Sparks in Sweden – So
Important.
When Sparks
first played in Sweden in the mid-1970s, the significant role that the country
was to play in their artistic career was some 35 years in the future. If the
1980s saw huge success in France and the 1990s in Germany, it is Sweden that is
linked with an exciting and challenging venture in the first decade of the new
century. As fans will know, Sweden
supplied the opportunity in 2009 for Sparks to expand their activities with
their fantasy radio musical The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman (of which
more later). Moreover, one of their impressive live performance DVDs, Lil'
Beethoven Live in Stockholm, was filmed at the Södra Teatern in March
2004. Stockholm, and the Södra Teatern
in particular, are special places for Ron and Russell: in October 2012, at the
Stockholm gig for the Two Hands One Mouth tour, Russell told the
audience that the Södra is their 'favourite home from home'. A beautiful and
imposing nineteenth-century building with its name emblazoned in huge letters
on the roof, the Södra is now a renowned international venue for music performance,
boasting restaurants and outdoor terraces as well as several stages. A quick
scrutiny of Sparks' tour dates reveals that Sweden has also been privileged to
be amongst the earliest countries in Europe to see several new Sparks' albums
performed live, including, of course, on the Hippopotamus tour of 2017.
So, may we start?
To begin at
the beginning: sources indicate that there were concerts in Stockholm,
Gothenburg and Lund on 3, 4, and 5 December 1974, following an extensive series
of gigs in the U.K. showcasing Propaganda, but I have been unable to
find many details of these. However, if they followed the format of the show at
the Olympia Theatre in Paris on 30 November, accompanying Ron and Russell were
Trevor White (guitar) and Ian Hampton (bass), both formerly members of Jook,
and Dinky Diamond (drums) and the set list would have included songs from Kimono
My House (1974), and Propaganda (1974) with ‘Girl from
Germany’ from A Woofer in Tweeter’s Clothing’ (1973) as an encore. The
following year saw Sparks return to Stockholm for a concert on 4 October at the
Konserthuset, a grand concert hall fronted by a row of classical pillars,
followed by gigs in Gothenburg and Lund, on a brief Scandinavian visit to
promote the recently issued Indiscreet album, prior to their third major
UK tour. The slimmed down band
again consisted of Trevor White, Ian Hampton and Dinky Diamond. This
characteristically energetic show included songs from Kimono My House
and Propaganda as well as a selection from Indiscreet (released
in September 1975); Looks, Looks, Looks', 'Without Using Hands', 'Happy Hunting
Ground', 'How Are You Getting Home', and 'Get in the Swing', which was to
become a hit in Sweden. Russell's red braces, already seen in Helsinki two days
earlier, had another outing, continuing the trend of unusual stage outfits that
has lasted to the present day, contrasted with Ron's more sober shirts and tie
(although there were to be notable exceptions to this in later years).
A long hiatus…
Their next
visit, however, was not until 2003, the first for decades. On two nights, March
23 and 24, the Swedish audience at the Södra Teatern was introduced to the new,
radically innovative Lil' Beethoven album, the self-proclaimed
'genre-defying opus', which had been released in October 2002 and premiered at
the Royal Festival Hall, London on 19 October 2002. Ron and Russell were accompanied on this
occasion by Dean Menta (from Faith No More) on timpani and guitar and Tammy
Glover on timpani and drums, both of whom have made significant contributions
to Sparks' albums and live performances over the years. The brilliance of this album's varied musical
styles and the incisive witty lyrics commenting on both contemporary social
manners and obsessions ('Ugly Guys With Beautiful Girls', 'Suburban Homeboy')
and the current state of music ('Rhythm Thief', 'What Are All These Bands So
Angry About') were to earn outstanding reviews from music critics. Immediately
after the re-release of the album by Lil' Beethoven Records in March 2004 and
two London shows, Sparks played three further nights in Stockholm (March 27,
28, 29), once again at the Södra. The DVD Lil' Beethoven Live
in Stockholm (released 9 August 2004), was filmed on this occasion.
