Swedish Charts Update

In this week's Sverige Topplistan album chart, "This Is Who I Am" has gone down from no.9 to no.16, but has still had an impressive chart run with a total of 40 weeks spent in the chart out of the last 52 weeks since it was released.

Salem appearing @ Stockholm Citypriset tomorrow

The Stockholm City newspaper will hold its annual Citypriset award ceremony tomorrow night at Nalen in Stockholm. Salem will be appearing there as will Maia Hirasawa and Swedish rap's man of the moment, Adam Tensta. I don't really have much more information about this show at present, but I'll keep my eyes open for reports/photos etc this time tomorrow.

UPDATE: well, nothing to report - couldn't find any reviews/photos but I'm sure that Salem was wonderful as usual.

Swedish Charts Update - This week's Digilistan

In P3's download-version of the Swedish singles chart, "It's True" has slipped from no. 25 to no. 34 whilst "Good Song" falls from no.33 to no. 51. I suppose that both songs will drop out of the chart next week, and that will be it until the next single is released. (Hopefully sooner rather than later, I'm getting impatient!!)

"Good Song" video finally on YouTube!!

Here it is - it's well worth the wait!!!



No other news to report of course, apart from the fact that we failed to mention on 24.01.08 that "This Is Who I Am" was released exactly one year ago, a fact well worth celebrating!!

No award tonight for Salem :-(

I watched the Rockbjörnen awards gala tonight (review over at EuropeCrazy) but anyway I had resigned myself to the possibility that Salem probably wouldn't get the Best Newcomer award. That award went to Måns Zelmerlöw but I’m not really complaining as I like him too, and as I said before it’s more of a populist award ceremony so it wasn’t entirely unexpected, as although Salem has gained many new fans he is still not at that level of mass popularity yet.

Anyway that's the Swedish awards season over till the same time next year. Fingers crossed that Salem gets his second album out in time for the next round of nominations, although I've also now resigned myself to the fact that it will probably be 2009 before the next one.

As I said last night, expect less frequent updates on this site, now that Salem will be taking some time out for a while.

Swedish charts update

In this week's Sverige Topplistan album chart "This Is Who I Am" has slipped from no.6 to no.9.

Whilst in the singles chart, "It's True" falls from no. 42 to no.56 and "Good Song" drops to no.59.

Rockbjörnen tomorrow / what happens next?

Hoping that Salem will take home the Best Newcomer prize at tomorrow night's Aftonbladet Rockbjörnen gala, although again I'm not 100% confident as (IMHO) I kind of get the feeling that this newspaper is not really too keen on him - I know it's the readers who choose, but again I've just got this vibe and I don't know why. Hope I am wrong though.

After tomorrow's ceremony - the last of the Swedish music awards for 2007 - it will be like the end of a chapter, closing the door on last year. I really don't know what's going to happen next for Salem, apart from the two Norwegian gigs next month. (I contacted EMI Sweden for info regarding future plans/possible UK launch/gigs but as yet have had no reply. Oh well.)

As Salem is (and always has been) such a workaholic, I'd guess that he'll now throw his considerable energy and talent into writing that eagerly awaited second album. No news on any Swedish tour dates or summer festival appearances yet, I could speculate on what that means ... but I won't. OK then, I will. Maybe recording new album? Maybe playing gigs outside Sweden? Maybe working with Snook again? Or maybe none of the above?

Whatever happens next, I'd anticipate that the postings will be less frequent over the next few months if Salem is taking some time out following what's been a high-profile, busy and successful year for him. Nevertheless this site will continue to post all the news, gossip and happenings in relation to Sweden's greatest living musical genius!!

(And don't forget to visit Salem's official site - http://www.salemalfakir.se/)

2 live shows next month in Oslo

The annual by:Larm music conference/festival takes place next month in Oslo and will feature live performances by lots of Nordic artists. It's described as a Nordic version of the South x Southwest event. Salem will be there, playing two gigs as follows:

21.02.08 Cosmopolite, Oslo - at midnight!

22.02.08 Sentrum Scene, Oslo, at 21.30.

Hopefully this will bring his music to the attention of yet another new audience.

Swedish Charts Update - This week's Digilistan

Three of Salem's songs have re-entered Swedish Radio's Digilistan singles chart this week, following his big success at the Grammisgalan.

"It's True" is at no. 25, "Good Song" is at no. 33 and "This Is Who I Am" at no. 39.

Google-searching "Related blogs"...!

Tonight I went to http://blogsearch.google.com/ as usual and typed in "Salem Al Fakir", to discover that this blog is the first one to come up on the page and has its own little mention under "Related Blogs".

My fifteen minutes of blogging-fame have arrived :-)))

P3 Guldgalan: empty-handed in Gothenburg, and I'm not happy.

