Things are moving fast now.
Yesterday Johanna was in the papers, the article from TT Spektra is out.
The article has so far been published in the two Stockholm papers City and Metro but it will probably show up in other papers too in the next few days.

We just got word from Jon Landau management that they turned down our request for an interview, but we’re not giving up.

On Thursday next week we go to Gothenburg for the show. It’s really exciting, we’re keen on seeing the concert and meeting the fans. There’s going to be a few busy days until next weekend, but a whole lot of fun too!

Today our project took another step when Johanna was interviewed by TT Spektra.
TT Spektra is a Swedish news agency that produce articles that local papers all over the country can buy.

This feature article will be available from the next week, but it will probably be published in papers close to Springsteen’s two concerts in Sweden on July 23rd and 25th.

We talked a lot about why Swedes love Springsteen’s music so much, what the fans will say if E Street Band is dissolved, who the typical fan is and if you feel like a minority if you are a female fan. We didn’t really talk so much about our film, but the phenomenon of Springsteen.

It was very interesting and a lot of fun. It turned out that the reporter, Erik Helmerson, had been a big Brucefan, but after the BITUSA album he got fed up with the partyrocking bodypumping Bruce and he hadn’t listened to the music since.

We are also in negotiations with SVT, the Swedish national television, about our film. They are interested in the material, but now we have to decide how to proceed. Shall we finish the film on our own or try to get the television company to be our coproducer? We hope for the best and that we’ll get the money we need to finish the project.

In eight days it’s time for the first of the two Swedish concerts on the Devils & Dust-tour. We plan to be in Gothenburg to film and then get back to Stockholm as fast as we can to prepare for the show at Hovet.

There is going to be a gathering at a nearby pub before the concert, we plan to meet our fans there and film. After the show we will host a big party for the fans in a cosy cellar vault in the Old Town. We will show our pilot film and do some more shooting. Read more about the party at this address

We’re busy planning and organizing everything for next week, but stay tuned with us here and you’ll know more about how everything is proceeding.

Two days ago we had our promoparty in a cellar vault in the Old Town.
Mikael had come from Västervik and we spent many busy hours arranging everything for the big night.

This included carrying loudspeakers and other musical equipment across the cobblestones of Old Town. It was hard on our backs, but we made it. Our biggest thanks to Staffan who let us borrow it!

Then Johanna went to meet Hans Ludvigsson who came by car from Jönköping to play for us. Since most of the streets in Old Town are very narrow or oneway, it’s very tricky to drive there. Of course we took the wrong turn, so we spent a lot of time before we finally came to the right address.

But it was really worth all the effort when people started coming. It was so nice to see everybody eating pizza, having a good chat and just enjoying themselves.

Then we showed our pilot film and it was much appreciated. “It should have been longer”, “we want to see more”, were some of the comments we got. That sure was good to hear after all the effort we’ve spent on it!

Then Ludde came on stage and did a few extremely good solo versions of some of our most loved Brucesongs. Drive all Night, Devils&Dust and All I’m Thinking About got some loud cheers. The crowd didn’t want to let him off stage!
But after a lot of laughs, good talking and great music it was time to close our eyes and say good bye. When the time had passed midnight the last our guests left.

Me and my boyfriend Carl spent a few hours on packing everything and cleaning up the cellar vault. I just want to take the time to thank him, if it wasn’t for his contacts and all his work we never would have been able to arrange this party. Thank you, baby!

The first Candy’s Room turned out to be a good night, though we could have had more guests than the twentysome that came. I hope you guys will be there next time!

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It’s only two days until the opening night for Candy’s Room.
the past few days have been very busy, we’ve applied for money from Film i Västerbotten and it was a hard job getting all the papers ready. But now it’s done!

The rest of the time I’ve spent writing a press release, contacting the media about the event and arranging all the stuff we need for the party.

Hopefully we’ll get everything ready in time!

The past few days have been busy. I’ve been working a lot with Candy’s Room, organizing the party, making sure we have all the equipment, updating webbsites and writing pressreleases.

But I got a nice break when I got a phonecall. It was journalist Anders Mårtensson who wanted an interview about our film.

Anders is based in Hässleholm, but with photographer Jörgen Johansson he has been interviewing a lot of musicians on the Jersey shore. This has resulted in the book Local Heroes, Asbury Park, NJ which will be published in Sweden August 25th to celebrate the 30 year releasedate of Bruce Springsteens record Born to Run.

When Anders and Jörgen was in Jersey to do all the interviews, they got a good contact with the Asbury Park Press. The American journalists are much interested in why Springsteen’s music hits home with the Swedish audience, and asked him to write something about it. Anders is going to review Springsteen’s shows in Sweden and write about the swedes love for Bruce at the same time. He figured it would be intresting to write about our film project, so he called me.

We talked about the progress of our film, what we aim to capture, when the documentary will be finished and when we’re going to Jersey. We also talked about the devotion Springsteen shows in concert, his ability to tell stories that people can identify with, no matter what nationality they have and who the typical Brucefan is.

It was a lot of fun and the article will be published in the Asbury Park Press on June 25th.

We are all looking forward to read it!

The plans for our Club Candy’s Room are ready.

Thursday May 19th we’ll open the gates to the party which will be held at Själagårdsgatan 21 in Gamla stan, Stockholm.

7 p.m. Welcome to the party!
Chat with your friends, have a snack and listen to good music.

