Call that snow? Magne Furuholmen is deep in it, in the Norweigian mountains. "There's seven feet of snow outside my window," says A- Ha's guitarist. "It's minus 18 but there's a bright shining sun. I'm up in the cabin and I'm doing all right."
How many homes does he have? "You know, one for every season. You've got to when you're living in Norway."
Odd that he'd choose the cabin in that case, unless replica breitling watches he's a winter chaser. But enough of that, we're here to talk about the end of A- Ha, as the trio have announced their farewell tour.
"It's a perfect symmetrical ending," he says, referring to the 25th anniversary of their debut album Hunting High & Low.
"We've had a fantastic run together but it's a long time to be working with anyone."
But their latest album, last year's Foot Of The Mountain, was a success, reaching No. 5 in the UK and earning critical acclaim. Why stop now? "It's the perfect opportunity to leave the party before you get thrown out."
Though he admits: "It's hard to walk away from any success. But I want to be brave and take steps that offer new and creative challenges."
You can sense from what he says next that not all is rosy in the A-Ha camp.
Thomas sabo charms "It's taking us four years to make records, and it involves a lot of debate and disagreements and it's not always something that comes out feeling like a strong team effort."
He adds: "This is an opportunity to say good bye to our fans while people have a good memory of A-Ha."
Furuholmen, Morten Harket and Paul Waaktaar-Savoy have sold in excess of 35 million albums in the past 25 years. Among their 15 UK Top 10 singles are Hunting High & Low, The Sun Always Shines On TV, Train Of Thought, Cry Wolf, Bond theme The Living Daylights and Take On Me, which reached number 1 in 27 countries.
In 1991, their show at the Maracana Stadium in Rio De Janeiro earned a Guinness World Record for the largest audience attendance at a paid concert - 196,000 people.
The band regrouped in 1998 after a four-year break and enjoyed a new audience, he says.
"It's been gratifying since then to see how the climate around A- Ha has changed, from being a links of london charms nostalgic 80s trip of teenage hysteria to serious music lovers owning up to being closet A-Ha fans."
They include Coldplay, Kanye West, Oasis and U2.
It was during the sabbatical that Furuholmen began working as a visual artist. That's what he'll be doing when the group split at the end of the year.
The farewell tour starts next week in Argentina, before heading to America, Europe, Australia, Russia, Japan and then the UK, ending in Oslo in December.
"Nottingham will be one of the last gigs we play together so, hopefully, it will be quite magical, certainly emotional and special, for us too."
Gig Who A-Ha Where Trent FM Arena When Sunday, November 21 Tickets Pounds 28.50, Pounds 38.50 and Pounds 55, 0844 412 4624 Web
Other articles:
http://www.efcoo.com/blog/more.asp?name=watches2009&id=2233http://www.myfamilymybiz.com/blog/view/id_532/http://www.jzysk.cn/bbs/Blog.asp?BlogUserName=mywatche&menu=ShowBlog&BlogID=293...