I've been watching the P3 Guldgalan on SVT Play tonight (full review over at http://europecrazy.blogspot.com/) but all I want to say here is that Salem was robbed. Although I enjoyed the show, I was extremely disappointed that he didn't win anything at the P3 Guldgalan.

Next, and final, Swedish music awards ceremony for this year is Aftonbladet's Rockbjörnen (the Swedish people's music prize!) on Thursday 24th January, which is being broadcast live at http://www.aftonbladet.se/ on the night. Salem should, and must, win that best newcomer prize.

Back in the Swedish charts / P3 Guldgalan preview

Doing my Swedish charts update tonight for EuropeCrazy, I noticed that "This Is Who I Am" has gone back up to no.6 in the Swedish albums chart this week. It looks as if Salem has got himself a lot of new fans since the Grammisgalan, and people who didn't previously take much notice of his music are now beginning to listen and like what they hear. And so they should.

In the singles chart, "Good Song" has re-entered at no. 36 whilst "It's True" is no. 42 and "This Is Who I Am" is no. 43.

Tomorrow sees the P3 Guldgalan awards, Salem is nominated in two categories - Best Live Artist : other nominees are Säkert / Laakso / Mustasch / Timo Räisänen, and Best Male Artist: other nominees are Lars Winnerbäck: "Daugava" / Jens Lekman: "Night falls over Kortedala" / Mange Schmidt: "Känslan kommer tillbaks" / Danny: "Heart.beats". I'm not so confident about these awards as I was about the Grammys, because it's a more "alternative" kind of awards thing (well, apart from Danny !!), but nevertheless we wish Salem good luck for tomorrow night and will hopefully have some good news to report soon!

"You know it's true, I'm so good...!"

You know you've really made it when you get parodied. Meet Per-Arnez, a witty Swedish guy who has created a parody of Salem, named Sune Al Frisyr, with his own MySpace page (www.myspace.com/slemalfrisyr) featuring a song called "I'm So Good", the vocal and musical style of which should raise a chuckle and be very familiar to anyone who has ever heard the real Salem. :-)

I also had a right good laugh at the info section in this page, which should be a big in-joke to Salem fans, and will probably go over everyone else's head:

Band Members: Me and my frisyr and my brothers Göran Al Frisyr, Benny Al Frisyr, Sonny Al Frisyr and Åke Al Frisyr
Influences: The great Stevie Wonder, which I never actually have listened to...
Sounds Like: I don´t listen to music, so how would I know...???

Well I thought it was quite funny anyway. Obviously Salem does too, as he's one of Mr Al Frisyr's friends on his MySpace page!

Meanwhile over at the real Salem's website...I'm loving these little 'sitting here at home' posts, the last of which saw him sitting on the floor and wondering what he should eat. Can't wait for the next one Salem!

11th best selling album of 2007.

Today Expressen published the list of the 20 top selling albums in Sweden over the past year. "This Is Who I Am" was the 11th best selling album of the year. Kent's "Tillbaka Till Samtiden" is the top seller.

Here are some of Salem's videos, because I like them.

"Dream Girl": Salem's first single, released in the autumn of 2006. Timeless, classic song with an unforgettable piano hookline. The video is rather nice and is our first introduction to the man himself, complete with his wonderful big crazy hair:



"This Is Who I Am": title track of a rather brilliant album. Like all Salem's songs it's deceptively simple but full of musicality. The video sees him in many disguises and ends with the 'real' Salem, in his trademark pullover of course! :



"It's True" - the original version, not the Axwell/Ingrosso remix (I've now given up on this ever being released here). Such a positive and uplifting song, and a compelling video with Salem wearing a suit, walking into the sea. As you do! :



(The above three videos can also be seen at http://www.salemalfakir.se/)

The video of "Good Song" is only available on the EMI site (follow the link from http://www.emi.se/artists/salem/tiwia/index.htm ) - I'd recommend you check it out as it's very funny and perfectly shows off Salem's bright and bubbly personality. However, here is my favourite live performance of the best song of 2007, and possibly one of the most uplifting songs ever written, taken from last summer's Allsång pa Skansen TV show:

Swedish radio appearance yesterday.

Salem appeared on P3's "Morgonpasset" yesterday. The interview is on P3's website at http://www.sr.se/cgi-bin/p3/nyhetssidor/amnessida.asp?ProgramID=2024&grupp=3720, in Swedish of course. I'm going to listen later and attempt to guess what he was saying. (If anyone out there is able to translate this then I would appreciate it!!)

Some more pics of Salem from the Grammisgalan...

This is my 50th post since I started Planet Salem (of course I've written many more posts about him prior to 01.12.07 over at http://europecrazy.blogspot.com/) . so what better way to celebrate than with some more pictures of Salem from the Grammisgalan!!