(Reader, if you are familiar with this DVD, please skip the next two paragraphs
which offer a brief description.)
The DVD, LIL’ Beethoven Live In Stockholm
The show consists
of a thrilling and compelling full performance of Lil' Beethoven in the
first half, with a 'Sparks Show' of songs from their back catalogue in
the second. Ron and Russell are accompanied once more by Dean Menta and Tammy
Glover, both of whom contribute backing vocals.
The stage of the luxurious auditorium (seen at the start of the DVD) is
relatively small and intimate, and much of the action accompanying the songs
takes place on a raised dais at the back. Two large timpani are sited at each
side of the stage at the front. The audience is seated and claps along in a
sedate manner, although there is a lengthy standing ovation and cheers at the
end of the show. The DVD reveals the
stunning theatrical effects devised for the show to accompany, highlight and
reflect the originality and innovativeness of the songs.
Projected on the rear wall are six arched windows in which fast moving and
constantly changing images (faces, words, piano keys) appear. Between songs, a
metronome (a MAELzel metronome, no less!) ticks away in the windows. The
theatricality of the show is not limited to the projections however: Russell,
wearing a reddish-brown suit with a light stripe and a black polo neck sweater
in the first half of the show, delivers the songs with an energy and a
beguiling intensity that reinforces the drama of the music and the highly
perceptive, acerbic and occasionally melancholy lyrics. Ron's physical role in
this gig is extremely proactive: he repeatedly rises from his keyboard to
interact with the images, attempting to catch up with elusive beautiful female
figures in 'I Married Myself', or performing a horse-riding pantomime for 'Ride
'Em Cowboy'. He delights the audience by
playing the piano with immensely long fake arms, for 'How Do You Get To
Carnegie Hall?' and parades around with a tall elegant female for 'Ugly Guys
With Beautiful Girls'. For 'Suburban Homeboy', he strips off his formal white
shirt and striped tie to a plain vest and speaks one of the verses. There are humorous moments too, as always:
during the extraordinary 'My Baby's Taking Me Home', an exercise in the
emotional power of repetition, for which Russell sings with three microphones,
Ron sits staring impassively ahead at the keyboard, studiously ignoring his
brother bouncing up and down beside him, and in 'Your Call Is Very Important To
Us', he rises from his keyboard
repeatedly to approach the telephone operator (Tammy Glover) on each line only
to return stoically to his seat on 'Please Hold'. The first number, the
sinister 'The Rhythm Thief', signalling a change from straightforward rock to a
quasi-operatic, orchestral style, and accompanied by images of frenzied
musicians, was a perfect opener for this concert, which has been judged to be
ground-breaking in so many ways. In fact, watching the live performance DVD of
this show is a revelatory experience and is a must for those many fans who
regard Lil Beethoven as Sparks’ greatest masterpiece.
For the
second half of the programme, the atmosphere is lighter without the overtones
of menace hovering over some of Lil' Beethoven . Russell wears a light
green shirt patterned in pink and white with a yellow tie and light-coloured
pants, while Tammy dazzles in a sparkly, strappy dress. Ron, this time, is
attired formally with white shirt, dark waistcoat and bow tie. This set
presents thirteen songs including perennial favourites 'No 1 Song in Heaven',
'Amateur Hour' 'When I Kiss You (I Hear Charlie Parker Playing)', 'When Do I
Get To Sing My Way' and a few songs less often performed live: 'Here In
Heaven', 'Nothing To Do' and 'The Ghost of Liberace'. And a little number
called 'This Town', of course. It would be interesting to know whether these
choices relate to a perception of which songs will go down best with a
particular audience, or whether Ron and Russell just like to vary the fare at
different venues. The audience members of all ages interviewed in the bonus
feature on the DVD clearly reveal that Sparks have a loyal, knowledgeable and
hugely enthusiastic fan base in Sweden: the best answer to the question ‘what
do you think is special about Sparks?’ has to be ‘Well, they are Sparks!’ There
is also a humorous bonus feature in which the band are seen backstage in white
bathrobes performing a version of themselves as eccentric and pampered stars
needing their own fruit trees imported from California. Ron explains their
demands while a young woman massages his hand and Russell, Tammy and Dean sit
silently eating. Interestingly, he points to photos of Ingmar Bergman on the wall,
a foreshadowing, unrecognized at the time, of what was to come a few years
later. The DVD was reviewed as 'Prime
Sparks in all their gleeful glory' and as 'The number one DVD gig in heaven'. The
Times offered unconditional praise of Sparks as 'the grandmasters of vivid
spectacle and alien glamour', while Mojo magazine reached for the superlative
in calling Russell's voice 'simply angelic'.
