The singles

The story

This is the story about my third album, “Player Characters”.

In the summer of 2023 I thought to myself (again): “I really should publish my songs. Because they are good songs!”.

Indeed, I have written songs already since 1994. But after several projects with several producers, I just couldn’t articulate how I wanted my music to sound. So I continued to wait, hoping someone would come along that could make my music soar.

And then in autumn 2023 it happened: I met Juho, the producer of “Player Characters” , probably introduced to me by the Instagram algorithm.

So I asked him: “Juho, let’s make a song!”. He agreed.

And after I heard the first version of the first song we made together (it must have been “Ordinary Day”), I knew I had met the right person.

Juho really has been able to make my music reach the heights I always wanted it to.

Juho, if you are reading this: I am forever grateful for your professionalism, attention to detail and creativity. You are the magic behind the songs. Wouldn’t be here without you.

The concept

As we started working, I laid out the overall plan: this was to be an album about dualism.

I wanted each of the nine songs to tell about a character that’s not exactly good or bad, or right or wrong. And, if they on the surface looked like one, I wanted the different elements of the songs to “blur the evidence”.

So if it was a happy song, the lyrics had to deal with a serious topic. If it was a moody track, somewhere there had to be a promise of better days ahead. If there was a historical reference, it had to be set in modern times. And so on.

Also, to know each of the nine characters of the album, you’d have to listen to their story, but your perspective would change depending on whether you observed the character before the song, during the song or after the song, because their story continued.

So the lyrics might say “In the bar he’s waiting for you”, which gives you the impression that you’re meeting someone you know. But, it turns out that someone is the Devil himself. But, it also turns out the main character has arranged the whole thing. So, they’re on a mission. But is it for good or bad, we don’t know – and that’s the interesting thing. The open ending.

Singles by release date

Let me walk you through the songs. On the top of this page the singles are listed in the order I have planned them for the album. Below they are listed in the order they were released. YOU, of course, can listen to them in any order you want, because each of them is an individual work of art 🙂

World Renewed

An ordinary person meets someone exciting in a nightclub only to realise he’s the Devil himself. But this was all pre-arranged.

Release date 6.9.2024

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He Who Walks Behind The Rows

The members of a blood cult in a rural village sing about their two gods who keep on demanding sacrifices

Release date 18.10.2024

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Landscape Fantasy

A human-like robot girl pop trio develops existential feelings in a dystopian party city that treats them like machines

Release date 22.11.2024

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Ordinary Day

A celebrity housewife learns a secret about her marriage and drops everything for a new life in Brazil

Release date 27.12.2024

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Ancient Manager

A senior corporate manager is doomed to sail the dangerous business markets, but manages to take the company back to green together with other Ancient Managers

Release date 28.1.2025

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Red And Blue

A female secret agent in a big city dreams of a quiet life on the countryside with a family, but is turned into one of the bad guys after an accident

Released 4.3.2025

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All These Worlds Are Yours

A frustrated social media influencer starts basing their brand on biblical phenomena to gain global and then universal popularity

Release date 8.4.2025

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Stand By You

The history of mankind in three minutes from an agrarian society to joining the stream of other races in the universe

Release date 16.5.2025

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Lover Costing Average

An investor playboy maintains multiple intimate relationships to see which of them starts working out the best

Release date 20.6.2025

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Why all this?

The concept of “Player Characters” is dualism and that is interesting to me, because we’re living in a post-normal age.

There, the world is not black and white anymore. It’s painted with an infinite number of different greys.

I realised this when I read the megatrend report by Sitra.

What was especially interesting was that not only had they formulated the latest megatrends, they had also identified three metatrends, the trends behind the trends:

1. First, we’re living in the post-normal age, where things we believed would never happen, happened – and then some! We have a hard time making sense of the world, because it’s too complex, contradictory and chaotic for any one person to comprehend.
2. This leads to people increasingly dealing with things with strong emotions, because our brains simply do not have the cognitive capacity to process everything in this world of conflicting information. Our brains seek simple answers to complex problems and we get frustrated, because there are none.
3. Finally, we live in a hyperconnected world, but increasingly feel isolation and loneliness. And while the amount and availability of information has grown, it has not caused greater understanding.

This is the world where “Player Characters” are living.

I do hope you enjoy the songs!

The album is available as “Player Characters” playlist in Spotify and as individual singles in other streaming services.

Thank you for listening and reading!