Above: On the red carpet prior to Wednesday's show. Shame he wasn't feeling well because otherwise I thought he looked really nice - I liked his hair and his suit - very unusual for him to turn up without his trademark tie!

Above: getting presented with one of his awards by Martin Stenmarck. Two lovely Swedish men on stage at the one time!

Above: Salem winning yet another award. He deserves all of them and more!

Above: This is from Swedish Radio P4's site - isn't he just lovely!!

The next award ceremony is Swedish Radio P3's Guldgalan next Friday, 18.01.08 at which he is nominated for Best Male Artist and Best Live Act. This will be broadcast on P3 and SVT1 and once again we hope that he can add to his long list of trophies.

I read recently that Salem will now be doing up his house - he might need to build an extension to hold all these awards!!

Swedish lyrics versus English lyrics?

An article from today's Arbetarbladet today, http://www.arbetarbladet.se/culture_article.php?id=592023&avdelning_1=0&avdelning_2=0# in which the writer Hans Carstensen suggests that Salem, and other Swedish lyricists like him who write in the English language, should switch to Swedish in order to truly lyrically express themselves. The writer stated that Salem deserved his Grammisgalan victory as he is an exceptional entertainer, songwriter, singer and musician with great stage presence, but was worried that he may suffer a similar fate to similarly talented 90s star Rebecka Törnqvist, who has continued to write lyrics in English and her career has suffered as a result.

I remember reading an interview with Salem once which said that he prefers to write in English to Swedish. It will be interesting to see what direction he goes in as he develops as a lyricist. I would like to hear him write and sing in Swedish too, maybe he could do a Swedish-language album someday as a one-off project once he is a confident enough lyricist? Why be talented in one language when you can be talented in two? (Just ask Annika Norlin!)

Salem's official website: inspirations

Last year, Salem famously stated that he never listens to music, but therefore it was good fun finding out that he has a little section on his website devoted to his musical inspirations: Glenn Gould, Bad Brains, The Band, Joey Jordison, Cameron and Paco De Lucia, Billy Joel and Humble Pie. Interesting mix - but he really needs to get Steely Dan in there. Every time I listen to "Thank You" from "This Is Who I Am", I just think of how much it reminds me of Steely Dan.

Life will smile for you, unless you're Markus Larsson.

Not that we need an excuse for another picture of Salem and his four Swedish Grammys of course! Aww. Hope he's feeling better today.

Anyway his victory on Wednesday night seems to have been received quite positively - but you can always rely on one dissenting voice to spoil the party. "It won't be no surprise..." that the dissenting voice is none other than Aftonbladet's music correspondent Markus Larsson, the man who last year achieved his five minutes of worldwide fame for giving the Rolling Stones gig a bad review only for Keith Richards to ask him for an apology.

Following the Grammisgalan, Mr Larsson targeted Salem for one of his famous attacks, asking why someone who 'sings through his nose' should win 4 awards.

Who said 'green-eyed monster'? How many awards have you won, Mr Larsson? Let me know.

An apology.

Watching Salem sing and collect his awards at the Grammisgalan, I thought that he didn't look too well but had (wrongly) assumed that this might have been as a result of over-celebrating, resulting in a sore throat.

I would like to apologise therefore, because I got it wrong. I have now found out the truth about Wednesday night. Salem had been very ill before the awards and there was a strong possibility that he wouldn't have been able to perform. He had been treated with cortisone throughout the day but deteriorated prior to the show. Crisis meetings ensued backstage. But in the spirit of "The show must go on" Salem bravely soldiered on and sang "It's True" in a lower register.

Well done Salem - and get well soon!

Salem now has an official website!

When I made my daily visit to Salem's MySpace today I discovered that Salem finally has his own official website at last! The address is http://www.salemalfakir.se/ and interestingly, the site content is in English, not Swedish. Delighted to see an official site at last and will keep checking it for news and other stuff. I've also posted a link to it over there in my sites list.

Still excited!

I woke up this morning and wondered if it had all been a dream last night, that Salem had won four awards. But it wasn't - yaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy!

Tonight I'll probably watch the video clips of the acceptance speeches and his, "different" performance of "It's True" from last night.

You can never get enough of Salem, well I know I can't!!!!

It's been uploaded to YouTube so just in case it may not be around for long, here it is!

"It's True" from tonight's show

Thanks to TV4's website for putting up the footage of Salem's acceptance speeches and his version of "It's True". Lemur - I see what you meant about his voice, he had to sing the song in a lower register and he probably needs to give his voice a rest now! It may not have been his best ever version of the song, but it is certainly the most significant. A superstar is born.