Hello Young Lovers
A similar
use of inventive and entertaining graphics made the 2006 Hello Young Lovers
tour a stunning visual as well as auditory spectacle, reviewed in The
Independent as one of gloriously camp effervescence', and which was to take
Sparks not just to Europe but to Australia, Japan and the U.S. This album got
to No. 48 in the Swedish charts in February and the band played in Sweden for
two nights, 23 and 24 February, once again at the Södra Teatern, following a
series of UK dates. The band consisted of Steve McDonald, Tammy Glover and Jim
Wilson (for part of this tour Josh Klinghoffer alternated with Wilson because
of conflicting commitments). As always,
the show demonstrated the power, wit and exuberance characteristic of a Sparks
performance, beginning with the forceful 'Rock, Rock, Rock', which featured Ron
as a manic guitar-playing rock star responding to Russell's lament that 'soft
passages ... get you in trouble'. As with the Lil' Beethoven concert,
this was a show of two halves, the first showcasing the ten songs from the Hello
Young Lovers album and the second, a 'Sparks Show' of a further fourteen
numbers. Apart from the 'must have' classics, this part of the show also
celebrated less often performed numbers: 'Achoo', 'Pineapple' and 'Happy
Hunting Ground'. It is a delight to see these performed live decades after their
original appearance. Videos from the Swedish gigs can be seen on Youtube, and,
of course, the 30 September Hello Young Lovers concert in London was
immortalised on Dee Vee Dee. Sparks at the London Forum. The combination
of the music and dramatic visual backdrops (described accurately enough on the
DVD cover as 'an audio-visual attack on the senses') was brilliantly conceived
and executed. Particularly striking are the scenes of marching figures that
accompanied 'Baby, Baby, Can I Invade Your Country', and the cat-headed figures
for 'Here Kitty'.
The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman – a truly Swedish venture
Exotic
Creatures of the Deep was not played live in Sweden, but, early in 2009 Ron
and Russell were contacted by Marie Wennersten of Sveriges Radio, who had seen
Sparks in concert and was interested in commissioning a musical radio drama.
There was one stipulation: that the piece should have some connection with
Sweden and the Swedish language. As Russell and Ron have explained in various
interviews, they were initially reticent about the project, since their
knowledge of Sweden was limited to Volvo and Ikea and coloured by the gloomy
human and scenic moods of Ingmar Bergman's films. They had both been fans of Bergman in their
days at UCLA, when it was apparently cool to like foreign films (and, according
to Ron, something of a chic magnet), and Ron came up with the idea of a fantasy
scenario transporting the Swedish director to Hollywood. Eight months or so
later the world première of The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman took place
at the Södra on 14 August, and was
broadcast simultaneously on Sveriges Radio. A limited edition CD was issued on
the same day, and an English version was released in November. The latter,
Sparks' twenty-second album, was broadcast on BBC Radio 6 Music on 8 November.
