There are many talented Norwegians whose work I've admired over the years: Edvard Munch, Liv Ullmann, Roald Dahl (Norwegian parentage), Roald Amundsen, the 2004 Women's World Curling Championship silver-medal winning team of Dordy Nordby, Linn Githmark, Marianne Haslum and Camilla Holth, Kings of Convenience, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer (even though he played for the dreaded Man U), Jan Aage-Fjortoft and
Arne Hansen and the Guitarspellers, to name but quite a few. (I dare say I'd add Henrik Ibsen and Edvard Grieg to that list as well if I wasn't such a philistine.)
Anyway, as you'll doubtless have deduced by now, today's Three of a kind features songs by a clutch of Norwegian artists: the very famous
a-ha, and the not-quite-so-famous but equally melodic
Harmonica and
The Ethnobabes.
I know precious little about the latter two bands - other than the fact that the two tracks included here are both
absolutely brilliant pop songs - but a-ha are an old favourite who'll always hold a special place in my affections because they came along right at the high-point of my Smash Hits-reading days in the mid-80s and proceeded to release a string of the most memorable chart-bothering pop singles of the time.
Hunting High and Low always reminds me of my first ever teenage infatuation, with a girl called Nicola Ling, back in the summer of 1986. (I never did get to snog her, but then adolescence never was all that kind to me!)
a-ha - Hunting High and Low mp3 (left click)
The Ethnobabes - Make Some Sound mp3 (right click)
Harmonica - Rocking Girl mp3 (left click)
Buy music by today's featured bands here and here.
