The Confusions are from Sweden...

Must be something about spending a lot of time around snow or fjords but the Swedes sure do produce some fine pop music. There is of course Abba, which I imagine every swedish band since has resented to some degree, The Cardigans come to mind as well and The Legends, who made one of my favorite albums of 2004. Then there's Aners Celsius who's responsible for the scale of atmospheric measurement that we in America try so hard to ignore (what do we have against European systems of measurement anyway?). Anyway, I could spend all day regressing into a listing of all that is great about Sweden (we could start with this randomly googled beauty named Kathleen) but what I'm really here to talk about are The Confusions. You probably haven't heard of these guys here in the states, but in Sweden, Japan and much of Europe they've been making quality guitar based pop music since about 1993. Their sound reminds me a bit of mid career U2 and even the last Snow Patrol album. It's very pop. They've made few inroads into the US listening audience despite an very warm reception at SXSW in 2000. I'm not even sure if any of their albums have been released state side. It's a shame because their sound would be well received by the indie-rock crowd. I really don't think The Killers have a thing on these guys. They don't rock quite as hard as my beloved Legends, but what they do is pretty damn catchy even if it feels slightly pedestrian at times (though nowhere near as pedestrian as the Killers, come on there's really nothing special about those guys).

They have an album coming out in 2005, these 2 songs are taken from a forthcoming (March, I think) EP "Don't Let The World Catch You Crying" that's a result of those sessions:

Don't Let The World Catch You Crying

Younger Than Yesterday

Purchase at will HERE