En åben snak med sangerinde Maria Montell om hendes passion for musik .
En åben snak med sangerinde Maria Montell om hendes passion for musik .
Welcome to Museo Lokal Podcasten, thank you, and how it enriches their lives. Every week, I invite a new guest to talk about their relationship to music and how they live and are affected by music. Insight, inspiration and, hopefully, some fun and exciting surprises. Welcome to Museo Lokal podcasten Musik mit Druck.
Speaker 3:And welcome to Maria Montell, thank you, peter, where is it nice to see you.
Speaker 2:Well, in the same way, we don't know each other? No, we don't, and despite that, I've actually booked you once for many, many years ago. Okay, in Silkeborg there was something called Chaplin.
Speaker 3:Yes, I can remember that. I can actually remember that it was probably some disco tour.
Speaker 2:No, I think it was yes, you played live I think I played live.
Speaker 1:Yes, I think.
Speaker 3:But it was from the time when oh Chapman, was it a café?
Speaker 2:It was a little play place, a disco, and it was really famous, a transition from some royals that went from each other and some pictures from that place Royal talk. That's what we're talking about today.
Speaker 3:Listen, I'm really happy about that.
Speaker 2:Maria, you've been making music for 30 years.
Speaker 3:I have simply For a year actually.
Speaker 2:You've just released a whole new single with Wayback. Yes.
Speaker 3:I've done a little collaboration with Tim John. Yes, and it was just a coincidence, and there are a lot of things in my life that are so random, but I have a little festival in my garden. Back home in Hummelbæk, I have a farm with 25,000 square meters and I have made a little festival and it's the fifth year now which is called Hop Creek Festival, and then I have to have some artists and. I can love going down to Memory Lane when I find artists.
Speaker 2:Yes, they have something to do with our age sometimes, but we have some back catalogue at a certain point. We have some back catalogue exactly.
Speaker 3:And then I had actually recorded a song called Are we Okay. It's a little vibe-like song and I recorded it in a Swedish forest, yes, and I think I also did a little pot joint there yes, that can happen. Yes, together with my guitarist, and we had set up gear and then we had to have feeling and we had to start making some music. And then we heard Laid Back and then we just came totally in tune and then we did this Are we Okay song and then afterwards my guitarist, hannibal, he sent it to John from Laidback and he said try to listen. We got so much vibe up in the Swedish forest we had a little one and then we thought we should just listen to this song and John thought it was super cool and then he turned back and then I thought I'll just take the chance.
Speaker 3:I should have Laidback at home to my festival.
Speaker 2:Yes, that was fantastic.
Speaker 3:And then they ended up at the festival and it ended with should we not make some music together? And then we did.
Speaker 2:Yes, that was cool and that festival it's you and your husband.
Speaker 3:It's Thomas. Yes, he's also with us, and it's in your backyard.
Speaker 2:Yes, ja, han er også med, og det er jeres egen baghave.
Speaker 3:Ja, det er på vores egen grund, ikke, jo. Og det startede selvfølgelig under det der corona, hvor vi var lukket ned og alt det der, og så startede det og vi testede folk Og så synes vi, vi synes det var sjovt og det var fedt, it was cool and it was close to home, and then it's been like this for five years now. It's grown up very organic.
Speaker 1:It had to be done a little too fast.
Speaker 3:And the organic way things grow, I really like.
Speaker 2:It's like the most beautiful thing.
Speaker 3:Yes, and you don't crack your throat, you don't make a wig-wham.
Speaker 2:No, I forgot about a wig-wam. No, a wig-wam is completely forgotten.
Speaker 3:No, but doing things like that it just grows, still and calmly.
Speaker 2:You do it while there's room for it and while you're ready for it there are the conditions that need to be it's really hard.
Speaker 3:I've had hands-on on everything and I still have.
Speaker 2:It takes a long time to prepare. I think yes it does. Just to make a festival in your backyard.
Speaker 3:Yes, but it's cool and people turn back and there's a true audience that comes, and then it's with good food and good wine we're doing a little high-end. It's not a tent on Roskilde, no, it's not a fat-oil-pump-pulse, so that's really fun. And then I have my own Hop Creek Orchestra. You know that plays every year, and then I have different cool artists that I've had one year.
Speaker 2:Fantastic, this passion for music. Where does it come from? Is it all back in your childhood home, where you become what?
Speaker 3:Yes, I grew up in Esbagaia in North Zealand and we had my father played jazz and was actually a clarinetist and played clarinet in his young days. So I grew up with big band music and my father always followed along and then it ended with something like HP, hancock and Fusion. So I grew up with jazz and in the basement there we had yeah, it started with that my father bought such a hammer and a needle, okay, and so I started with going to hammer and a needle and it was very early actually in I mean, it was in high school, it was in third grade or something like that where I sat and swam in that, hammered With foot pedals and stuff like that.
Speaker 3:And I was totally lazy to play it. So my father took over those music lessons because I didn't want to study. No, of course no.
Speaker 2:But, anyway, Is it a?
Speaker 3:self-sufficiency. No, it's not a self-sufficiency, but there are some who fall for something and just want to study it. But I went to Aal and learned some things. My brother played the jazz drums. We had full jazz stuff in the basement.
Speaker 2:There was a set up in the basement. Yes, there was a set up.
Speaker 3:So I grew up with all kinds of music, always music in the morning when you were in school. Before you were in school, then my father had just turned up for for high music. So now we have to get the fuck up yeah. I do that myself today really yeah yeah, with my own children there is full of smadder on the music. I mean what I like.
Speaker 2:Yes, there is only one who decides, that's it the DJ who wakes up first. Exactly I stood first with the other leg. You can try tomorrow, if you get there first.
Speaker 3:So I grew up with a lot of music and I started out very early with singing. In second grade I was the one who put me up on the table. I was incredibly lucky to have a good music teacher who was a jazz drummer and his wife was a jazz singer, and then I started to go to the singing class with her and play a little with him, and my brother too, so I started very early with that.
Speaker 2:Yes, and now you say and it was the one who stood up on the table and sang and you thought that requires a little patience, doesn't it? Yes, I was completely clear.
