It must have been love
| It Must Have Been Love (Christmas for the Broken Hearted) |
|
|---|---|
| Roxette | |
| publication | November 23, 1987
June 9, 1990 |
| length | 4:18 |
| Genre (s) | pop |
| text | Per Gessle |
| music | Per Gessle |
| album | Pretty Woman soundtrack |
It Must Have Been Love is a ballad by the Swedish pop duo Roxette , which was awarded gold in various European countries as well as in the United States and is still one of their best-selling and best-known singles . Both the text and the composition are by Per Gessle , who put the song on the market in 1987 in his home country with the title Christmas for the Broken Hearted . Outside of Sweden, however, the song only became an international music hit in 1990 after it was re-released as part of the very successful soundtrack to the comedy film Pretty Woman , with a slightly changed line of text .
In 2005, Per Gessle received a special award from the US music company BMI after the song had been played more than four million times on US radio stations.
First published in 1987
For the first time It Must Have Been Love (Christmas For The Broken Hearted) , the original title, released in the course of 1987, after EMI Germany Roxette asked for the composition of an intelligent Christmas Song. Although the single made it to number 4 on the hit list in Sweden, EMI decided not to release the song in Germany or any other country.
This original version was not to be found on any Roxette album until 1997, before it appeared as a bonus track in the re-release of the album Pearls of Passion . The song Turn to Me , which filled the B-side of the record single of Christmas For The Broken Hearted at the time, is also featured as a bonus track on this album.
Second publication in 1990
Due to the successful chart placements of the singles from the Look Sharp! -Albums, Touchstone Pictures approached Roxette and their record label EMI with the request to contribute a song to the soundtrack for a romantic comedy in the making that was to be released in the US in the spring of 1990 under the title Pretty Woman . The film starring Richard Gere and the then largely unknown Julia Roberts became an international hit, grossing more than $ 460 million worldwide.
Per Gessle decided to offer the almost three-year-old recording of It Must Have Been Love , as Roxette had no freedom to write and record a new piece due to the tour through Australia and New Zealand that was taking place at the time . Gessle and his producer Clarence Öfwerman took the original version from 1987, had Marie Fredriksson replace a line of songs to relieve it of Christmas and added some instrumentation and new vocal background overlays to enrich the sound. The B-side of the record single contained the song Paint , which was part of the album Look Sharp! was taken.
The song did not appear on any studio album released by Roxette other than the Pretty Woman Original Sound Track and was only featured on the 1995 greatest hits album Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus! represented.
Released in 1993, alternate versions in 1993 and 2012
During Roxette's world tour in 1993, a modified version of the song was re-recorded in a Los Angeles studio to support sales of the recently released Joyride album . This slow country version , in which the piano solo was replaced by a steel guitar solo , is featured on the 1992 tour album Tourism: Songs from Studios, Stages, Hotelrooms & Other Strange Places .
A re-release of the 1990 version hit the UK Top 10 again in September 1993 after Pretty Woman first aired on non-private British television.
For the 1996 album Baladas En Español , Roxette finally recorded a version in Spanish . The resulting song No sé si es amor ( I don't know if it's love ) with a text translated into Spanish by Luis G. Escolar was finally released as a single in Mexico in 1997.
In 2012 Roxette recorded a new studio version of the song with orchestra accompaniment for their ninth studio album Traveling .
Music video
The video for It Must Have Been Love was shot in a darkened warehouse with only the windows lit from the outside. Fredriksson moves through the scenery alternately in a red and white dress or lies on a bed while she is accompanied by Gessle with the guitar and at times with the piano. The scenery is interrupted by various sequences from the film Pretty Woman . In the booklet of the greatest hits album Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus! In addition to the lyrics, personal comments by Gessle and Fredriksson are printed on the individual songs. This is how Marie Fredriksson relates:
“… The video was a weird experience. The director wanted all movements in slow motion so I had to lip sync the vocals in double speed. My first lesson in how to sing an emotional ballad Mickey Mouse style. A strange way to make a living. "
“… The video was a strange experience. The director wanted all movements to be in slow motion so that I had to move my lips at double speed in sync with the singing. My first experience of singing an emotional Mickey Mouse style ballad. A strange way of making a living. "
There is also an alternative version of the video without the cut-in film scenes, which appeared in 1991 on the official clip compilation Roxette The Videos as VHS video and as a laser disc .
content
Unlike stylistically similar ballads that have an emerging or existing romance about, describes It must have been love, (but it's over now) ( It must be love before, but now it is over ) with melancholic words being lost on the first Day after the end of a love affair. The original version speaks of a Christmas day, for use in the film Pretty Woman , which appeared in spring, the action space was generally moved to winter time by adding a line towards the end of the second verse of "It's a hard Christmas Day". modified into "it's a hard winter's day" . In keeping with its melancholy text, the song in the film also accompanies a scene in which the two main actors decided to split up for a short time.
Chart successes
Achievements and Awards
Although the lyrics describe a lonely winter day after a broken relationship, It Must Have Been Love became an international hit in the summer of 1990 of all places. The song was not the first release from the Pretty Woman soundtrack, but it became the best-selling single from the very successful album. He spent a total of two weeks alone, from June 16 to 29, 1990, at number 1 on the Hot 100 in the USA and ultimately surpassed the mark of 500,000 copies sold.
In England the single was also released in June 1990 and reached 3rd place in the UK charts, Roxette's best position on the island until then, where it lasted 14 weeks. The re-release in September 1993 reached tenth place again and stayed on the hit list for a whole eight weeks. In addition, the song made it to the top position in the singles chart of Norway, Poland and Spain. In Australia, he became Roxette's second No.1 and held the top position for two weeks in July 1990. He also reached 4th place in Germany, where he stayed in the top 50 for 6 months, as well as the top 5 in Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands and the group's home country, Sweden.
