Pearls of Passion

Roxette are a Swedish duo consisting of Marie Fredriksson and Per Gessle, who were both established artists in their home country prior to the duo forming. Gessle had experienced considerable commercial success with his previous band Gyllene Tider, releasing three number one albums in Sweden during the early '80s. When the band broke up in 1984, however, Gessle's solo albums failed to replicate that level of success: 1983's Per Gessle and 1985's Scener both failed commercially.[3] The latter peaked at number 39 on Sverigetopplistan,[4] and sold less than 20,000 copies—a substantial drop from 400,000 copies sold by Gyllene Tider's self-titled debut album five years earlier. Gessle later revealed his contract with EMI Sweden was close to being terminated after the commercial performance of Scener.[3]

Meanwhile, Fredriksson was also signed to EMI Sweden, and had released two commercially successful albums: 1984's Het vind and 1986's Den sjunde vågen, as well as several hit singles. On the advice of Rolf Nygren – the managing director of EMI Sweden – Gessle translated a song called "Svarta glas" ("Black Glass") into English. It was originally written for Pernilla Wahlgren. Nygren then suggested that Gessle record the song as a duet with Fredriksson. This became the duo's first single, "Neverending Love",[3] which peaked at number three on the Swedish Singles Chart.[4] The rest of the album was recorded sporadically throughout the summer of 1986.[3]

Dance Passion, a compilation EP containing seven remixed versions of tracks found on Pearls of Passion, was released in Sweden in 1987, and a further two songs from the album were re-recorded for inclusion on later Roxette albums: CD versions of 1991's Joyride contained a version of "Soul Deep", while Tourism, released the following year, contained an acoustic version of "So Far Away".[2]

Jason Damas from AllMusic gave the album a negative review, rating it one-and-a-half stars out of five and writing: "Nothing here is bad, but it lacks nearly all of the elements that made Look Sharp! and Joyride massive hits just a few years later." He elaborated that "Roxette's most intriguing qualities are that they are a pop band that can rock, and that Per Gessle is a crack songwriter that almost never produces a bad tune. Here, however, there's a lot of indistinguishable dance-pop, and their trademark gritty guitars are completely absent". He went on to say that the album contained three great songs: "Soul Deep", "Neverending Love" and "Secrets That She Keeps", but charactised the rest of the album as being "insignificant, except to the most serious of fans."[1]

The record was an immediate commercial success in Sweden,[1] peaking at number two on the albums chart,[4] and going on to sell over 200,000 copies by the end of 1987.[3] However, it failed to chart internationally.[1] "Neverending Love", "Goodbye to You", "Soul Deep" and "I Call Your Name" were released as singles, with the first three becoming top twenty hits in Sweden.[4] A non-album single, "It Must Have Been Love (Christmas for the Broken Hearted)", was released in December 1987, and became their second top five hit there.[4] The song was later re-recorded – with the reference to Christmas changed to a neutral winter reference ("It's a hard Christmas Day" replaced by "It's a hard winter's day") – and became a substantial international hit after appearing on the soundtrack to the 1990 film Pretty Woman.[5]

Pearls of Passion was remastered and released on CD for the first time eleven years after its original release, on 31 October 1997. Three songs were re-released as promotional singles in selected territories to promote the reissue: "From One Heart to Another" was issued as a promotional single in Brazil, and a slightly remixed version of "I Call Your Name" – "I Call Your Name '97" – was released as an airplay-only single in Spain. EMI Spain also reissued "Neverending Love", to commemorate shipments of over 50,000 units of the album in that country.[2] As of 2001, Pearls of Passion has sold 800,000 copies worldwide.[6]

All lyrics and music written by Per Gessle, except where noted.

Credits adapted from the liner notes of Pearls of Passion.[7]

• Roxette are Per Gessle and Marie Fredriksson
• Recorded at EMI Studios, Stockholm, Sweden
• Remastered by Alar Suurna at Polar Studio, Stockholm (1997 version)
• All songs published by Jimmy Fun Music, except: "Soul Deep" by Happy Accident Music; "From One Heart to Another" by Sweden Music AB; "Voices" and "Turn to Me" by Shock the Music/Jimmy Fun Music

• Pearls of Passion (original) at MusicBrainz
• Pearls of Passion (remastered) at MusicBrainz