He was obviously very happy and "tired and emotional" (as we say here in the UK) !!!! :-)))

Time to celebrate!

FYRA.

Fyyyyyyrrrrraaaaa.

Fyra Grammis.

That's four Swedish Grammy awards, by the way.

Tonight, Salem Al Fakir became the winner of four awards (voted for by the Swedish public) for best newcomer, best male artist, best composer and best producer. (He should have won best song as well, but I'm so happy tonight that I might just leave my rant about that until another time).

I am so happy, deliriously happy, that this incredibly talented young musical genius has been recognised and rewarded not only by the Swedish media and music industry, but also by the general public in his home country.

Grattis Salem.

Now go and have some time off.

And then go and conquer the world.

Grammisgalan tomorrow!

I'm so excited! This time tomorrow it will be all over and we will know who has won the Swedish Grammy awards, the most prestigious of all the Swedish music award ceremonies and this time of course it's "power to the people" as the Swedish public will have chosen their favourites. Hopefully Salem will be among the winners, we are keeping our fingers crossed that he will win.

Now it's time for a blast from the past.

There is footage on TV4 Nyheterna's site http://tv4nyheterna.se/ of Salem's appearance on "Nyhetsmorgon" from 14th January 2007, yes almost a year ago. I had previously seen the clip of "Good Song" on the same show before, but hadn't seen him singing "It's True". Wow! Salem's performance of this is so sweet, captivating and full of charm. Why do I love this man and his music? Watch this clip and you will understand why. There is also a nice interview with him on the same Nyhetsmorgon show.

EDIT 15.01.08: This has now been removed from that website, but they've still got all the Grammisgalan stuff.

So...what was Salem doing in 2005?

Answer: playing violin on a song called "The Tree", an acoustic-jazz number in the style of Norah Jones, sung by a pleasant young lady called My Engstrom Renman. The video has finally appeared on YouTube and the reason I mention it here, is that our favourite man is in the video, playing the violin and wearing an extremely silly hat. :-))

Another Expressen poll.

In the lead-up to the Grammisgalan, Expressen has been asking its readers whom they think will win the "Best Album" award. Kent's "Tillbaka Till Samtiden" is narrowly in the lead with 25.8%, and Salem's "This Is Who I Am" is a close second with 25.3%.

Two days to go....

Firstly the Expressen prize, now the Expressen polls.

Ooh I love the Swedish tabloids' websites with all these polls to vote in!!

After the great news that Salem won the Spelmannen prize, Expressen asked its readers whether or not he deserved it. Well, it's not good news at the moment as 53% of voters say "nej" :-(( of course I wasn't one of those voters - it's a ja! from me...

There is another poll on the Expressen website asking "what's your favourite Salem Al Fakir song?"

Results stand like this at the moment:
"Good Song" - 45.4% (I voted for this as my favourite too)
"It's True" - 23.4%
"This Is Who I Am" - 21.3%
"Dream Girl" - 9.9% (thought this would have been higher?)

I don't know how long these polls usually run for, but I may check back tomorrow to see if the results have changed.

Salem versus the mobile phones....the debate starts here!

Interesting comment by Salem in his Expressen interview today when he said that during a gig in Lund he had started playing "Good Song" and then stopped because of the number of people in the audience holding up their mobile phones to record this. He said that he was "enraged" that people were doing this.

I understand the point that Salem is trying to make, when good artistic efforts are diluted in this way, (and I certainly get annoyed at gigs when everyone is taking pictures or video on their phones yet you aren't even allowed to take a camera into a concert venue) however as long as this technology exists, and websites exist to allow such material to be uploaded, then it would appear to be a losing battle.

Since I discovered Salem's music 6 months ago, I visited YouTube and watched every single video posted there, whether official or not. The quality of these vary from good to extremely poor, but I'm still glad that they exist as it has given me the chance to see his promo videos and live performances - especially as I don't live in Sweden and therefore have never had the opportunity to watch him play live either at a concert venue or see him on television.

What I would really like Salem to do over the coming year or two - apart from the international launch and the release of the second album - is to bring out a live DVD, then we could all enjoy his top quality live performance on an equally top quality DVD instead of inferior mobile footage on YouTube!

Salem wins the Expressen Spelmannen 2007 prize!

Very happy to report today that Salem has won Expressen newspaper's Spelmannen prize. There is also a good new interview with him in today's Expressen, find it at http://www.expressen.se/kultur/1.990939/lustans-fakir . No information about future plans though, all he says is that he's now off to write some more music and that his next album will be a little more "serious".

It really has been a fantastic 12 months for our favourite singer, and it's not over yet - 3 days to go till the Grammisgalan....

