This podcast does not include any music. Due to copyright reasons.

Alan: Hello Pontus, long time no see.

Pontus: Yes. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?

Alan: We’ve been through the desert and back.

Pontus: Feels like it. And so what shall we talk about today?

Alan: Well, we can either talk about Angelina Jordan or we can talk about Angelina Jordan, which do you prefer?

Pontus: Oh, let’s take the first one.

Alan: Okay. You got it.

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Alan: I heard a little rumor that you have a very, very clever idea of having a mock album for Angelina Jordan and you have actually chosen 12 of your favorite songs, which you would love for her to do. Tell me about that Pontus.

Pontus: Yeah. Thank you. First of all, I’m so glad you think it’s a good idea. When I started listening to Angelina I was so focused on her music, the covers she did and her original music.
And then I got interested in listening to other music too. I mean, my interest in music sort of-what do you call it? It sort of grew.

Alan: Mushroomed.

Pontus: Yeah, mushroomed. Good word. I’ve always been like that, as a person, that I go through phases in my life. So in some phases I don’t listen so much to music, in some phases I don’t read many books. and, so this actually started a new phase with music, but then of course she has ruined music for me because when I listened to other artists, they pale in comparison. Many people comment that they hear other artists and they think, oh, this should be so much better if Angelina had done this song. So then I started thinking, okay, which songs do I want Angelina to do a cover of so that I can enjoy them so much more.
So that was the basis of this idea to do a mock-up album. And it’s actually just a playlist on Spotify. It’s songs that I feel has some connection to Angelina and I definitely feel I want to hear her sing them.

Alan: Well, it’s a great idea. And not only is it a great idea, but it’s an original idea. And it’s really, really interesting because there are other moments in some of her other songs, which we can almost, can I use the word extrapolate, where we can sort of like grab her style from one moment in one song and say, right, Maybe she could do that style with this song. And that is a really, really interesting theoretical discussion for us to have.

Pontus: I’m so glad that you think that, but I don’t want to be pretentious.

Alan: What you are doing is you are providing food for thought. It’s a very interesting concept and this concept can go in so many different directions. It’s not about you pushing; it is a matter of you introducing an approach, a way of thinking about her music and, and for her fans. So it’s very, very interesting and it’s very original. It’s a very creative idea that you have.

Pontus: Thank you. Thank you. Of course there are so much good, great music, and she’s so versatile. She can do anything really.

Alan: I know, I know.

Pontus: And I’ve deliberately stayed clear from the songs that she’s already done, of course. So it’s like, if she were to release a cover album with songs that we never heard any clip from TikTok or anything from her at all, this is, what I would like to hear.

Alan: I’m sure once this podcast reaches her fan base, there will be very, very interesting input. You will have all suggestions from so many different directions and it will be a great conversation.

Pontus: Everybody has their own favorite artists and their own sort of, secret fantasy about, which song she’s going to do next.

Alan: Why this is such an appropriate idea is because she has a thousand different voices. So in that way, her talent is so chameleon-like that almost any song she can interpret in a style which is completely appropriate. This idea of making pseudo suggestions of what she could do is a way of actually, highlighting the nature of her thousand voices.

Pontus: That’s true. Although I have not, in this playlist, gone for  a wide variety of styles because I wanted this playlist to be a listenable experience. You don’t want the album to… you want it to be sort of a complete album, a complete feeling.

Alan: A unit.

Pontus: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So that’s what I’m aiming for. I don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but for instance, I did want to include a rap song somewhere just because, you know, but I didn’t do that.

Alan: She’s a music lover more than you and I put together.

Pontus: Yes, of course. And I’ve read in an interview that she actually enjoys rap. She’s fully capable of doing it if she wanted to.

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Alan: A couple of people have said, Alan, why don’t you get to interview Angelina Jordan? And this is completely, completely beyond my control and imagination, you know, it just, you have a fantasy album. I have a fantasy question. What goes on between your ears, Angelina? Do you hear the version like Mozart and just sit down and, take dictation and write that. Does it come to you fully formed or, is it 10% inspiration and then 90% perspiration. In other words, do you actually hear it and it’s a complete work or do you have like a little semblance of a little sprout and then you have to do a lot of hours and hours of work on it. So that would be a very, very interesting question and very interesting answer from her.

Pontus: Absolutely. I would like to know that as well. And I think that is a great idea for a podcast. Our next podcast will be our imaginary questions to Angelina Jordan and our imaginary answers.

Alan: Yeah, exactly.

Pontus: I think that would be great.
I went to see one of the interviews that Michael Jackson made and in that interview, he described writing Billy Jean. And the only idea he had from the beginning was he wanted a hook, a baseline hook. And that baseline, it just came to him and he said, “Musicians and artists, they really should stop trying to write music. It will just come to you.” So that was his process.