Speaker 3:I wasn't afraid to say see me. I mean, I wasn't.
Speaker 2:No, that's how you actually work today.
Speaker 3:No, that's not how it works today.
Speaker 2:Or in general, I only know you from outside. We don't know each other very well, except that we've met a few times, but you've always looked like someone who had pretty good control.
Speaker 3:Yes, is that completely wrong? Yes, it is, but I think it's because of the years.
Speaker 2:Yes, I know that I've also been worse than I am today.
Speaker 3:I think it came with the years, but I think there was also a place. Maybe it was the time when it was okay it was her who could sing so she did it.
Speaker 2:And it might also have something to do with the fact that you were good at it.
Speaker 3:I was also good at it.
Speaker 2:yes, Then you also have a little more self-confidence about things.
Speaker 3:Yes, of course, the song wasn't completely pitch-well right from the start.
Speaker 2:In the second part no in the second part.
Speaker 3:And I remember my father said you'll never learn to sing. No, you don't mean that. No, you don't learn that. Did he really yes, he and I think that all my life I've tried to prove the opposite to my father. Oh, you'll never get that with music. Take some education instead. Exactly, it's not going to work. So I think that somewhere the parents give you a little bit of a counterplay.
Speaker 2:Like you can't do that. It's become a little drive instead of.
Speaker 3:It's become a little drive and I think about it myself today with my children. I mean not too much of it either. So you get. You get the self-confidence out of them.
Speaker 2:That's what I think is insanely important, or for me it's a hard balance because my children get roasted in the shade just because of the ring. It doesn't fit. But I don't think it's weird to say to someone that you can snuff some streams by resistance no, but I have to say my father has been a little unpedagogical.
Speaker 3:Yes, but are they?
Speaker 2:our generation's parents, or was it?
Speaker 3:I think so it was also something with he stopped playing, so I should to start playing too. I didn't want to start too early.
Speaker 2:How do you get on with it? Because now you're in second grade, but you have a long career 30 years now, or over 30 years, just as an artist.
Speaker 3:Or over 30 years as an artist? Yes, I started my first band when I was 16 years old, and then I went to high school. Or did I do that?
Speaker 1:Yes, I was on my way to high school. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 3:It was called Remedio Nord. Yes wow, and we made our own songs and stuff. And we practiced down in, you know, down in the basement under the children's garden. You know that's usually a kind of deadly place right Out in the windows and could you afford that at the time?
Speaker 2:Yes, I don't know why, but we did that too. In my little school we were allowed to rent.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly, and that was where I started. And then we played around the local environment and stuff and I remember we played warm-up with Sanne Salmondsen down in Humlebeckhalden Wow and sneakers. So it was pretty wild to meet her there. Yeah, that's understandable. She was 16 years old. I don't know if she came to hear anything. I don't know, she probably didn't. She probably came right before she played.
Speaker 1:But, anyway.
Speaker 3:So it started there actually. So I've always been someone who played in bands. Are you a little aware of that?
Speaker 2:I think I've read it somewhere. Yeah, there was a when she was together one who played in a band.
Speaker 3:Are you a little aware of that? I think I've read it somewhere. Yes, there was a. When she was together with Mads Ronanter. There was actually a Swedish producer and guitarist and songwriter. He saw me and then ended up with us. He asked if we could do a collaboration and then I made my first single. Yes that's right. Yes, it was pretty nice.
Speaker 2:It would have been wild to make your first single until you were 16 or 17 years old. Yes, yes.
Speaker 3:I was also on my way out of high school there where I told my father no, now I have to be a pop star.
Speaker 2:No, now I'm moving, Now I can say yes.
Speaker 3:And we went to the studio and I wrote my first lyrics and melodies in collaboration with him. It was a bit rocked and it was a bit sneaker-like, because that was what I was crazy about at that time. So it was the local bearer who gave it. He made a record called Svanen Records and I was a little around on a tour a little around in Copenhagen and Aarhus with local radio and such, but it didn't get that much it was fine enough, but I felt a bit of it.
Speaker 1:You have to promise that.
Speaker 3:How it was and my father made covers. I remember it was insanely beautiful.
Speaker 2:So he was okay with you anyway. Anyway, he was, so you could still sing well.
Speaker 3:Yes, exactly, and it was before that time we used autotune and all kinds of weird things. It was just where you had to simply hit.
Speaker 2:It had to work. Yes.
Speaker 3:That's it. So there it starts and I think, okay, I just have to be a student, and then I just have to go out and sing, okay, and then I just have to go out and sing, okay. And then I actually went to Spain, because all my childhood I had a aunt who had a place in Spain where I had been a holiday child, okay, and she took me down to visit it and found a different place where I could live, and then I went around and sang at different nightclubs and asked if they needed a singer in. It was in 1989. Wow, yeah, nice, and I was alone, light-haired, I think it would have been completely crazy.
Speaker 2:It was completely crazy In that age to be so brave.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, you know, my father gave me a law and stuff and he betrayed me a little bit sometimes.
Speaker 2:If I had had a daughter at that age, I wouldn't have been allowed to go. Let's just say it like that, Not even today. No, they wouldn't have allowed my daughter to go when they come and say I'm going to be 16 or 17,.
Speaker 3:I take it to.
Speaker 2:Spain and expect to go around and ask if anyone wants me to sing.
Speaker 3:Exactly, and the light hair is gone. It's gone. Then I went and the light hair is gone, it's all gone. And then I walked around and I got to work at a nightclub called Pavilion, yes, and owned by a mafia of Italians who really wanted to have me sit and drink with the guests.
Speaker 1:After I had sung.
Speaker 3:There at 12 o'clock, I was part of a show. There were some flamingo dancers, then there were some Englishmen, then there were some Brazilians, and then, there at 12. I was part of a show. There were some flamingo dancers, some Englishmen, some Brazilians, and then there was me, the Scandinavian, what's it called?
Speaker 2:Yes, scandinavian, scandinavian, iceland, yes, exactly.
Speaker 3:And then I sat there for two evenings, I think, and I was supposed to order champagne of course in the bar. It was just that I wasn't 18 yet. I had just turned 19. And I can only remember I had to say I can't sit with the guests.