"Black Sun, Black Moon" : here yesterday, gone too soon :-(

Was over at YouTube last night and much to my delight someone had posted a clip of Salem's 25.12.07 Stockholm gig, in which he was singing a new song called "Black Sun, Black Moon".

It was a slow and quite sad song (a bit of a change for him), which he played solo on the keyboard, and was rather nice even if it sounded a bit unfinished.

I wanted to hear it again today so went back to YouTube only to find that the video had been removed by the user. Not happy about this, don't know why it's been removed. I hope there's a valid reason for removing this video..

More YouTube: Snook, and some mad dancing

Still over at YouTube, found a clip of Snook performing live at Grona Lund in September 2006. Not only did I find myself yelling "back in the day" at the computer screen, but halfway through I had a right good laugh at Salem doing a silly dance on stage with the boys. Even "back in the day" he couldn't stand still! :-)))

Couple of new videos on YouTube.

In the absence of any real news this week I notice that two short clips from last August's Way Out West festival in Gothenburg have been posted on YouTube: they feature "Good Song" and "Dream Girl" - nice to hear everyone singing along too.

If anyone has any footage of any new songs from the recent Swedish tour - can they please upload this to YouTube!!

6 days to go till the Grammisgalan....hoping that someone posts any clips of Salem playing live and/or when he goes up to collect his awards next week!

Things we want to see in 2008.

Salem winning at the Grammisgalan, the P3 Guldgalan and the Rockbjornen - as many awards as possible!

A new album - we can't wait to hear some new material!

And most of all... an international launch, particularly here in the UK - more than anything I would love to see Salem and his band play live because they are brilliant!

Salem - I don't know if you are aware of the existence of my site, but maybe one day you will discover it and hopefully enjoy what I've been writing about you. I just want you to know that your music has brought so much happiness to me and to many others, and you are such a talented musician, singer and songwriter who deserves worldwide success.

Tack så mycket for your wonderful music, and good luck for 2008.

Nisse's band Conrytmo featured in Göteborgs Posten

I didn't know that Salem's drummer Nisse has another band, but he does! It's a group of five drummers called Conrytmo (like the Blue Man Group only without the blue paint :-) ), and there's a feature in today's GP about them. Seemingly they will play a show in Gothenburg at New Year and they also have a show lined up in Las Vegas next March among other things. I don't know where this leaves his commitments to Salem's band though?

Swedish Grammys: how many will he get then??

Over at my other blog EuropeCrazy I've been doing predictions for the Grammys. Much as I would love Salem to win all seven, I need to be objective and realistic and therefore I think he is likely to win the following:

Best Newcomer
Best Song
Best Composer

I would really really love him to win Best Album too, as "This Is Who I Am" is utterly fantastic.

Final list of nominations for Swedish Grammys announced today - SEVEN NOMINATIONS!!!

Today the final list of nominations for the Swedish Grammys was announced, with the initial lists of ten nominees in each category now narrowed down to the final five.

Absolutely brilliant news that Salem is nominated in seven categories - he is the artist with the most nominations this year, closely followed by Kent (six nominations).

Salem is nominated in the following categories:

Best Album
Best Male Artist
Best Song
Best Lyricist
Best Composer
Best Newcomer
Best Producer

When the initial list was published (nine nominations) I didn't want to get too excited until the final shortlist came out, but now it has.....I'm excited. Very excited indeed. I'm realistic enough to know that he won't win all seven, especially now that it's decided by the Swedish public and not the industry professionals, but surely now he must win at least one or two?

Anyway big congratulations on the nominations - well done Salem, you deserve it!

Stuff from another blog, about last night's Stockholm gig

I read a Swedish blog just now, the person who wrote it went to see Salem at Debaser in Stockholm last night. Not surprisingly it was a very good review, the band were great as ever and the songs were even better live than on record. There were apparently a lot of new songs and the blogger said that there could be a new album in the spring - I know Salem's very prolific but this might be wishful thinking, although how good would it be if that was to happen?

A festive appearance on SVT's Bolibompa...!

Have only just come across this one: SVT Play has a video clip of Salem's appearance on "Bolibompa" which of course is presented by his big brother Nassim. Rather funny clip of Salem playing "Jingle Bells" on a number of musical instruments. OK so kids' TV isn't the most credible thing in the world, but if it gets him some new fans then bring it on!

Find it at: http://svt.se/svt/play/video.jsp?a=1002195

Salem playing Stockholm tomorrow night

Still no real news to report apart from this: Salem plays his last gig of 2007 at Debaser, Stockholm tomorrow night. Hopefully there will be a bigger turnout than at his last gig in Gavle :( anyway I hope someone from the Swedish media will review this at some point. Good luck for this gig Salem, hope it's a great one.

Right I'm off now to get ready for Santa Claus!

