Music We Listen To, feat. The Cardigans
Genre: Rock and Pop
At some point about 20 years ago, there was this movie called “William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet” staring DiCaprio and Danes in the lead roles and the fellow who played Michael in Lost, Harold Parrineau, as Mercutio (my favorite character in all of Shakespeare’s plays). We’ll leave off the obvious redundancy of the title of the film: We know that William Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet- who else could have possibly wrote it. Instead, we shall focus on the soundtrack from the movie.
At some point, whoever was in charge of the movie decided to put a little poppy ditty from the album First Band on the Moon, onto the soudtrack. It was Lovefool by the Cardigans, and it was a huge success for the band. Now- I had been living in Japan for a year by then and already had been exposed to the Cardigans. And I just thought they were the most innovative band in the world! Because while the rest of the world was making the transition from grunge to the claptrap in the late 90s, the Cardigans made a record of soft, basically lounge cuts in Life. It sounded so different than everything else out at the time, and I just loved it.
When the more straightforward rock album First Band On the Moon came out, I was already hooked and jumped at the chance to buy the record. And when Lovefool came out, I was thrilled that one of my favorite bands was getting recognized at last.
The worst part about this is that Lovefool is usually the only thing that people know of the Cardigans. I suppose this would qualify them for “One Hit Wonder” status, but they have put out 6 albums in total, ranging from the delicate Emmerdale (Originally released only in Sweden, where they come from, but later re-released in the West), through the heavily electronic influenced Gran Turismo, into the country influenced introspective Long Gone Before Daylight and finally into the Alt-Rock signoff Super Extra Gravity. The Cardigans’ career spanned 20 years and they time and again proved their excellence and inventiveness. They sang songs about everything from picnicking to domestic abuse, and covered Black Sabbath a few times!
And so, without further ado, I give you the second best Band to ever come out of Sweden, and one of the greatest Rock Bands of the last 25 Years. This is music we listen to. This is the Cardigans.
(Spotify doesn’t have Life or Emmerdale, but I have linked them on YouTube above)
