the 60s and 70s had social concerns, a fact that the politically toughest proggers would
never have admitted to. And if they did, they would have written them
off anyway as cynical attempts at capitalizing on the zeitgeist. Much
of the commercial music was crap, no doubt about it, but not all was. There are examples
of commercial songs with genuinely concerned lyrics,
albeit not phrased for a Proletärkultur or Oktober release. But you
don't have to applaude Stalin to have honest intentions. Actually, I
prefer if you don't.
My point is, there are nuances. Not all so called commercial music is inherently bad and meaningless, and not all progg is inherently good and meaningful. There is no such law of nature. It's just not that simple.
From this perspective, this is Fria Proteatern's most interesting effort. It's firmly dependent on the context, even if that hardly will make any sense to a non-Swede even if you know about its background. I happen to like the melody myself even if it's a bit of a tearjerker, but that is really irrelevant as the value here doesn't lie with the music, but what their version symbolizes in relation to the version it alludes to. It's a talking point where the music itself is subordinate.
The B side ”Tänk dej ett Stockholm”
(=”imagine a Stockholm”) has strong environmental concerns, with
lyrics painting a utopic picture of a Stockholm without pollution,
noise and unfriendly atmosphere. It's very much like an afterthought
to the elms battle, but musically it's just as chunky and lyrically
blocky as your typical asinine Fria Proteatern original.
Vi blir fler (through kallelind.se, scroll to the end of the article and click the link)
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