End-of-year polls (part 1)

Another no-news week, but things should pick up as all the end-of-year polls are coming around.

At the end of every year Swedish news agency TT Spektra commissions a poll of all music reviewers for their Swedish and international albums of the year. The results for 2007 are as follows:

Best International Album:

1. Arcade Fire: "Neon bible"
2. Feist: "Reminder"
3. Robert Plant & Alison Krauss: "Raising sand"
4. MIA: "Kala"
5. UGK: "UGK"
6. Band of Horses: "Cease to begin"
7. LCD Soundsystem: "Sound of silver"
8. Amy Winehouse: "Back to black"
9. Ryan Adams: "Easy tiger"
10. Foo Fighters: "Echoes, silence, patience & grace"

What we're interested in of course is the Best Swedish Album list:

1. Säkert: "Säkert"
2. Anna Järvinen: "Jag fick feeling"
3. Jens Lekman: "Night falls over Kortedala"
4. Kent: "Tillbaka till samtiden"
5. Sahara Hotnights: ""What if leaving is a loving thing"
6. Eldkvarn: "Svart blogg"
7. Laakso: "Mother, am I good looking?"
8. Salem Al Fakir: "This is who I am"
9. The Tough Alliance: "A new chance"
10. Moneybrother: "Mount pleasure"

We'd have "This Is Who I Am" at no.1 of course but 8th isn't doing too badly, as this is one of those "trendy" polls (!) Good to see Kent and Moneybrother in there too.

My top 50 songs of the year (over at my other blog)

This afternoon I completed my countdown of my 50 favourite songs of 2007 over at my other blog EuropeCrazy (http://europecrazy.blogspot.com) and inevitably there were a few appearances from Salem!

No.1 - Good Song.
No.2 - Dream Girl.
No.7 - Count Me Out.
No.9 - It's True.
No.13 - This Is Who I Am.
No.17 - It's Only You.

Grammisgalan appearance confirmed

Only 24 days to go now, till the Grammisgalan: Expressen revealed today that Salem Al Fakir will be playing at the show, also on the bill are Lars Winnerbäck (sorry but I can't understand his appeal), Maia Hirasawa, Lasse Stefanz, 50 Cent, Westlife and Motorhead. If that's not a diverse bill then I don't know what is. Fingers crossed that TV4 are as good as SVT at putting stuff on the web for us non-Swedes to drool over :-)

Gävle gig review in Gefle Dagblad

Another four-star review of Salem's gig from Thursday night can be found in Gefle Dagblad: http://www.gd.se/Article.jsp?article=121264 . The heading reads "Big entertainer - small audience" and the reviewer highlights that despite the poor turnout, Salem ("Mr 100 percent") took it like a professional and provided those present with a high quality show. I liked the reviewer's comments that if there was a "most humble" and "most charming" category in the Swedish Grammys, Salem would win. The reviewer also highlighted that Salem and his band are at their best in smaller venues such as this one. The review also stated that Salem has taken Sweden by storm this year, with many hit songs and sell-out concerts (and a bigger tour bus now) but looked forward to what he'll come up with next, as he's got much more to give. We certainly agree with that. Here's a picture from the gig, courtesy of Gefle Dagblad:

Gävle gig review in Arbetarbladet

There is a great review of Salem's gig from last night on the Arbetarbladet website http://www.arbetarbladet.se/PGarticle.php?id=586955&avdelning_1=111&avdelning_2=173 . The heading read "Al Fakir hot - but Gävle dead" in which the reviewer Erik Suss expresses his disgust that only a very small crowd (50?) turned up at the Slick City club for the show, which was the only gig on Salem's current tour which wasn't sold out. The review stated that in spite of the low turnout, Salem put on the same high quality show which he gave when playing to thousands at the summer festivals this year, and the reviewer described Salem's band as one of Sweden's best. It was everything you'd expect from a Salem gig by now - headbanging, swinging from the lights, running around from one end to the other whilst delivering a mixture of everything from pop to soul to heavy rock. Mr Suss apologised on behalf of the people of Gävle for not coming along to what was an amazing gig, and said that this gig proved that Salem was worth every one of his Grammy nominations. Here is a picture of Salem from last night's gig (courtesy of Arbetarbladet). Wink wink!

Marlene: we salute you

Over the past week I've been enjoying Marlene Gustafsson's blog posts on the Klubb Smart blog on the Örebro Expressen website. She is a big fan of Salem's and she was the person who had the dream about Salem's hair being made of foam rubber. Her latest blog post revealed that at last week's gig she had to conscientiously examine his hair - in the public interest of course!!!! - and she said it was definitely real, exceptionally curly, fine and newly cut. Thanks Marlene - I love your attention to detail! :-)

Salem's tour reaches Gävle

After a few days off, Salem and his band will be playing the Slick City venue in Gävle (north of Stockholm, that's today's geography lesson) and on checking their website, I note that he won't be on stage till 23.30. Ooh what a late start! Too bad if you're going for the last train/bus home :-( Anyway I know whatever time he's on stage he will be wonderful!