Speaker 1:I can't really get rid of them afterwards.
Speaker 3:And I have to go home alone on my little knapsack. It's something I couldn't tell my parents. They said I might have to come home again.
Speaker 2:Or I'll come and get you now. I think I said Exactly.
Speaker 3:But it was that time.
Speaker 2:It's crazy enough.
Speaker 3:And then I found out I wasn't supposed to be a nightclub singer when I came home from Spain. It was a hack at that, and then I found out that I wasn't supposed to be a nightclub singer when I came home from Spain. It was a hack in that. I've just tried my best through what I wanted. So I came home and I've always written songs, can you say I've always written right since I was little.
Speaker 2:I've written.
Speaker 3:And then it's that am I good enough to write the songs that you hear on the radio and how to deal with it? So I've always been doing this and wanted and dreamed of it and that's what I wanted. And then I went while I was living away, I came home and then I got a job as a choir singer with Dodo and the Dodos yes, where I was part of like 30 jobs as a choir singer with someone called Louise Norby who is Cecilie's little sister.
Speaker 2:Yes, and Duracell sisters we were called Duracell. Yes, and that was in Dodo's time of greatness yes, it must have been the Swimming World and all those big hits.
Speaker 3:Yes, it was huge, yes, and it was cool. And then I found out that I shouldn't be a choir singer. But all the while I went up and wrote songs and I wanted to go to the studio and make my own record and such.
Speaker 2:You've built a lot of routines in singing both for a few years in Spain and suddenly with so many concerts.
Speaker 3:Yes, exactly, and I also sang with Kaja Bryhl when she was big at the time, and I sang a little with Orup Swedish Orup, what is it called? So I møder Morten Rehmer I Nattelivet I Helsingør. Where you meet everyone On something called Svingelport and he had heard me for a long time and we knew each other from Helsingør and from Esbjørn Gager and things like that, from musical relationships, and are they going back to back?
Speaker 2:Yes, they are, they are going back to back, they are running full time in politics.
Speaker 3:Exactly, yeah. And then he heard when we were on Svingleport. He heard my single there and he just thought she's there, she needs to do something with me at some point, yeah that's funny. And then he made a studio called Stone Road Studio in Stengade in Helsingør, yeah, and from the house rent he had to pay for the commercial for the local radio. And then it became like this and I became the one who made the radio spots.
Speaker 2:So you were the one who did the intel jingling.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly I was like it's a steamer roll roll. It's a steamer roll. All kinds of do the kangaroo what the hell did we not do All kinds of shit? So I made a lot of stuff. Do the kangaroo, what the hell didn't? We make All kinds of shit, and for that I got studio time. Yes, in the studio, wow. So I made free advertising spots and then I got studio time.
Speaker 2:And then we actually started making my first album. Yes, that's because it's another time, right? Right, I mean today we have studio time. We don't have that anymore, because we have studied it at home all together. If we wanted to have it right, I mean, back then you really had to go into a real studio to record something and there had to be someone who could control it, right? I mean, it wasn't.
Speaker 2:I don't know, it's probably been recorded on hard disk anyway but it was also a mixer-pult that I remember Morten had bought, which he was mega proud of he had bought it from an old Easy Sound or something like that, I think it was.
Speaker 3:So it was a fine pult. And then I started and I remember the first thing I did was a handicap OL song which I won a competition between other songwriters in Helsingør, and that's also something about believing that you can do it. And then I won this competition and it came with the handicap OL song. It was called we Denmark da-da-da-da-danmark, something like that, and it was very, very festive.
Speaker 2:And you'll hear it when we're done here.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's it. And then I got that, and I think Morten did too, and there was a kind of respect for me because I was a songwriter. It's a lot of that you come in and you have to prove something. What can you do? And then I won this competition and then I could feel around me that people started to support me, that I should, that you should be allowed to write and sing like that.
Speaker 2:Yes, I should be allowed to do that.
Speaker 3:And then it started with sending different singles to all kinds of record companies, and then we got some no around to all kinds of record companies and there we got some, there we got some no's and all kinds of things. And then there was actually one called Kai Leitner, on Sonet that time, who fell for the first single that I wrote called Jeg er her for dig.
Speaker 2:So it becomes your first hit. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 3:And then a song called Sådan går det hver gang, and it it came out on single on Sunet. And then they said if it's that it comes out and it comes on the radio, then you get to make your album yes, and I already had songs laying around.
Speaker 1:You were ready, I was pretty ready?
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, and then you just need a little money. It costs and that's where you hired musicians and it's studio hiring and all that, exactly.
Speaker 2:It costs a lot of money to make a record. Exactly, yes.
Speaker 3:So it was just like I was, just like I was number one on P3 with I'm here for you and the second most played with. Sådan går det hver gang in 94, I remember them as huge hits in 94? Yeah, it was there too, and and then it was that that you first get to make that album, if you get played on the radio, yeah and it was also very it was not easy in that way.
Speaker 2:No, I think you also have to be in some frames so that it fits the radio in some way. Yes, exactly. There are maybe some limitations in what you want.
Speaker 3:Yes, but I wanted, I was like that Scandinavian sound there. Yes and all that I grew up with all that Swedish music. Because I lived in Helsingørinki and I listened to Swedish radio. I grew up, my parents had a house in Sweden which I came to in 30 years, and you also sing Swedish sometimes? Yes, I do. And Spanish? Yes, of course that Spanish. I have that Swedish-Spanish, yes there's a bit of that. That's what I grew up with. It's very funny what you give your children. It's not unimportant, it has an incredible meaning.
Speaker 2:It has a huge influence on you the rest of your life.
Speaker 3:Yes, it does. So I've always had that Swedish sound and I was crazy about both Ettegat and Lisa Nielsen and Lisa Ekdal and all that culture and I was crazy about all the Swedish machinery and the way they the access to the professional.
Speaker 2:They were super professional, mega, mega, and that's also why it took many years. They were far ahead of us when it came to abroad, before Denmark was really there. It was a completely different game. It was a completely different game From the Swedish people you could say so.