The drama,
in 24 subsections and lasting about an hour, was played to an audience in front
of a screen showing just a large profile portrait of Bergman. Because it was
conceived for radio, the piece depends entirely on the music, the voices and
the sound effects for atmosphere and story progression. The plot is built upon
the delightfully surreal concept of Ingmar Bergman finding himself transported
to Hollywood after his success at the 1956 Cannes film festival by powers
wanting to recruit him to make blockbuster movies, exploiting his fame in
exchange for unlimited resources. His struggle, both internal and external, is
how to resist the corrupt blandishments and temptations of the moguls and
hirelings of an imaginary unscrupulous Hollywood movie studio in order to
retain his integrity and stay true to his artistic vision. This is a
sophisticated piece that incorporates references to Bergman's films as well as
being both a homage to Hollywood musicals and a satirical portrayal of the
movie industry. The trials that Bergman undergoes, including being pursued by
the LAPD with dogs and helicopters, until he is rescued on a beach at Santa
Monica by Greta Garbo (who else?), are conveyed through a breath-taking variety
of musical styles (with echoes of synth pop, classical, polka, jazz,
vaudeville, Kurt Weil and Sparks' own oeuvre), instruments (piano, keyboard,
guitar, drums, orchestra), witty and dramatic lyrics and impressive sound
effects. Although Ron and Russell have said that the story was not intended as
a personal statement, it is easy to see how the central theme of artistic
integrity versus commercialism could apply to their own career, as they have
consistently taken pride in pursuing their own vision, sometimes at the expense
of commercial success, instant celebrity and large financial reward. The BBC
review of the album made the connection explicitly, alluding to Ron's and
Russell's often declared European sensibilities, and describing the story as
one of 'cultural European intelligence, resisting the bland homogenising
influence of corporate America to carve its own idiosyncratic path – does that
remind you of anyone?'
In his
post-show speech at the Södra (available on YouTube), after Ron has paid homage
to Bergman as an 'incredible inspiration to anyone with creative aspirations'
and hopes that 'wherever he is, he can receive SR', Russell describes the
difficult logistics of recording the piece in both Swedish and English, and the
necessary close collaboration, joking that nobody understands Ron's lyrics in
English, so the translator had a challenging task. He introduces the actors who
played Bergman (Jonas Malmsjö) and Greta Garbo (Elin Klinga), both of whom had
worked with Ingmar Bergman, and explains that the other musicians involved in
the project (Jim Wilson and Dean Menta on guitar, Marcus Blake on bass, Tammy
Glover and Steven Nistor on drums), could not be present because they were back
in Los Angeles.
In the same
speech, Russell announces that they have plans for a movie version of The
Seduction of Ingmar Bergman as well as a theatrical performance. The
former, unfortunately, has still not become a reality but a theatrical
performance of the English version took place on 25 June 2011 at the John Anson
Ford Amphitheatre in Los Angeles at the L.A. Film Festival. A new cast, with Finnish actors Peter Franzen
as Bergman and Ann Magnusson as Garbo, performed in front of spectacular
projections that brought together vintage images from Sweden, Los Angeles and
Bergman's films as well as snatches of the lyrics. Ron and Russell were
prominent, of course, playing a sycophantic but sinister limo driver and tour
guide (Ron)and cynical studio boss (Russell), and band members played other
parts, including Tammy Glover as the seductive 'Hollywood Welcoming Committee'.
The link with a potential movie version was effected by the involvement of the
Canadian director Guy Maddin who read stage directions and filmed the action
from the side of the stage. The dedicated website for The Seduction of
Ingmar Bergman is an excellent resource which has much
fascinating detail about the project, including all the music and lyrics and
the projected images. Although this project has been regarded by some fans as a
side step in Sparks' career, Ron and Russell have always insisted that it is as
much a Sparks venture as any of their albums.