8 p.m Viewing of our film
We show our pilote film, present our documentary and there will be time for Q & A afterwards.

9 p.m Live music
Hans Ludvigsson plays Bruce covers.
Sometime during the evening a lottery with nice Brucerelated prices will be held.

24 p.m Good night!

See you all there!

Yesterday me and my friend Ingela, who is visiting in Stockholm, went to the Dreamfactory, a mini festival about film and filmmaking.

It started out very nicely, when Calle my boyfriend called a cab, it proved to be Morgan, a Brucefan that Mikael and I had interviewed for the film, who was behind the wheel. Morgan works as a taxidriver and now he took us to Filmhuset for the festival party.

There were a lot of people there and we soon started talking and mingling. I took a flyer for our film project and walked straight up to Leif Pagrotsky, the swedish minister for Culture. I handed him the flyer and told him a bit about our film and how we try to get an interview with Bruce.

– Why don’t you meet him when he comes here?, the secretary asked.
– We’re trying to arrange an interview, if we don’t get one when he comes here, we’ll try to stop by New Jersey when we go to Nashvill to interview Garry Tallent, the bass player in E Street Band. By the way, do you know how we can finance our film?
-Try the Swedish Film Institute.
– Ok, but do you have any other suggestions?
– The department of culture only hands out the money to the big institutions, I don’t have the names of them all, you’d have to search for them yourself.
– Thanks!

As the evening passed by I also met Mattias and Mathilde, we practise karate together and they proved to be in the film business too. Perhaps we can arrange a joint venture, we need a cameraman and a sound technician for the US-trip, and Mattias was interested in working as a cameraman. We also invited them to party with us at Candy’s Room in May.

We also met with Per Holm, he’s a consultant for Film i Västerbotten. Per knows Ingela well, because he’s financing her film.
Here you can read more about Film i Västerbotten and their work.
Per proved to be a devoted Brucefan too, and we talked a lot about our film, the music, our plans, and the interview with Mr. Tallent. He wanted to see our storyboard, budget and know more about our film. It sounds very promising, and maybe we’ll be able to get some financing from Film i Västerbotten!

We had a truly wonderful night at the party, we did a lot of networking and hopefully it will really benefit our film!

We’ve got good news!
We have confirmed an interview with E Street Band-member Garry Tallent! All we have to do now is raise the cash for a trip to Nashville, with a stop in New Jersey too.

To get some money into our project we have decided to launch a club evening here in Stockholm.

Thursday May 19th, at seven o’clock pm we open the gates to Candy’s Room.

We’ve rented a cool place at Gamla stan, at Själagårdsgatan 21, a cellar vault where we’re going to play live music. Hans Ludvigsson has agreed to come from Jönköping for a solo accoustic performance, playing Bruce covers. There will also be time to mingle, listen to albums with Bruce, Miami Steve, Nils Lofgren and Southside Johnny, have a beer and talk to other Brucefans.

We will of course show our pilote film and all the money we raise will be used for our trip to Nashville.

So if you want to join the party, send an e-mail to jatack@candysroom.se
Entrancefee if you pay in advance is 75 SEK, if you pay in the door it’s 100 SEK. But don’t forget to e-mail us that you’re coming even if you’re arriving on Thursday, we need your name on the guestlist!

We’ve been catching our breath after a few hard days of work.
After the ticket sale was announced, Mikael and I had a hard time getting our hands on a camera, but we managed to borrow one mini-DV from Svante, a friend of my boyfriend’s. Thanks to Svante we had the equipment so we could film during the ticket sale.

I got to the Globe arena early Sunday morning, got myself a numer for the line, and then I started waiting for Mikael. He was going to hitchhike from Västervik on Saturday, but he got stuck so he didn’t arrive until Sunday morning. I was a bit worried then…

When I had to leave for work, a friend took my place in the line. Mikael spent the day filming and talking to our fellow Brucefriends. Though there are a lot of waiting, you seldom get bored. You talk to friends, discuss every angle of Bruce’s music, have a snack or a nap, go to McDonald’s to get out of the wind, listen to some good music, and suddenly the hours have passed by without you noticing it.

We had a lovely time in the line, though it was a bit windy. But the night went all right and in the morning everybody was on their toes. The line was organized perfectly, nobody managed to sneak through and we all got our tickets.

Before the sale started we filmed, and I took some still photos. Several tv-stations were there to shoot, newspaper- and radiojournalists were also there to interview people in line. We both got good tickets for the show, as did most of our friends. It was fun to be able to shoot during the time people was waiting, some had been there as early as six days before the sale went on!

Hopefully the material we got is good, and we also hope we got some attention for our film. We had printed a lot of flyers for the project that we handed out to everybody in the line. Now we’re facing more work with the budget, raising money, organizing a sponsor party, showing our pilot film and contacting the tv-networks. But it’s fun and we really hope that we pull this one through!

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Today it’s official. Ticketrelease for Bruce Springsteen’s two concerts in Sweden will take place om Monday, April 18th.

Already fans have gathered around the Globe arena, to stand in line for tickets. Hopefully we’re going to make our way there too, to take pictures, film and talk to the fans.

We’re a bit jumpy too, you can only buy two tickets per person, so it’s going to take som effort to get a hold of one. Not even we are sure we’re going to make it.

We wish all the fans the best of luck in their tickethunt – we’ll see you around!