Speaker 3:I had that Swedish role model in many ways. I didn't have so much of the American or English, it was a lot of the Swedish where I saw over to the Swedes yes, so it also has a lot of that Swedish sound. I was also crazy about Mario Scocco. Yes, and that was Morten too. Yes, there, we had such a common thing Then we were crazy about Prince and Michael Jackson.
Speaker 1:Like all of us Like all of us, yes exactly.
Speaker 3:So we were very much in it and Morten was a great producer what is his name? So I've learned all that studio time and stuff and recordings and stuff I've been involved in all those years. But in any case it's like I come in on a record company and then I followed the record company with parts to Sony and then I made my number two record, which was called Svært at Være Gud Inden, which in many ways was my international breakthrough, because I made it in English and also in Spanish and also in Spanish yeah, yeah, yeah, and it made it so that I got, can you say, a breakthrough abroad and you get a huge hit from there, right?
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, that's what you have to say, and it starts a little bit with the first record in Japan and stuff, and then on with the number two record there. It's also both from all over Europe, south America and Asia, and that's La La Dee we're talking about right. Yes, that's La La. Dee, that was your very first fuck-up there.
Speaker 2:After six minutes I thought I was pretty good. La La Dee is called La La Dee.
Speaker 1:I mean whatever La La Dee, yeah what the fuck Di. I mean whatever Dida.
Speaker 2:Di yeah.
Speaker 3:What the hell? Sorry, but anyway I'm touring in those 20 countries and I'm number one and it's amazing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because there's suddenly an international career in the course of a short time or there are a lot of things happening.
Speaker 3:It was like in 96 it came out, and then it was like in 1996 it came out, yes, and then it was like in almost two years. So it was first in Denmark and then it became two years. I've been working on this record for a very, very long time, for a few years.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:And because I'm making it in English and I'm going to go out first and do that huge leg work it's to do that circus.
Speaker 2:I'm thinking a promotion, hell right.
Speaker 3:Yes, I was just in Røven on Agfa and on Michael Learns to Rock. So all those radios, especially in Asia.
Speaker 2:Agfa had always been there for something. Was it easy to navigate in that?
Speaker 3:Well, it's where you say you have to really, really want it. And I really want it and I really love music and I have to say that the fact that I have written my music myself has been a huge advantage for me, because there can be an extra mile to go than if you could go out and sell someone else's music and I've been able to. All the places I've been to I've been able to speak from my heart, because the things I've written they've been some things from my life and my heart, so it's been easy in that way.
Speaker 2:Yes, because I was just about to say that your texts and such things are about you. It sounds like, yes, of course it's about crises and break-ups and what the hell you know, it's your own stories that are out there, it all seems very, very honest.
Speaker 3:Yes, it is, it is. It is a form of blotting in many ways to write songs. But it hasn't been so. It hasn't been so much of a problem or so much of a problem or so much of a problem, or so much of a problem, or so much of a problem or so much of a problem, or so much of a problem or so much of a problem or so much of a problem or so, but I also think that what has done it for me has been the feedback I've received from people, I mean the letters I've received.
Speaker 3:It's just as I have it, maria, the way you write that song, the fact that I haven't felt good enough, the fact that I've been burned out, or all the things that have happened, or the fact that I've become unemployed, or what the hell I could find out, or what I've written about what from? Or all the things that happen, or the fact that I'm unemployed, or what the hell I could find out and what I've written about what's happened in my life, so that response from people. That's simply what made it happen for me To get that feedback.
Speaker 2:That made it all worth it. That made it all worth it.
Speaker 3:And then talking about it and saying, okay, well then it's important in a way.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:It's not just because I have to stand in that light.
Speaker 1:No no.
Speaker 3:It's all the other things, and it's also cool To stand in that light Absolutely. You have to like that. It's insane, it's mega cool. There have been times when it hasn't been cool. You know when there have been times when it hasn't been great.
Speaker 3:Yes, I think so it has been for everyone, Because you take many things personally in and with and you can feel sometimes that the whole world thinks the same, that you are a huge clubhead or that you are really unruly Because there are people who have meant something. So you are pretty vulnerable in many ways, Also when you write or when you just perform virkelig udulig eller et eller andet, fordi der er nogen der har ment et eller andet. Så der er man jo ret sårbar på mange måder, også når du skriver eller når du bare performer.
Speaker 2:Ja, og jeg tænker lige der I mid-90'erne, hvor du for alvor bryder igennem med de her sange, og det er udlandet, og nu snakker vi lige om det der Royal der er en, and it must have been very, very violent. Yes To be you at that time Mega violent, so what?
Speaker 3:I would like to have credit for that's what I've done, and I'm not just some blonde with curls in her hair or with weird hair what's it called.
Speaker 2:But were there anyone who noticed you? No, it's that feeling.
Speaker 3:I think I have I håret eller med mærkeligt hår. Hvad hedder det? Var det nogen der opfattede dig sånn? Det er den følelse, tror jeg, jeg selv har. Det ved jeg ikke om det er en selvbillede, men det der med at alt går I baggrunden, at alt det jeg har arbejdet for og alt det jeg har gjort og hele min historik, at det ikke bare and my whole history that they just got wiped away.
Speaker 3:When things happen to someone that it's like what they have done and knuckled for and have been to, it's like it's wiped away.
Speaker 2:There's only one thing that stands. It's just that you're an idiot.
Speaker 1:Or what you are now.
Speaker 3:I think that for me it's been. There's a lot of stuff. It's just you're just an idiot, you're just, or what you are now, or I think actually that it has for me been. It hasn't, it hasn't really bothered me. I want to, I'm her there and I'm not her the other one, and so so, so, so, so, so. So all that needs to be written about one. No, it's on the magazine.
Speaker 2:It's for selling the magazine.
Speaker 3:And I'm completely on it.
Speaker 2:But I'm just thinking it's you personally that goes out there.
Speaker 1:Yes, exactly, so it's good that it's me who has to read it.
Speaker 2:But there still has to be some.
Speaker 1:I'm just thinking with such a huge success and such a huge awareness all of a sudden on everything else and navigate in that, because how old are you?
Speaker 3:here You're what 28 years old, maybe, yes, 28-30. 28-30, right.
Speaker 2:And do you get an idea of all this that it helps the music or it doesn't help the music?
