After being asked to perform A-ha’s The Sun Always Shines on TV for a play in Germany, Uma E became hooked. The anthem of the Norwegian trio, first released in 1985, was a success back then, but it still sounds perfectly good today. However, Uma E wanted to twist it and make it her own, adapting it to her style and musical identity. Today, she’s releasing her own take on it. And we couldn’t be happier about it: it’s cinematic, dramatic, and mesmerising. Have a listen!
Speaking of how her new song The Sun Always Shines on TV came to be, Uma E explains: “I worked in the theatre play Touch by Falk Richter in Germany at Münchner Kammerspiele during the pandemic. I was asked to perform the A-ha song, The Sun Always Shines on TV, and it started off quite close to the original. I realised after a while I wanted to express the song in a different way to make it feel right. I got very attached to this song and the lyrics as it was a song I heard a lot growing up. I felt that I wanted to express it more like a poem – slower and more intimate.”
With the help of her producer, Don Gog, the versatile Swedish singer and performer transformed that ‘80s song into a six-minute trip-hop track featuring her recognisable hazy vocals. This new stripped back cover blends a grainy synth bass, pounding kick drums and industrial soundscapes that takes listeners to another dimension, where they can float in an atmospheric and ethereal sound. The end result is, indeed, like a dream.
Speaking of that process, Ulriqa Fernqvist aka Uma E says: “Me and my producer Don Gog started to experiment with what that change could be. It developed to what we came to call ‘a techno prayer’ and we started building this track with the idea that it was to be performed in this play. Later we reworked that version to make it more like a track without the theatrical context - even though those memories still live in the track. The challenging thing with the vocals was to keep it very fragile and honest even if we wanted the music to have this constant rise. It was also very interesting to blend the electronica with elements from techno.”