Scan Magazine
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Culture
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Columns
Best new Scandi music in November After scoring a major hit together over five years ago with Breathe, Norwegian artist Ina Wroldsen has reunited with British producer Jax Jones on a new single release Won’t Forget You. It’s been a big summer for Ina; she’s the writer behind Kylie Minogue’s monumental smash Padam Padam. Won’t Forget You is a hands-in-the-air dance track that pairs well with Kylie’s hit. Swedish artist Lou Elliotte is out with a super-cute new release. Tracksuit Pants is a pop tune about being triggered by a particular item of clothing that a loser ex used to wear all the time. I feel for her as it just so happens to be a wardrobe staple for many – but I’m delighted to get such a top-tier bop out of her unfortunate plight! Early ’00s Danish pop band C21 have reunited for their first release in 18 years.
Tricks is the big comeback single from the pair and serves up a slice of welcome nostalgia – taking us right back to the sound of start-of-the-century radio pop. If you weren’t familiar with C21 first time around, you might well recognise one of the two – Søren Bregendal – regardless. Since his initial run in C21, Søren has represented Denmark at the Eurovision Song Contest in 2016 as a member of Lighthouse X, and he’s also starred in seasons 2 and 3 of Emily In Paris, as Erik. She’s previously written for Scandinavian pop faves including Omar Rudberg, Synne Vo, Torine, Ruben and Broiler – now Norwegian artist Caden is set to become a new Scandinavian pop fave herself. Debut single Bridges is an instantly likeable country-pop ditty that demonstrates the fact that Caden knows her way around a
Monthly Illustration
Swedes love a good, Swedish feel-good novel. Especially, one set in the north, featuring solid northern characters and solid northern topics, such as poor communication, darkness, death and loneliness. If you ask yourself what these topics are doing in a feel-good novel, you’re not alone. I keep turning the pages of these books, waiting for something – anything – uplifting to happen. But it doesn’t. By the penultimate page, I may be rewarded with a bleak allusion that things ‘might get better’.
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Issue 160
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November 2023
hit composition. The song should appeal to fans of Smith & Thell, Of Monsters & Men, and really just about anybody who appreciates the art of an epic pop melody. www.scandipop.co.uk
By Maria Smedstad
Vemod
One story that I read recently was so miserable that I had to buy an English translation to give to my husband, just to share the burden. “This is the most miserable thing I’ve ever read,” claimed my husband, whose other bedside literature includes titles such as How not to be Boring, and a Stalin biography. The Swedes on the other hand view it differently. “Didn’t you get the funny
By Karl Batterbee
country far, far away, we highlight our ability to spot elements of optimism in dire situations. Yes, it may all be very morbid at the source, but Lucia brings light to our frozen darkness at a time when we need it most. Which is what I’ll be telling myself the next time I pick up a Swedish feel-good novel. Or perhaps I’ll stick with British crime, where at least the misery is every bit as miserable as it proclaims to be.
bits?” my sister will ask, surprised. I think it comes down to the Swedish appreciation of ‘vemod’. Vemod roughly translates to melancholy. And Swedes can’t get enough of it. Something about relentless, angst-ridden sadness really puts them in a good mood. Perhaps it can be further demonstrated in our annual celebration of St Lucia. In choosing to commemorate a candle-clad Italian saint, who died a horrible death in a
Maria Smedstad moved to the UK from Sweden in 1994. She received a degree in Illustration in 2001, before settling in the capital as a freelance cartoonist, creating the autobiographical cartoon Em. Maria writes a column on the trials and tribulations of life as a Swede in the UK.