I have waited for this moment for months now. I'm listening to You Have What It Takes right now. Ok so basically for context, a-ha is releasing a new album next month and they made a movie to accompany it. That movie was shown yesterday and of course I went and saw it!
There were only like fifteen people in the cinema, and a surprising number of these people literally arrived halfway through the movie. I'm also pretty sure I was the youngest person in there by a decent amount... but anyway.
The movie was so cool. I wasn't expecting the entire album to be featured in the movie, but I'm pretty sure that all the songs from True North were in there. It was honestly kinda amazing hearing these songs because (I'm gonna explain this really badly) it was like hearing Morten's voice in a different context? Like, this is a-ha but not how I know it. Ghcdyusgvfbi I have no idea how to explain it.
I think a couple of songs stood out to me. Obviously I'm In was like a nice familiar start to the movie and it is a really good song. True North (the song) stood out to me too, plus also Forest For The Trees (which I had heard before too thanks to a kinda sketchy YouTube recording of it). I think those are the ones that stood out the most to me, but I'm sure that once I get to know all the songs I will have more to say about them. Also, Bluest of Blue was pretty cool and definitely gave off a-ha vibes.
I think that a lot of the songs in this album seem like feel-good inspirational lighthearted songs when you first listen to them, but then you realise that they are not. I remember when I'm In was first released, I thought, "wow this is way too lighthearted and inspirational for me" then once I saw the music video my opinion changed very fast. I think that a lot of people think that type of thing about a-ha in general. Like, lots of people just know them as The Take On Me Guys and therefore don't exactly take them seriously. But surprisingly most of a-ha's songs are not at all like Take On Me, some are kinda very dark. Like, The Blood That Moves The Body is pretty dark. I'm also pretty sure one of the versions of the music video for Dark Is The Night For All got banned for being too dark or something. Half of a-ha's later music is just about them being annoyed at each other hahahahaha (Daylights Wasting is an amazing song too by the way, I want to learn guitar just to play that riff).
I think that a-ha did reflect on a lot of important issues in True North (the movie) and presumably also in the songs. Like, climate change is something that a-ha is pretty passionate about and that was definitely evident in the movie. Speaking of which, I really liked how the ocean was a big inspiration for a-ha while they made this album. I also found it really interesting that they were trying to incorporate the history of Norway into the music and film -- like, the fishing stuff.
I do think that the members of a-ha are genuinely good people though. I've said this hundreds of times, but I think that Paul and Mags are sometimes underappreciated. Even though they write most of a-ha's songs they are quite often ignored. I also think that Morten is also underappreciated in a way too -- I feel like he is objectified in a way and people just know him for his good looks or whatever it is that allosexual people say. But he is also a good person who has a really good voice.
Another thing that I liked a lot about True North was the fact that they had like a full-on orchestra there. The orchestra really made the songs sound very powerful and majestic. It also made me notice how much a-ha's music has changed over time. When I was watching True North I felt like I was starting to like a-ha all over again, if that makes sense? It probably doesn't but I tried.
I feel like I haven't talked much about the film itself, so I'm gonna do that now. To be perfectly honest sometimes I didn't understand what was going on in the storyline apart from the a-ha stuff but I think it was meant to be ambiguous? But there was a lot of stuff that didn't get answered -- like, I wanna know why those people were burning down the house? And seriously, WHO DIED?! I think that the non-a-ha storyline was supposed to be open to interpretation but honestly I was expecting more of that storyline to be in the movie. I guess I was hoping for it all to be tied up in a nice little bow in the end, but it wasn't. I mean, it kinda was, but also not. I think I was expecting something similar to Scenes From The Suburbs. I don't know why, but I was. (Scenes From The Suburbs is amazing by the way I might watch it again after I finish writing this review). A lot of the advertising for the movie was the non-a-ha plot so maybe that's why I was expecting it to be more prevalent.
Also that one guy who was surfing must have been so cold oh my goodness. But the Norwegian mountains and oceans and beaches in True North were so amazing. I really wanna go to Norway now. I did before, but even more now.
Anyway, I think that's all I have to say right now... I will probably come back later and add a lot of stuff haha. I'm really hoping that the True North movie becomes available to watch again at some point because I would really like to see it once I get to know all the songs from the album.
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