I guess you could call this an opening statement, but we’re sat here together with Memorial Beach filling in the silence, deep in thought and discussion about the last eight years spent supporting a-ha. All four of us feel such an overwhelming sense of being completely misunderstood and an intense feeling of being badly reperesented.
It’s 1993 and all we have been hearing is that a-ha don’t want to be pop puppets anymore and it’s said as though it was us who wanted that, as though it was us who have kept the band engulfed by the teen hysteria and superficial speak. It hurts and we are angry because hand on heart, if anyone has lived for a-ha’s music it’s us and this will be just a little something for us to put the record straight about our involvement with a-ha - as fans and once said, this shall be the only personal mention any of us will ever have in this magazine.
A-HA - I guess this is addressed to you, but it is a chance for the four of us to take a stand, our chance to prove to other fans, but especially you a-ha, that not all fans are totally consumed by your wiggles Morten, your fictitious happy go lucky air Magne, or your shy, sweet smile Pål! There are fans who no longer want to be tarnished with the same brush, those of us who are tired of being blamed for the pop phenomena you have been chained to, who wonder if it wouldn’t have been more beneficial for you and us serious fans if you had gone towards success from a different angle. There are among us fans who went along to those hysterical 1986 dates and stood angrily in disbelief at the deafening yells of people who ruined the show because we couldn’t hear the music and never understood why you were labelled a pop band when your music was always so much more.
‘Memorial Beach’ has a new sound, but it is one that we have been on our knees praying for for several years - who saw the potential and have enjoyed the progressional strive to reach it. Can’t you understand that there are fans out here - like us, who don’t want you to be pop heroes, teen gods or sex symbols. We want you to be yourselves, plain old Pål Magne and Morten and sure we want to know more about how you make music, the minds behind it and the characters who have touched our lives, but we don’t really give a shit what you have for breakfast, what you do in Norway over Christmas or what you wear beneath your jeans. Music first and always the most important thing.
Eight years is a long time however to support you without the ability to just say ‘hello’ - you are not the elite, untouchable, men above all other humans. To us you are musicians, dreamers, lovers and creators - three ordinary men just trying to make a living the only way they know how and in a way they can enjoy.
We are no longer teenagers. We are 20-24 and have a varied musical taste with a larger love for yours, but you must forgive us our interest, because like it or not, eight years on, when we look at you, we see more than image and looks. When we look at you, we are not just women, we are critics, philosophers, psycho-analysts and believers.
For us it does hurt when you look at us with scorn and contempt. But our emotion and passion for those five studio albums and your live performances ensures - luckily for you - that as snobby, arrogant, condescending and hateful as you can appear, you can never destroy a true fans devotion to the music.