Ola Salo | |
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 Salo in 2007 | |
| Background information | |
| Birth name | Rolf Ola Anders Svensson |
| Born | 19 February 1977 |
| Origin | Avesta, Sweden |
| Genres | |
| Occupation(s) | Singer songwriter keyboardist |
| Instrument(s) | Vocals, piano, guitar, harmonica |
| Years active | 1991–present |
| Labels | Roxy |
Ola Salo (born Rolf Ola Anders Svensson; 19 February 1977) is a Swedish rock musician, lead vocalist of Swedish glam rock band The Ark.
He was born in Avesta, Dalarna County, in the Dalarna province of Sweden, and raised in Rottne, a locality in Växjö Municipality, Kronoberg County, Småland province, when he was a child. It was just there that in 1991 he and his friends "Jepson" and "Leari" officially founded what would be their band The Ark.
Ola Salo and the other members of the band had an international breakthrough in 2000 with the album We Are The Ark, whose second single was the signature song "It Takes a Fool to Remain Sane" (for which Salo won a Grammis for "Song of the Year"), a song the musician wrote after watching the Danish film Idioterne ("The Idiots"). [ citation needed ]
In October 2006, during a party celebrating the new Swedish embassy in Washington, D.C., The Ark was performing on stage. As a plane was flying very low overhead Salo said "In this country, you don't know where those planes are headed. Well, this one seems to be heading in the right direction anyway..." meaning the airport, but then suddenly adding "...to the White House", which happened to be in that direction. [1]
This caused controversy as many newspapers reported that Salo had "wished an airplane to crash into the White House". Salo later said that it was a bad joke, "totally unserious way of being cheeky toward the White House" and not a political statement. [2] [3] The band ended up cancelling almost its entire U.S. tour. [4]
On 10 March 2007, Salo and his band The Ark won Melodifestivalen 2007 and went on to represent Sweden in the Eurovision Song Contest 2007 with the song "The Worrying Kind", with whom they arrive 18th with 51 points. [5]
In 2008, Salo translated Andrew Lloyd Webber's Jesus Christ Superstar into Swedish for a performance in Malmö where he played the role of Jesus, and as a result he stated that "2008 will be a very quiet year" for The Ark [6] after a hectic 2007 with the Eurovision Song Contest of that year and the release of Prayer for the Weekend. In 2009 Salo featured on the Empire Dogs' album, Come On You Preachers. [7]
In 2015 he released his solo studio album, Wilderness. In 2018, he participated in the first season of Stjärnornas stjärna on TV4.
In 2019, Salo opened his headline residency It takes a fool to remain sane in the Rondo of Liseberg amusement Park, in Gothenburg, directed by Edward af Sillén. [8]
Salo is openly bisexual. [9] On November 27, 2009 he married his girlfriend Anneli Pekula, who gave him two children, in 2010 and in 2015.
| Year | Album | Peak positions | Certification |
|---|---|---|---|
| SWE [10] | |||
| 2015 | Wilderness | 2 |
Neal Joseph Schon is an American musician and songwriter, best known as the co-founder and lead guitarist for the rock band Journey. He is the last original member to remain throughout the group's history. He was a member of the rock band Santana before forming Journey. He was also a member of the group Bad English during Journey's hiatus from 1987 to 1995, as well as an original member of Hardline.
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Christos Dantis, is a Greek multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, lyricist, and record producer best known for his hits such as "To Palio Mou Palto" and "Ena Tragoudi Akoma" and later for co-writing the song "My Number One" for Elena Paparizou, winning the Eurovision Song Contest 2005 for Greece.
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The Ark are a Swedish glam rock band formed in 1991 and disbanded in 2011. They released five studio albums and became one of the most successful groups in Scandinavia. They made their breakthrough in 2000 with the song "It Takes a Fool to Remain Sane", and since then several hit songs followed; they reunited in 2020.
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We Are the Ark was released on 25 September 2000 and is the debut studio album from Swedish glam rock group The Ark. The album was both a critical and commercial success, spawning four singles.
In Lust We Trust is the second album by Swedish glam rock band the Ark, released on 26 August 2002. Four singles were released from the album: "Calleth You, Cometh I", "Father of a Son", "Tell Me This Night Is Over" and "Disease".
Ola Nils Håkan Svensson is a Swedish artist and songwriter, known professionally by the mononym Ola until 2014, and as Brother Leo from 2018 to present. Born in Lund, Skåne, his career began in 2005, when he finished eighth on season two of Swedish Idol. Since then, Ola has released four studio albums. Eleven of his singles have reached the top five on the Swedish singles chart, with six achieving number one, and nine attaining gold and platinum certifications. After being signed to Universal Music for many years, Ola founded his own record label Oliniho Records for the Swedish market, keeping distribution arrangements with Sony Music in Europe and internationally. Following a four-year break, he returned in 2018, recording under the stage name Brother Leo for Columbia Records.
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"It Takes a Fool to Remain Sane" is a song recorded and performed by Swedish rock band The Ark, published as the second single of their debut studio album We Are the Ark, released in 2000. It was a hit in Sweden and Italy. The song was also awarded a Grammis for being the "song of the year".
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