Håkan Hellström
En midsommarnattsdröm CDS
EMI

Håkan Hellström's career is quite intriguing, from playing bass in indie combo Broder Daniel he has, after two solo albums, become one of Sweden's biggest and most popular artists. Hellström has somehow managed to become a major artist (and a proper household name) without alienating most of his original indie audience, which is quite a feat. It comes as no surprise then that this new single from his forthcoming album "Ett kolikbarns bekännelser" (which roughly translates as "Confessions from a colic child"), is the most anticipated single this year in Sweden. The single did of course race directly into the number one spot in the singles chart. My expectations for this song was probably way too high, and I should have realized that my hopes would inevitable be crushed no matter what. But even though there's some nice flute playing by Dungen (who's to my bewilderment has received a lot of hype in the States in the past months) the song is unfortunately not as fantastic as Hellström's previous singles/songs.
- Simon Tagestam

The annual Village Voice Pazz & Jop critics poll is out and Scandinavian entries on the top album list include The Hives (#53), Dungen (#69), The Concretes (#80), Erlend Oye (#88), Annie (#90), Kings of Convenience (#101), Sahara Hotnights (#240), Luomo (#261) and Pan Sonic (#291). Read more: http://www.villagevoice.com/specials/pazznjop/04/

Dungen in Vice Magazine: http://www.viceland.com/se/v1n4/htdocs/pills.php

Scandinavian highlights from the Pitchfork top 50 album list include The Concretes (#45), Jóhann Jóhannsson (#37), Björk (#19), Annie (#15), Erlend Øye (#14) and Dungen (#13): http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/top/2004/index.shtml

Subliminal Sounds, the label of current media darling Dungen, has signed The Works and will release their debut album sometime around February.

Lots of Scandinavian stuff in the latest Aquarius Records list such as Circle, Darkthrone, a restock of Dungen, The Haunted and tons more: http://www.aquariusrecords.org/cat/newest.html

Newly famous international psych-rock superstar Dungen will be travelling to the US to play the Vice Magazine 10 Year Anniversary Party on October 16 in NYC. He'll also play a free in-store at Other Music on October 18 at 8pm.

Stylus reviews Dungen and selects them as their pick of the week: http://www.stylusmagazine.com/review.php?ID=2412

Delusions of Adequacy weighs in with their take on Dungen: http://www.adequacy.net/review.php?reviewid=4729

Subliminal Sounds will be releasing a special 2xLP version of Dungen's latest album "Ta det lugnt" in the next 2-3 weeks. Go to their website for ordering details: http://www.subliminalsounds.se/

Music blog The Blank Generation goes on at great length on Swedish psych-rock artist Dungen: http://theblankgeneration.blogspot.com/2004/09/whats-keyboard-shortcut-for-umlaut.html

Music for Robots has posted a mp3 from Dungen: http://music.for-robots.com/archives/000528.html

Dusted is not quite so easily impressed with Dungen: http://www.dustedmagazine.com/reviews/1705

Well, this is quite a surprise: Pitchfork calls Dungen's new album one of the best of the year: http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/record-reviews/d/dungen/ta-det-lugnt.shtml

Gustav Ejstes of Swedish psych-rock act Dungen is one of this week's guest contributors to the 'Listed' column at Dusted Magazine: http://www.dustedmagazine.com/features/255