Aftonbladet's Rockbjornen nominations announced...

...but there's only one nomination for Salem, in the newcomer category, where he is up against Danny Saucedo, Måns Zelmerlöw, Miss Li and Oh Laura. OK so I like the ex-Idol boys but in terms of musical talent, none of these nominees will ever come close to the mighty Salem, but this poll is after all Sweden's most, how shall I say, populist music award. Draw your own conclusions.

Now comes...the 9th nomination!

It was announced today that 20 songs are nominated in the "Best Video" category at the Swedish Grammys. "Good Song" is among them - deservedly so, not just because I'm biased but because it is an excellent and very funny video which perfectly matches the uplifting nature of the song.

Swedish Grammys: voting opens tomorrow

Been over to http://www.grammis.se/ and found out that the voting opens at 12.00 tomorrow. More than likely it will only be open to Swedish residents, just like the P3 Guld awards, therefore I won't be able to vote as I'm not Swedish and don't live in Sweden either (something I hope to rectify in one of my next lives!). Anyway if you are reading this you know what to do - get voting for Salem in every category that he's nominated in.

New interview clip from Örebro, and some screencaps from it.

Meny @ Nerikes Allehanda has a video interview with Salem before his gig in
Örebro on 08.12.07: follow the link from
http://www.na.se/meny/artikel.asp?intId=1258926

I see that he's had his hair cut again, which is back to its nice mid-length curly-ness, although I rather liked the out-of-control look which he sported on that recent Norwegian TV appearance. Oh whatever, I like both styles, as long as he doesn't hide his lovely hair under the flat cap :-(

Anyway my Swedish is still rubbish but I was trying to listen and pick up some info, I think he said his next album is in the planning stages but no further forward than that. Might need to be patient and wait a bit longer, that's not going to be easy for me....! Will just have to accept the fact that it won't be as soon as I thought. (Also, "This Is Who I Am" took 3 years to make so roll on 2010!!)

Anyway I decided to do a bit of screencapping from this interview. It's not always easy to screencap Salem because he's very animated and fidgets a lot while he's being interviewed (!) but here are three nice pics from this interview.

Another day, another live show

Tonight Salem is playing the Konserthus in Vara, I wasn't sure whereabouts in Sweden that was so I had to Google Earth it (!) and now I know it's in the west of the country, north-east of Gothenburg. That's my Swedish geography lesson for today :-)

New Swedish newspaper interview

The Nerikes Allehanda newspaper from Orebro has a new interview with Salem today at http://www.na.se/artikel.asp?intId=1257848, prior to his Klubb Smart gig this Saturday.

In this interview he said that although he's not always as happy as he comes across in interviews, he has a positive attitude to life. Also he said that he wants to make a commitment to his live performances, but don't expect the rock & roll lifestyle - he's too busy eating fruit and drinking water backstage!

Grammys: now comes the backlash

If you're over here reading this rant, then do not expect me to be unbiased.

I've been checking out some Swedish press articles since yesterday which have described Salem as 'overrated' and 'over-nominated'. The same Swedish press which have hyped him up all year and went on about how good he is.

FACT: Salem Al Fakir deserves each and every one of his eight Swedish Grammy nominations. OK so he's a newcomer and doesn't have the career longevity of the likes of Magnus Uggla, who controversially received no nominations, but genuine new musical talent should and must be recognised.

It's not just the press who have been commenting but also several websites have been joining in the backlash.

And another thing....I don't understand why, on his blog, Swedish singer Mauro Scocco dared to suggest that he's never met anyone who was able to hum one of Salem's songs. Eh?????

Anyway after last year's controversy when multiple Grammy winners The Knife didn't even turn up to the awards, we needn't worry that Salem will do a no-show. He told Svenska Dagbladet that he will be at Globen on 09.01.08. (We hope he'll not just be there, but be picking up as many awards as he can carry!)

Salem nominated for 8 Swedish Grammy awards!!!

The full list of nominations for the Swedish Grammy Awards were announced today: but what we're really interested in is the fact that Salem Al Fakir's name turns up in no less than eight of the categories! Best Album, Best Composer, Best Song ("Good Song", of course), Best Male Artist, Best Newcomer, Best Producer, Best Lyricist and Best Live Act (the latter with Moneybrother and Sakert on the Parksommar tour).

After my slight disappointment yesterday about the P3 Guld awards, this cheered me up no end.

