Loreen
It came as no surprise when Loreen won Melodifestivalen, the Swedish selection for the Eurovision Song Contest, but she did it with record figures; more than 670,000 of the four million viewers called in to vote for her song Euphoria. Afterwards Loreen was simply overwhelmed: ”A fantastic feeling, I almost started sobbing... but now I want to see what I can do better. Two months of preparation can do miracles!”Loreen (28) was raised on the countryside outside Stockholm, in a family of Moroccan-Berber origin. She has a very focused attitude to her music. She gets frustrated when she's tagged as an R&B artist: ”It's almost bizarre. I never listen to R&B or soul music!” She continues: ”The music I get inspiration from is music that gets you into kind of a trance. Both musically and vocal wise. Artists like Björk, some of Enya's music, and especially Lisa Gerrard”.
It's fitting that Loreen learned to play the piano by imitating the very minimalistic Michael Nyman score to the 90's film The Piano. Loreen continues: ”I want to make music that really connects to my soul. I think that's when my music affects the most.” She describes herself: ”Somewhat a loner, a seeker that steers away from the information overload of today. I have no TV set. I have a laptop but I only use it for e-mails and music programs".
She then interrupts herself laughing: ”I'm really “impossible” in this age of living your life in the digital space. The people I work with really hates that I'm not even on Facebook!” Her general aim? ”To unite people in the thought that there is much more to life than the materialistic aspects. I know that it may sound hippieish and overblown. But is that really a reason to give up on this ambition? I'm certain the answer to that is no!”
Euphoria, written and produced by Peter Boström and Thomas G:son, is Loreen’s third single release and has already spent three weeks topping the Swedish charts quickly surpassing Platinum status. Neighbouring Norway and Finland were quick to discover this uplifting future anthem and are currently also reporting no.1 positions. Loreen's highly anticipated debut album is scheduled for a September release.
The composers have a double job in this year's Eurovision Song Contest as Thomas G:son co-wrote the Spanish entry and Peter Boström the Norwegian one.