Stripped down Sparks
A Sparks' venture of a very different
sort arrived at the Södra on 9 October 2012 as part of the Two Hands One
Mouth tour, which featured just Ron and Russell alone, without
backing instrumentation or vocals. Once again, Scandinavia was early on the
list of concert venues, with Helsinki on the 7th and Oslo on the 8th,
preceded by dates in Latvia and Lithuania. Despite their anxieties about this
'stripped back' presentation of their work which involved the recasting of the
songs for keyboard alone, the tour was a triumph and the reception at the Södra
was as warm as ever. The show began with
the marvellous piano Overture, in which Ron, alone on stage, tantalised the
audience with refrains from well-known Sparks’ songs, and the set list was
composed of eighteen numbers from throughout their catalogue ('Sherlock
Holmes', 'Metaphor', Singing In The Shower', 'My Baby's Taking Me Home', Under
The Table With Her', and extracts from The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman, which
gave Ron an opportunity to leave the keyboard and play the voice of
Bergman). The show finished with the
specially written 'Two Hands One Mouth (That's all I need, to satisfy you)',
the potential double meaning of which was clearly as apparent to the Swedish
audience as it was elsewhere. Russell, whose outfit was a typically playful
take on a classic style – a brown suit with cut-off trousers and striped socks
– demonstrated that he had lost none of his physical or vocal energy as he
leapt around the stage delivering the songs in flamboyant style. The critically
acclaimed outcome of this format was that, in the absence of loud instrumental
accompaniment and visual special effects, the focus remained intensely on Ron's
interpretation of his music, on the wit and subtlety of the lyrics and on
Russell's passionate and clearly articulated communication of them. This tour
was captured on the Two Hands One Mouth Live in Europe CD, a compilation
of recordings from various venues, which demonstrates what an inspired project
this was.
The success
of this format generated an offspring, Revenge of Two Hands One Mouth,
which reached Stockholm for another Södra gig on 12 December 2013, following
dates in the U.K., France and Spain. This time the show included fifteen songs
that had not been heard the previous year (or, as Russell explained it, 'for
virgins of Two Hands One Mouth') and the audience was treated once again to
relatively rarely performed numbers ('Nicotina', 'Those Mysteries', 'Academy
Award Performance', 'Katherine Hepburn', 'Falling In Love With Myself'). At the
end of the show, Russell announced that Ron, 'the hardest-working man in show
business' had written another new title song, 'Revenge of Two Hands One Mouth'
to honour the concept.
The Hippo arrives in Stockholm
Sadly, for
Swedish fans, Sparks' next venture, a highly successful collaboration with
Franz Ferdinand to form the supergroup FFS, did not reach Stockholm, but they
had the opportunity to be amongst the first to hear songs from the new Hippopotamus
album, even before its release on 8 September 2017. Sparks played in Stockholm
on 10 August, followed by an extensive European and UK tour. Ron and Russell's
new and widely admired band consisted of Evan Weiss and Taylor Locke (guitars),
Zach Dawes (bass), Tyler Parkford on additional keyboards (both from L.A. Group
Mini Mansions), and Stephen Nistor on drums. This time the venue was not the
Södra, but the Skandiascenen, a modern addition to the late nineteenth-century
Cirkus Djurgarden building, with its striking curved steel and glass façade,
('time and space intertwined, elegance, simple lines'). The coordinated dress
theme was navy blue and white stripes: Ron looked extremely spiffy in a striped
jacket and tie, while Russell wore a slightly eccentric combination of striped
top with loose cut-off pants and bare legs and formal shoes with red laces.
Among the songs from the new album that featured in the generous twenty-one
numbers set were 'What The Hell Is It This Time', 'Missionary Position',
'Hippopotamus', 'Edith Piaf Said It Better Than Me', 'Giddy, Giddy', 'I Wish
You Were Fun, ‘Probably Nothing’' and (of course) 'Scandinavian Design'. The
latter must surely be something of an affectionate tribute to this special
place! In any case, fans in Scandinavia were the first to hear it, and their
appreciation for the show as a whole was evident in the ovation at the end and
rave reviews on social media. The scene
was set fair for a triumphant tour, during which Sparks were rewarded with the
news that Hippopotamus had reached number seven in the U.K. album
charts, for the first time in forty years! An amazing achievement.