Alan: The hook is really important and this is why you have great producers, you know, you have Quincy Jones and you have Mark Ronson who really, not only understand the concept of a hook, but the how to generate one and make it work. Angelina Jordan is working with the Stargate team and they’re working on a song together. I would be fascinated to know what type of inputs the Stargate team put in on to what type of idea Angelina Jordan has. In other words, the way a song is put together, especially with one of Angelina Jordan’s original songs.

Pontus: I did read one of the interviews with Stargate team and they said something like, ”We did something in the music and Angelina came into the studio and listened to it and she instantly said, ‘what’s that? That’s a little something there. Oh, no, no.’ And we removed it. And she was right”, they said.

Alan: If you look at the face of the producer of, I Put a Spell on You, when he is reading her note, he reads the note and he has a type of Mona Lisa smile, and he nods his head. So this is the moment which is captured of a professional producer seeing Angelina Jordan’s suggestion. And says, ”She’s got it. She’s got it.”

Pontus: Yeah. And also there’s a beautiful scene where they’re going over her Summertime appearance on Norway’s Got Talent. They’re in this big conference room and they’re talking about the trumpet solo, the beginning there and she, she actually mimics the sound of a trumpet and I find that really, spot on. She has, from a very, very young age, a very good idea of what she wants.

Alan: I think that’s the video where they use the B word and they say that she’s the boss, but I think that’s the wrong word to use because all she’s doing is she’s giving very clear musical directions. I think being the boss has a more of a negative connotation. She’s very evolved musically and she is trying to communicate that very diplomatically.

Pontus: Yeah. And they also say it’s her wishes.

Alan: That’s a very nice, well, you know, it’s like a birthday wish.

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Pontus: So how do you want to go about discussing this imaginary cover album that I’ve put together, like a playlist?

Alan: Well, do you have a particular song which is accessible that we can listen to straight away?

Pontus: Well, I’m sorry, I didn’t have time to prepare anything for this, for this recording.

Alan: Okay, well, maybe when you edit this podcast, maybe you can add, you know, for example, maybe you can add Sting’s Shape Of My Heart with the opening acapella segment from Bohemian Rhapsody. Maybe you can put them together and we can hear how with just a little spin Angelina Jordan can handle a Sting song.

Pontus: You feel that Shape Of My Heart and the acapella intro of Bohemian Rhapsody, go well together, sort of speak. Why is that do you think?

Alan: It’s not because it’s acapella. It’s because at that moment, when she is doing the acapella, she has extreme softness and extreme tenderness and extreme expression in her voice, which is a similar way to how Sting starts that same song. So it’s not because it’s acapella, but it’s because of the expression in her voice, which I was reminded of when I heard Sting’s version.
In other words it’s 90% in the direction of Angelina Jordan could use this voice or this style or this approach for this particular song.
This is just us being musical novices. This is just a gut feeling, but, we really need to get Angelina Jordan on our podcast and give us some guidance about how we should have this conversation.

Pontus: Exactly. Yeah, because of course she goes in a direction that is, almost, well, it is impossible to guess. I mean, would you have guessed that she, she would do a Billy Jean and that she would do it like a jazzy Billie Jean version?

Alan: Well, I certainly would not have guessed that she would do a video in a shopping cart.

Pontus: No, that’s a good one.

Alan: It has to do with versatility and it has to do with interpretation and you know, the nature of jazz, it is very, very spontaneous.

Pontus: Yeah.

Alan: I mean, you know, some people are using the S word and they say, ”Oh, we would love to hear Angelina Jordan do scat”, which was the feature of, a Billie holiday or an Ella Fitzgerald which is a variation of jazz. You can also say it’s a jazz variation when you can’t remember the words.

Pontus: Okay. That’s good.

Alan: You know, the nature of jazz it’s completely, completely spontaneous. It’s not planned, it’s free form and free flow. That is why we are constantly surprised because when you hear someone who is very, very advanced in the field of jazz, It’s really, really difficult to anticipate. The inability to anticipate jazz is why we are continually, I think I have to use the word, renewed. We are renewed when we hear the music.

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Pontus: We all have our different sort of tastes in music. Before Angelina anyway, I loved listening to Adele.
And also Sting is one of my favorites, and this French singer called Myléne Farmer, which I also very much enjoy. And I still do of course, but in a way it’s like Angelina has ruined it for me a little bit there. And, I tend to think about her when I listen to other music. I don’t know how you feel?

Alan: Well, it’s sort of like if you live in a cave for 10 years and then you live in a nice house, suddenly you can’t really go back to the cave.
I don’t know if that’s a fair image, but, you understand what I mean? You know, sometimes we get accustomed to either a higher standard and then it puts the past into a different perspective.

Pontus: It will be interesting to see the fans reaction to this crazy idea.

Alan: No, no, but please don’t use the word crazy. It’s not an accurate word. if you want to use the C word, use the word creative, not the word crazy.

Pontus: That’s a good word. I will use that instead. Okay. Thank you, Alan. Thank you.

Alan: Okay.