The album for the film was awarded triple platinum by the RIAA and sold over nine million copies worldwide. The song also received gold in Germany, Austria, Sweden, the United States and silver in the United Kingdom.
Chart placements
| Charts | Top ranking | Weeks |
|---|---|---|
| Chart placements | ||
 Germany (GfK)
|
4th (36 weeks) | 36 |
 Austria (Ö3)
|
3 (20 weeks) | 20th |
 Sweden (GLF)
|
4th (15 weeks) | 15th |
 Switzerland (IFPI)
|
1 (32 weeks) | 32 |
 United States (Billboard)
|
1 (25 weeks) | 25th |
 United Kingdom (OCC)
|
3 (14 weeks) | 14th |
Contributors
The following people played a key role in the creation of this piece:
1987
|
1990
|
Cover versions
När kärleken föds
The Swedish pop singer Shirley Clamp brought in April 2006, a version of It Must Have Been Love out in the Swedish language, entitled När kärleken föds ( If love is born ) wore and Place 6 of the Swedish single charts reached. However, the song did not contain any reference to Christmas, other holidays or certain seasons.
More cover versions
- Shirley Bassey released her version of the song in 1995 on the Sings the Movies album .
- The Mexican singer Rocío Banquells brought out an acoustic version for her 1991 album Escucha el infinito .
- The 2002 album Standstill by the punk rock band Polly Esther also includes a cover version of this song.
- In 2004 a cover of the song was released by the British group Friday Night Posse (aka Dancing DJs) featuring Soraya.
- The British pop duo Journey South took an acoustic version of It Must Have Been Love on on their eponymous album in 2006.
- The song was released in a Spanish version by the Australian band Aleks and The Ramps on their album Pisces Vs Aquarius .
- The German music project Get Well Soon under singer Konstantin Gropper covered the song in 2008.
- The Norwegian singer Maria Mena covered him in 2008 and released the piece as a bonus track via iTunes UK for her fourth studio album Cause and Effect .
- The Swedish duo First Aid Kit and Maja Francis covered the song on the occasion of the memory of the recently deceased singer Marie Fredriksson at the Musikhjälpen 2019.
Web links
- Roxette.se , official website (English)
- Planet Roxette , comprehensive fansite (German)
- Official music video on YouTube
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Interactive Roxette Discography . roxdisco.narod.ru. Retrieved March 4, 2012.
- ↑ a b Interactive Roxette Discography . roxdisco.narod.ru. Retrieved March 4, 2012.
- ↑ 2005 BMI awards. . bmi.com. Retrieved March 4, 2012.
- ↑ a b c d e Sven Lindstrøm: Dont Bore Us - Get To The Chorus! (Greatest Hits album notes). (No longer available online.) Pergessle.net, archived from the original on April 3, 2012 ; Retrieved May 23, 2012 .
- ↑ Box Office Mojo's page on Pretty Woman . Box Office Mojo. Retrieved May 23, 2012.
- ↑ Roxette - Tourism ID: 733574 (CD, EMI Svenska AB) . music collector. Retrieved April 7, 2012.
- ↑ Roxette - No Se Si Es Amor (It Must Have Been Love) . Retrieved April 7, 2012.
- ↑ Roxette Official Website / Lyrics . Archived from the original on March 4, 2012. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved March 4, 2012.
- ↑ It Must Have Been Love in the Official UK Charts (English)
- ↑ a b c Song artist 92 - Roxette . tsort.info. Retrieved March 24, 2012.
- ↑ Pretty Woman's soundtrack RIAA multi platinum award . www.riaa.com. Retrieved March 23, 2012.
- ↑ Roxette's biography . www.sonofaplumber.com/www.roxette.se. Archived from the original on February 13, 2012. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved May 23, 2012.
- ↑ Gold / platinum database . www.musikindustrie.de. Retrieved March 23, 2012.
- ↑ IFPI Austria - Gold & Platinum . ifpi.at. Retrieved March 17, 2012.
- ↑ guld-platina-1987-1998 (PDF) ifpi.se. Archived from the original on May 21, 2012. Retrieved March 17, 2012.
- ↑ Roxette's RIAA single & album certifications . www.riaa.com. Retrieved March 23, 2012.
- ↑ Certified Awards Search . www. bpi.co.uk. Retrieved March 24, 2012.
- ↑ Roxette - It Must Have Been Love Chart placement Germany. GfK Entertainment , accessed on June 3, 2018 .
- ↑ Roxette - It Must Have Been Love Chart placement Austria. In: Austriancharts.at. Hung Medien, accessed June 3, 2018 .
- ↑ Roxette - It Must Have Been Love Chart placement Sweden. Swedish Music Charts , accessed June 3, 2018 .
- ↑ Roxette - It Must Have Been Love Chart placement Switzerland. In: Hitparade.ch. Hung Medien, accessed June 3, 2018 .
- ↑ Roxette - It Must Have Been Love Chart placement United States. Billboard , accessed June 3, 2018 .
- ^ Roxette - It Must Have Been Love Charthistory United Kingdom. Official Charts Company , accessed June 3, 2018 .
- ↑ Discogs Roxette-It Must Have Been Love (Christmas For The Broken Hearted) . Retrieved March 4, 2012.
- ↑ Discogs Roxette-It Must Have Been Love . Retrieved March 4, 2012.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i coverinfo.de . Retrieved March 4, 2012.