Speaker 3:Have you ever thought about that? I would say there has probably been a lot of people when you have. I mean, I was, I was in a paparazzi and piss and shit.
Speaker 2:I think they were lying on the floor all the time.
Speaker 3:Yeah yeah, and I don't think that would have happened if it wasn't. But I don't think I've sold. I don't think I've sold more clothes than that People. It's been a blad, I mean, it's been sold, so it hasn't helped me, there at least.
Speaker 2:But it hasn't been negative. No, that's what I mean you know it has had some meaning on the whole?
Speaker 3:No, I don't think so.
Speaker 2:Which is nice. Yes, yes, absolutely, because you could, as you say, because, as you say, sometimes there's one thing that can overshadow everything that has been going on for the rest of your life.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, but it was like I've learned a lot from Skif and I've also seen things from a different perspective. You know that little country girl from Esbjerg.
Speaker 2:She just suddenly came out of who came into Storbyen right.
Speaker 3:Yes, she came into Storbyen and I've seen it with a little different eye, and also on people. You know how people are and like okay it's not all. I thought all people were just fucking good. It's not like that.
Speaker 1:No, it's not how it is in life.
Speaker 3:It's not everyone who thinks you're cool, no, no. And then there are also people who just give you to know they just think you're a nobody or something. Yes.
Speaker 2:But you may have gotten some hard on the chest, as it's called by, first Spain alone, home and tour with the big bands, and then you get a huge success and go abroad. And there you're a little on your own again, because there's no one. It's you, it's not a band. And it's your music and it's you who sings it.
Speaker 3:I was out on a lot of promotions. I was alone with Søren Hedegaard who made my hair and was almost a tour manager and a guitarist, but otherwise I was doing some promotion and stuff. But I've tried to get music all the way and when I was making some of these things I had some, but everything was also a matter of money and stuff. But I had some tours where, among others, Klaas Anton was also with me. And what's his name?
Speaker 2:Thomas Andersson and some of all those Some prominent gentlemen you've met.
Speaker 3:yeah, yeah, yeah the whole team of cool musicians, søren Runge and Jens Runge, and I've actually played with the best in Danish music and and and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and and.
Speaker 1:Yes, for fuck's sake.
Speaker 3:So I've always had the cool musicians. That's what I have to say, and I've been good at choosing. I think there's all kinds of music. Some are good at playing, some are not good at playing, because I've also played a lot of jazz.
Speaker 2:And all kinds of genres and things like that. Yes, because you go over them afterwards, don't you, when you've?
Speaker 1:had this big success and you're like.
Speaker 2:I don't know if it falls a little, but then your next records become jazz records.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah. But just to go back to that whole trip there with All, around the world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all around the world.
Speaker 3:It also makes you stand there, think how do I get there? And then I make another album on Sony and it comes out and it gets very well received in Denmark and I also make a duet with Orup and a little different. And I actually travel a lot to Sweden because there I have really I have seen up to the Swedes and such things. So I go a lot to Stockholm and work together with different producers there and make music with them and I also start co-writing. And then it happens that in all this there is an Asian artist called Kokoli who sells 2.3 million of my hit and remakes it, and there is actually another part that remakes Ditter D.
Speaker 3:That makes that.
Speaker 2:That's really cool, that's super cool because it's still your number and it's my number. I've's super cool because it's still your number and it's my number.
Speaker 3:I've written it 100%. That means that I can actually also sit at home and say you can sleep on your back. It's really nice that you take that. And Kyrolie was huge both in America and Asia and she actually just committed suicide last year?
Speaker 1:Is that true? Yes, it was pretty sad.
Speaker 3:It was pretty awful actually, but I have remade some of my other songs to others abroad and such. So it's also been a very cool thing.
Speaker 2:It has been, because it's really proof of how good you are at writing songs.
Speaker 3:Yes, it is.
Speaker 2:I think there are others who want to write their own things. Yes, yes.
Speaker 3:It has also given me the faith that I can do this. It's a lot about faith.
Speaker 2:Yes, it does. It's something self-sufficient.
Speaker 3:It really is, because if you live on that wave of self-confidence, then you can also just suddenly do a lot, and then no one can come and say you shouldn't think, you're in a law of the law or are you sure you can do it, or are you good enough, or is it good enough?
Speaker 2:You don't get in doubt about what they say when you've just been there, right?
Speaker 3:Yes, I'm in doubt, no, it's not, but so Now I'm running a bit, it's okay.
Speaker 2:There's no system In how we talk, and I just think it's fucking interesting To hear Also because that You're bringing that On the stage that there's someone who has re-recorded your songs and actually has gotten huge hits with them. I saw on your Instagram the other day. There was A Brazilian band that also plays it Live. Yeah, instagram. The other day, there was a Brazilian band that also plays live.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, but that's something I'm discovering, because it's obviously. I didn't know it was big in Brazil, but then I see a festival where there's a band and they're playing it to their. So they're playing it on top of my remix song. Yes, that's so spooky. You could say but when I look out At this festival, I just see people standing.
Speaker 2:People are singing along and are involved. How full are they? And?
Speaker 3:then I think I also wrote to that band and I wrote hey, shouldn't I come down and perform a little With you Right there at carnival time in.
Speaker 2:Rio yes, where it's fun and where it's good weather.
Speaker 3:That would be perfect. Isn't that where I should be on stage and just come in?
Speaker 2:I have two or three weeks there where it can fit in, that's it right.
Speaker 3:So actually I go a little in my own little universe and examine a little. You know your experiences.
Speaker 2:I can just feel now.
Speaker 1:I have three children.
Speaker 3:And the oldest will be 20, and then one at 17, and one at there will be 14 and will be confirmed by next year. But I have also just been a mother.
Speaker 2:You have been a mother for many years now. Yes, I have.
Speaker 3:And there I have. In that period I have just made Bossa Nova and have issued some jazz music and some Bossa records and so on. And written music for film, and I've made a complete record of Dorte Kollo. Actually, I've read that a little.
Speaker 2:Yes, you get a robot for music for Solkommen.
Speaker 3:Yes, exactly, so you've made everything possible.
Speaker 2:Yes, exactly, so you've made all kinds of records, all kinds of records.