The 2018 Hippopotamus tour also
played two dates in Sweden (16 and 17 June), at the Cirkus in Stockholm, a
large venue originally used as a circus, and the Kulturbolaget live music venue
in Malmӧ, with a
slightly different line-up: Evan Weiss and Eli Pearl (guitars), Patrick Kelly
(bass), Steve Nistor (drums) and Alex Casnoff (additional keyboards). This
time, there were six songs from Hippopotamus in the eighteen-song set
and the others included ‘Tryouts For The Human Race’, ‘B.C,’ ‘Propaganda, and
‘At Home, At Work, At Play’. Before singing ‘When Do I Get To Sing My Way’,
Russell sang a verse of the classic ‘My Way’ (‘And now, the end is near’, etc),
which must have caused surprise and some brief consternation amongst the
audience. For this tour, Russell wore an elegant and much admired military
style jacket in pink, while the band wore pink denim jackets. Ron sported a
pink tie which, as elsewhere, was thrown into the audience after his dance
during ‘No 1 Song in Heaven’, to be retrieved by some lucky fan. He went
through a lot of ties on this tour! He also daringly descended into the
audience, although what he did there is unfortunately obscured on the YouTube
video by the delighted crowd rising to its feet to take pictures. If anyone was
there, please let me know!
A new decade of Sparks
The 2020 tour for
the new album, A Steady Drip, Drip, Drip was to have included a
gig in Stockholm at the intimate Annexet venue on 12 June, but, of course, all
tours and their 2021 rescheduled dates were postponed because of the continuing
global coronavirus pandemic. However, on
29 April 2022, Sparks did arrive at the Annexet, as part of a massive tour that
also included Denmark, Norway, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Before
the tour, Sparks’ management put out an announcement that certain Covid
restrictions would be in place, requesting fans to wear masks to protect the
band and other fans and not expect to get autographs before or after the
shows. Accompanying them was a partly
new band line-up: Evan Weiss and Eli Pearl (guitar), Max Whipple (bass), Steve
Nistor (drums) and Tyler Parkford (additional keyboards). While the band wore
dark outfits, Russell stood out in bright, yellow trousers and, occasionally,
matching waistcoat over a dark top, prompting remarks that he had borrowed a
‘high-vis’ suit. Ron wore dark wide-legged trousers with a stylish long jacket
and a dark polo neck top. As elsewhere in Europe, the lengthy set list included
two songs from Annette (‘So May We Start’ and ‘We Love Each Other So
Much’) and three from A Steady Drip, Drip,Drip: : Stravinsky’s Only
Hit’, ‘Lawnmower’, and, as a final song,
the anthemic ‘All That’. The latter,
like ‘May We Start’, has now become an iconic part of a Sparks’ show, and forms
a very emotional closure, with the auditorium spangled with phone lights as
fans sway to the music. Also in the set
list were songs from various earlier albums, intended, no doubt, to appeal to
old fans and introduce new fans to their vast catalogue, and they were often
greeted with surprised delight by the audience, notably ‘Tips For Teens’, ‘Get
in the Swing’, ‘Under the Table With Her’ and ‘I Predict’. Russell’s energy was astonishing throughout,
and his gestures (especially the iconic waving pointing finger) were eagerly
copied by the fans. There are always many endearing moments in a Sparks’
performance, and amongst them on this tour were Russell sitting on a stool,
Sinatra-style, for ‘Rhythm Thief’ and ‘I Married Myself’. During the latter, he
produced a hand mirror and said ‘Hi Baby. How you doin’?’ and sang the rest of
the song gazing lovingly at his reflection.
Ron’s monologue in ‘The Shopping Mall of Love’ was also a big hit this
time. His facial expressions, chuckle, and the repeated dead-pan ‘Yeah’,
accompanied by a small fist pump were greeted with amused cheers. Russell’s closing speech spoke of their
current work on a new album and another movie musical. After the grimness of the previous couple of
years, it was clearly exhilerating and emotional to be seeing Sparks in concert
again and to hear that more exciting events were to come.
Sweden did
not feature on the itinerary for the shorter Latte European tour
(celebrating the new album The Girl Is Crying In Her Latte, released May
2023), but it has recently been announced that there will be a concert in
Stockholm in 2025 on the Mad! tour. Fans will no doubt be thrilled to
welcome Sparks back to the country that has a special place in their hearts.
Penny Brown
March 2025
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