Peter Morén
The last tycoon
Quarterstick Records/Wichita
The huge success of Peter (Morén) Bjorn and John's "Young folks" did the disservice of casting them as potential one-hit wonders despite a back catalogue of some mighty impressive song crafting. Given this, it's interesting to hear what Peter Morén does on this first solo outing.
The short story is that he goes the singer-songwriter route, creating quiet, intimate, and earnest numbers built on his singing, a warm guitar very well-played, and additional instrumentation ranging from sparse to lush, percussive to orchestral. Some songs evoke the breezy French jazzy lounge sound that gentle Swedish bands do so well (one even finds him singing in French). Others are more straight-ahead pop numbers akin to his work with Peter Bjorn and John.
Morén's voice conveys an appealing honesty and vulnerability, and he's grown considerably as a singer, but in some passages, his songwriting talents stretch further than his voice. The resulting intermittent dopiness and a few too many slow or too-long songs keep "The last tycoon" from being uniformly great, but there are more than enough creative, touching and memorable melodies paired with thoughtful lyrics to affirm his status as one of Sweden's best exports.
- Nancy Baym