Speaker 2:Yes, and I'm thinking a little, and it's just to hold on to the fact that now you come out and you say so, you're going to make your second record on Sony where you say, yes, it's going to be a big hit in Denmark, it's probably not going to be so much in the Netherlands. Has that also done that? You're abroad, you're in over 20 countries where you promote the record and it's given away and things like that until the next record. Well, there it's actually only your own little other country you're interested in.
Speaker 2:Is that where you change a little too, or what is it? Do you still, even though you've been so much on yourself, even though you've been working so hard on yourself.
Speaker 3:I think I'm a little and I might also be a little tired there. And then there were also a few aftertales of my private life.
Speaker 2:Yes, so there are more things that play into it? Yes, there are that it becomes like that?
Speaker 3:Yes, and then I had actually made a record. Then I switched from record company to Universal, yes, and then I was actually allowed to make exactly the record I wanted to make. And at that time there there was this you should, you should, be the cool, Maria Montel.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean you know her there who really could do something right. So I went to the USA and and there I actually wrote. I mean, it was actually like there were some who came to take something from the One called Billy Steinberg and Rick Knowles and if you don't know them, then Billy Steinberg is the one who wrote Like a Virgin and Falling Into you with Celine Dion and all kinds of Cindy Lauper Some pretty big hits. A text author who is huge, you could say and Rick Knowles, who also made Robbie Williams' album.
Speaker 3:They had come to steal something from my song.
Speaker 2:That's what they came to.
Speaker 3:Yes, that's what they came to. It was my foreplay, and they were so afraid that I would put the case down. We also wanted to put the case down against them, and then they turned back instead of asking if they didn't just and I just came in on something royalty on that song which we had written together yes, which we had written and published in a relationship.
Speaker 3:And my predecessor. He of course also saw money in his eyes, but I said try to listen. They invited me in on the cut there and then they invited me over to Rick Knowles and Bill Stambeck to write in Rick Knowles' studio in Los Angeles, because when we had written one hit together, we could have written more. Exactly, or you could have maybe over and get the opportunity to write with the two guys there and it was the best.
Speaker 3:It was a huge experience, huge experience and a little sweat in the hands, you know, and that sharing of that and what. Then again the question okay, am I cool enough for this?
Speaker 2:Yes, but it's always in your mind, Maria, Especially in this entertainment industry. It's always in your mind Maria, no matter what you do, especially in this entertainment industry, it's always about being judged constantly. It's not just You're just judged, no matter what you do, and I think you just never get used to it.
Speaker 3:But in any case I make two songs with them. One is called Think Positive, but in any case I made two songs with them. One of them was Think Positive, which also became the title track on my album, and another one was Heart Candy, which was a bit controversial and they asked me if I could sell it to Lene. Okay, yes to.
Speaker 2:Lene Nystrøm. She was just about to make her solo album there, maybe in that period.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, exactly Because they thought it was a really good idea.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think so too, it wasn't just the music, the things they can do, no, they thought also in the money, of course.
Speaker 3:And then it said we can also pitch it to Carrie Hathaway. And what do you think that the dumbest blonde in Denmark says no, I don't know. I think I'll give it to her first.
Speaker 2:It's a bit of my own song. It's a bit of my own song.
Speaker 3:And I can also be controversial Because it was a little flabby that song.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and everyone was very involved and I had almost nothing on the cover and I was like wow, dangerous, miss, dangerous miss, and what's it called. But then he does this and we record it at Bill Champlin from Chicago, the band there. He has a studio and a Swedish producer who knows Bill Champlin and, yes, it ends up with me living there in Los Angeles for two months and making this record, and also in Stockholm and it comes out and it's really. It's a lot. Many say, oh shit, an international sound and that Swedish sound. And it's really. And there's some edge, there's some lot of Many say, oh shit, an international sound and that.
Speaker 1:Swedish sound and and there's some edge.
Speaker 3:There's some edge to it and all kinds of, and then he comes out and I can remember that it gets. It gets judged on the front of the Extra-bladet by Thomas Trejo with one star.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:It doesn't always mean it's bad, no, no.
Speaker 3:But I think he just waited for me to have a kick in the nerves. Yes, so now she had to go down Now.
Speaker 2:We had you Now we had you.
Speaker 3:So it was like, and I can remember I couldn't take it.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 3:I was in first position after that record and I can remember I had a boyfriend there who I think thought it was pretty hard because he was supposed to be there in Ski with me in the first position.
Speaker 2:It was a little too bad in the long run. It wasn't what he had dreamed of. It wasn't what he had dreamed of.
Speaker 3:It was the last pop record and then I got pregnant and stuff like that, and then I made my bossa nova album and started playing more jazz. And went to jazz parties with couples jazz parties and started getting involved with other songs and kind of covered myself up you know, put me a little there, it's so nice here with the others.
Speaker 2:Yes, but they can understand it well because you've been on the road all alone for a long period and then suddenly you get that over the top, which you may not have expected, and you may have made the decision yourself that it should be your songs where you could have sold them to some Big international stars.
Speaker 3:Christ, how stupid.
Speaker 2:No, I'm not saying that Because I think I've done the same. I would have done the same if I had done it myself.
Speaker 3:But there is something in it that the decision you make that maybe wasn't completely right, or at least could have been made when someone else read it, but also just that they asked me Steinberg, and som måske ikke var helt rigtigt, ja, men det er det. Eller I hvert fall kunne have felt, når helt andet leder sig. Men også bare det der med altså, de spurgte mig, jo, du ved Steinberg derovre. Han spurgte mig om jamen, altså, hvis du vil noget, så skal du flytte herover, ikke? Ja, og så var det sådan ja, ja, skal du det.
Speaker 3:Var. I was a little worried, but at least there was something that pulled me back home. So I went home and then I met a man and then we started getting some children. Yes, exactly, and I was also brave about it.
Speaker 2:I was 34 when I got my first child and you have experienced a lot before Exactly I got my first child. And you have experienced a lot before, precisely, it's also a strong balance. I think, now that you've been together for over 20, years.