The only thing is that each category has a list of ten acts nominated by the jury, this list will now be narrowed down (in a public vote!) to five acts. I'm a bit concerned as he doesn't really have a solid fanbase as yet compared to some of the acts on the list, it has also struck me over recent months that he seems to be more popular with the critics & media than with the general public: even though his album has sold well, he still seems to be playing relatively small live venues, or maybe that's just the way it is in Sweden?

Anyway I will enjoy this moment today and hope that on the night of Wednesday 9th January 2008, he will be going home with at least one award. There would be no justice if he didn't win something!

Today's gratuitous Salem pic

A recent one from his gig at the Rival in Stockholm. As the man himself would say...."Nice!"

Two nominations for Salem in Swedish Radio's P3 Guld awards

The nominations for Swedish Radio P3 Guld awards have just been announced. Salem has been nominated in two categories, Best Male Artist (he's up against Danny, Jens Lekman, Mange Schmidt and Lars Winnerbäck) and Best Live Act (other nominees are Laakso, Mustasch, Säkert and Timo Räisänen).

To be honest, I expected a few more nominations, but I suppose two are better than none. Salem's already rallying the troops to vote over at his MySpace and I'm doing the same here, so - good people of Sweden, you know what you have to do!! Vote vote vote!

New site soon?

Bit of speculation now. I'd been on Google the other day and discovered a salemalfakir.net address - when you go to this there is a link directing you to his MySpace.

Now I'm not one to gossip (!) but I would hazard a guess that this could either be (a) someone just messing around or (b) the possibility of a new, long overdue, official site. How good would it be if it was the latter.

At the moment there is only the MySpace site and the EMI Sweden page so we really need an official site now. And an international launch. Please please please!

If anyone knows anything about this, please feel free to comment.

Good morning!

It's Monday, which is never good .... but I decided to cheer myself up by listening to my Salem playlist on the way to work this morning. I hadn't heard "Devil Look" for a while and had forgotten just how good it was.

Screencapping!

I've been doing a bit of screencapping tonight because there aren't enough pictures of Salem around so I thought I'd make some of my own!

This one is from the very first time I ever saw him, on SVT's "Grattis Victoria" concert in July, when he sang "It's True" and "Dream Girl", the moment when I realised we were in the presence of greatness. And yes, there is such a thing as love at first sight!

YouTube: new Uppsala clip added

There's now a brief clip of "Magic Night" on YouTube from the Uppsala gig - it's short but very funny with Salem dancing, clapping, making funny faces and being his usual entertaining self. Video cuts out just as it's breaking into a manic funky jam.....I so want to see him play live!!!

"Good Song": the video

Catch it over at http://www.emi.se/artists/salem/tiwia/index.htm and follow the link to the video of the magnificent "Good Song", in which Salem and his chums mess around in white suits and be completely nonsensical, which is ok.

If you've ever visited my other blog, EuropeCrazy (yes, let's have a gratuitous plug: http://europecrazy.blogspot.com/ ) you will be aware that there is much love for Snook in this blogger's world: uncontrollable delight therefore that Oskar and Danne appear in the "Good Song" video. Salem's big bro Nassim is also spotted playing keyboards. Oh and by the way, Salem looks very nice in that white suit. Wish I was that girl dancing with him....!

A man in a flat cap in Uppsala: new videos on YouTube

Been watching these videos on YouTube again. It's a real rarity to hear "It's Only You" live, it's so pretty and beautiful on record but my initial reaction to this was that it was a bit throwaway, however I'm just glad someone uploaded it anyway. Notice that he plays it on keyboard rather than on guitar.

"Damien and Bob"/"Dream Girl": kind of bombastic, and proof that there's that "edge" in his live performance which isn't there on record. Strange ending though!

Current Swedish tour: full list of dates - updated 02.12.07

18.11.07 - Rival, Stockholm
26.11.07 - Storan, Gothenburg
27.11.07 - Platens Bar, Linköping
28.11.07 - Konserthuset, Västerås
29.11.07 - Katalin Jazzclub, Uppsala
30.11.07 - Mejeriet, Lund
07.12.07 - Konserthus, Vara
08.12.07 - Klubb Smart, Örebro
13.12.07 - Heartbreak Hotell, Gävle
14.12.07 - Högfjällshotellet, Sälen
25.12.07 - Debaser, Stockholm

Welcome To Planet Salem!

Hello and welcome to Planet Salem !!

This blog is a spin-off from my other blog, EuropeCrazy, and if you've ever visited that blog then you'll know how crazy I am about Salem Al Fakir, who is my favourite singer/songwriter/musician in the whole wide world.

My Salem obsession has now outgrown that blog, therefore I have created this one for news, information and obsession about this brilliant Swedish musical genius.