Speaker 3:I think Thomas right, yes, I'm quite sure that it's about having done it. I've done it when I was a kid. Now I've had three. I think if I hadn't lived that dream I mean now I've had three I mean I think if I hadn't, if I hadn't lived out that dream, then it could well be I wouldn't have had three kids.
Speaker 2:I mean, then I would have like maybe.
Speaker 2:Then you would have maybe all the time been on the way to the next or or or or, and that's something you can. I'm 57 years old and I'm sitting here today and I have discussions with people who say what's going to happen. I would just like to maintain my life. Actually, I haven't, which sounds completely crazy, because I've always had ambitions and done everything possible. I don't have any ambitions right now. I would really like to maintain the fantastic life I have, exactly, and that's something with trying all that. You have tried all things, or a lot of things, and that you get older. Of course, it's clear. Yes, are you something to us?
Speaker 3:Well, I'm so crazy about music, yes, and I have people say, but do you still make music? I've made music all the time.
Speaker 2:Yes, and you've still published records.
Speaker 3:Yes, and it's been one way or another. I play live music and I play with people who are fucking good. We practice at home. I have a studio I play, I play in a studio, I have a creative workplace at home with myself, with my festival, and we practice at home in my Kenya studio, as I call it, and I have a studio and make music all the time.
Speaker 2:You've built what you want at home with yourself at some point, yes, and your practice room from childhood is now on your own. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 3:And then it's just that if I haven't made music for a long time, then Thomas says there's something. You're fucking angry and cranky and there have been periods With three children when there are just periods when you can't do it and you just have to that music. You can't let go.
Speaker 2:When it's such a big passion and it's such a big part of your life, you can't let go. You can't let go of having music, but you get a different relationship to it. Yes, you're. I think it's also precise. It sounds like you're quite good at doing what you want to do all the time.
Speaker 3:Yes, I've never been dictated anything.
Speaker 2:No, that's what I mean you haven't been pressured from a record, fantastic things. But otherwise it's like as an elder you start to give out the things where you say I'm so happy with it If it sells or something, if there are people who hear it. This is really good for me to get rid of.
Speaker 3:But it's really annoying, it's really annoying that you do something and then it doesn't get played. And then they can't understand it. Why is it that it gets played? This I've done, but now this? Isn't it good enough, or?
Speaker 2:is it?
Speaker 3:because it's English, or is it our? Age.
Speaker 2:Yes, I understand correctly it's not something, but we're almost the same age, right, we're not potential customers or artists to a P3, p4 or something like that.
Speaker 3:I'm P5, of course, but even P5 can say, For example. Now I can give you an example. Not so long ago I released a single called Are we Okay? It's a little vibed song From the Swedish forest. Yes, which came from that thing with Laid Back. Then I made a song with Laid Back where John is in on it, and I've made a total. You know it's in English. They won't play that, no, isn't that?
Speaker 2:weird. Yes, it's very weird. Is it because you're in a box? Yes, it could be.
Speaker 3:They say this is a weird constellation. Now she sings in English. Okay, I've sung in. I don't know how many languages.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a bit like you're both in Swedish and Spanish and English.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but it's such funny things that happen where you can't really find out what is it really, but I think it's age.
Speaker 2:It can be. I think so. I don't know why, but it's just like it's not and I don't sound, or it might sound like, but I'm not, neither A beater or anything. No, my music I've made In my time has never been A radio. It's always been Club music and more underground. But I don't know, it's just uninteresting. I think yes For those who are sitting there.
Speaker 1:And playlisting.
Speaker 2:I don't know why. Yes.
Speaker 3:Or maybe For those who are sitting there and playlisting. I don't know why. Yes, or maybe there's also a lot coming, but it could be that they're making a scapelon. They're making some scapelons, I think. So you say, okay, there, it's there, and if you go out of it or away from it, then you can't.
Speaker 1:Then it doesn't fit to the format we have. No, it's the format.
Speaker 3:Because you're there and, and it's also very good, if you want to listen to something else in the Bolshevik store, the problem is we never get to hear anything else.
Speaker 2:If you always have to have that skabelon on a radio station, I've always been pissed off about that. You're not there to promote the music and it's not because it's supposed to be a hit on Danish radio, but I think that with public service it should be that we should hear everything. Yes, exactly. It becomes a lot. I don't know, it could be that I'm just old. I don't listen to radio anymore. I only listen to the music I buy myself.
Speaker 3:That's what I do I listen to? I run records. I have a huge vinyl collection at home. Really, I'm crazy about what I do?
Speaker 1:I listen to, I buy records. I have a huge vinyl collection. Is that true?
Speaker 3:Yes, I'm totally crazy, I do that too. That's cool. 30.000? No, I don't have that. Okay, I don't have records. No, but okay, I have good records.
Speaker 1:I've also sorted them. Yes, I have that I don't have that, but I.
Speaker 3:There are just those good A-list records.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you still buy records.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I do, wow. Yeah, for fuck's sake.
Speaker 3:And the records I release I also make on vinyl. I can really like that, that's fantastic, I'm crazy about it. I like that organic sound and it's just great to have it in your hands. Yeah, it's something else. I have to sit and look at the lyrics and I have to look at everything.
Speaker 2:I also think it feels like you've released a real work as an artist when it's on vinyl.
Speaker 3:Oh that streaming Spotify?
Speaker 2:It doesn't feel quite right, does it?
Speaker 3:I also have my own label which I release my music through, and others too. Oh, okay, I didn't know that. I run the whole Palette.
Speaker 2:You run hard.
Speaker 3:And label. I mean If you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you, if you If you have to do it yourself.
Speaker 1:And it's a huge relief as.
Speaker 3:I also say to those who have permanent work I can't be fired. No, You're just lying on the floor all the time, but on the other hand, I can really sleep well at night if the shit has to run around.
Speaker 2:You're on your own to pay for the house rent and make the money. It's not like there's just a check. No, I've never had.
Speaker 3:I haven't had a job since 89. No. A permanent job no, and there's ups and downs In music business. That's what you have to say and that thing With the phone ringing, the phone doesn't ring? No, then you have to be creative. Yes, Then you have to be creative, you have to get your fingers out and you have to find something. And I'm so mad to see over and over again with people who make their things creatively that they find something. You shouldn't sit down and take out a corner and say there's no phone ringing.
Speaker 3:It doesn't work right.
Speaker 2:No, it doesn't. You have to create it yourself. That's always been my opinion. And how, Maria, are you going to? How are you going to get through this? How are you going to get through this? Because we're reaching an age and it's not because we're talking like we're old, but when I think there are 10 years left, I'm a pensioner on paper. I think that's insanely scary.
Speaker 3:Well, I am pensionist on the papers. Yes, I think that's insanely scary. Yes, but I'm 55, right, yes. And now I'm looking at, for example, Birthe Kjær. She's still running. Yes, that's right, she's got a full knack for it.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:She's actually written a song too, is it really? Yes, birthe, yes, funny, but a little over in the Danish top branch there, but in what's it called? How do?
Speaker 2:I get on.
Speaker 3:I'm thinking how will it go for?
Speaker 2:the rest of my life.
Speaker 3:How will it go? I'm really positive Now. I can feel it with the children who have become older and I've got a you know up in the saddle.
Speaker 2:Yes. And I want to make new music and you've also got some time, because the children suddenly are not ready for themselves and want something else and I can't, god willing, not sit and look at him at home he has a lot of hope also to do yes, exactly so it's fine enough that we have been our lives in that way, but I just have it like this there's a new phase in my life and I have a lot of experience with myself, and now I'm going to play concerts until next year.
Speaker 3:At the beginning of next year I'm going on a trip and I'm about to make an album and I'm about tove nogle remixes. Og farfar har lige skrevet til mig, faktisk, at han har lavet et remake af Ditter D.
Speaker 2:Nå fedt.
Speaker 3:Som jeg lige har sunget ind på spansk og på engelsk I hans studie. Og så har Laidback lavet et remake med Ditter D, where I laid back up with Ditter D as well, okay, so there's probably something Jubiläums or something like that. I'm simply running with Yubi for 30 years in music yeah, so I have a full hammer on that. And then my festival there, and then I have a little. I'm going to play a little bit with some old hits on the set, and then I said yes to being in Vi elsker 90'erne.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:With Sasseline, and what's her name? Julie Blåøgne. Yes, Julie. Blåøgne and Julie Bertelsen.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:We should be an entry with our 90'er hits. Just like 35 minutes on that we love the 90's and it's fucking long since I've played For a big crowd.
Speaker 2:There's been like 15.000 people.
Speaker 3:I think it's.
Speaker 2:There's quite a lot.
Speaker 3:It's like 4 cities In August.
Speaker 2:Can you get nervous for that? No, I'm kidding, and I also saw it's like four cities, right?
Speaker 3:Yes, in August, can you?
Speaker 2:get nervous about that. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. It's crazy, okay, good.
Speaker 3:And I also said to the others they're like, you're such a real musician, you know, and they were a little scared because I had started to think something with something I said we're just going to go all in.
Speaker 2:It's funny too, isn't?
Speaker 3:it Exactly. And then there was someone who said to me what the hell do you think you are? Yeah, that's very nice, no, but that. And to say we don't know when we'll close and close. Exactly these eyes and I look around me and people die all the time, yeah all the time I sing to one and the other funeral, so I just have to fire it off and then actually a little shit on what others think. Well, I think that's also what you should do.
Speaker 2:I understand that well and I think that also bears pre that you have done. You have been very good at doing what you wanted. It seems like that, without me knowing you very well, but out of it at least, and it doesn't seem like it, unless I know you very well, but out of the question at least. And then you say that you have started to sing to the funeral as well.
Speaker 1:Or have done Not as a new thing.
Speaker 2:It's a whole new thing. You just call Now. My upcoming funeral song is coming up in a bit. What are you going to?
Speaker 3:play to your funeral. Have you thought about that? Now I've heard your podcast. I'm asking you. You're really cute.
Speaker 2:Go there and talk to yourself. Exactly, I thought I wouldn't say it, I'd rather sing it. How beautiful.
Speaker 3:Let's see this song I'm going to hear in the church I sang in in Ebbeksvang Church in Aspergære when I was young and up in the church choir where I made money every Sunday and there I was just. It was the folk school and I have a little anecdote to that. It was that sometimes we had two God's services, and that's just to show how much rock and roll I am. So we had two God's services and I went down and got the daily bread and that little gibbonakker there, the kistler wine there.
Speaker 3:I went down there twice where the priest said to me Maria, you can only get the daily bread once a day. That's why it's called daily bread.
Speaker 1:That's why it's called daily bread.
Speaker 3:But I looked down two times and I can remember I got a pretty red chin. But I could actually like that church wine there. But anyway. I think, it's that church that I could think of getting a tarskede in because it's a pretty nice church, it's right by the water and I love the water and then I've sung this song to many sacrifices.
Speaker 1:I'm really happy to hear it. Smile though your heart is aching.
Speaker 3:Smile even though it's breaking when there are clouds in the sky.
Speaker 1:You'll get by if you smile through your fear and sorrow. Smile, and maybe tomorrow You'll see the sun Come shining through For you.
Speaker 3:Okay, I think I'm going to sing another verse, you know what it's my favorite song?
Speaker 2:I've just been to it. I can't keep. It'm singing the second verse. You know what it's my favorite song? I've just been told I can't stand it. It's Charlie Chaplin's song. It is, it's the most beautiful, beautiful song.
Speaker 3:And it's just exactly.
Speaker 1:You have to the people who are sitting back.
Speaker 2:I can't stand it.
Speaker 1:They just have to.
Speaker 2:I can't stand it. I'm so easy to torment so I'm going to learn with everything and it sounded great.
Speaker 3:Yes, well, fantastic song.
Speaker 2:Thank you, thank you for that Fantastic choice yes and thank you so much for letting me be a part of it. It was so little.
Speaker 3:I Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2:You're welcome. Thank you for listening to this week's Museo Lokal podcast, music my drug. I hope you have enjoyed the music's fascinating universe and found inspiration for your own musical journey. If you'd like to listen to today's guest's list of songs, you can find the list on Museo Lokal's Spotify list on Spotify. I look forward to exploring more aspects of the music's knowledge. The, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the.