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Travelling XL

After pulling everything together for Travelling, I realised I may have been overly harsh by judging Charm School for only having 39 tracks. I managed to scrounge together 25 tracks for this edition, and that was only possible since I generously included two demos previously included on other albums.

Travelling: XL Edition

I understand why the album got the “Songs from Studios, Stages, Hotel Rooms and Other Strange Places” subtitle as a reference to being a sequel to Tourism, but I can’t think of a single strange place among the recording locations. Anyway, it seems just enough space was intentionally left to add “XL Edition.” I’m not going to complain.

Album

Although presented as a spiritual successor to Tourism, Travelling barely qualifies. Yes, it includes some live tracks, but the majority of the other tracks were recorded in Sweden—including the new mixes of “The Weight of the World” and “See Me.” Oh, well. My personal highlight is the soundcheck version of “Stars.” It’s so, so good.

  1. Me & You & Terry & Julie (3:45)
  2. Lover, Lover, Lover (3:59)
  3. Turn of the Tide (4:10)
  4. Touched By the Hand of God (3:48)
  5. Easy Way Out (3:38)
  6. It’s Possible (version one) (2:38)
  7. Perfect Excuse (3:40)
  8. Excuse Me, Sir, Do You Want Me to Check on Your Wife? (4:15)
  9. Angel Passing (2:46)
  10. Stars (soundcheck, 20 May 2011: World Trade Centre, Dubai, UAE) (3:35)
  11. The Weight of the World (vocal up mix) (2:52)
  12. She’s Got Nothing On (But the Radio) (live, 16 April 2011: Citibank Hall, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) (4:41)
  13. See Me (new version) (3:48)
  14. It’s Possible (version two) (2:44)
  15. It Must Have Been Love (live, November 2009: Night of the Proms, Ahoy, Rotterdam, Netherlands) (4:17)

Demos

If I exclude the demos for the live tracks, we see that the remaining tracks were written specifically for this album, with the exception of “Turn of the Tide,” which was originally intended for Have a Nice Day and subsequently Room Service.

  1. Turn of the Tide (demo, 30 September 1997: Tits & Ass) — Per Gessle (4:19)
  2. Stars (demo, 9 July 1998: Tits & Ass) — Per Gessle (3:57)
  3. The Weight of the World (demo, 18 October 1999: Tits & Ass) — Per Gessle (2:56)
  4. Charm School (demo, 10 September 2009: Tits & Ass) — Per Gessle (2:07)
  5. Excuse Me, Sir, Do You Want Me to Check on Your Wife? (demo, 13 October 2009: Tits & Ass) — Per Gessle (2:52)
  6. Me & You & Terry & Julie (demo, 9 June 2011: Tits & Ass) — Per Gessle (2:46)
  7. It’s Possible (demo, 26 July 2011: Tits & Ass) — Per Gessle (2:32)
  8. Lover Lover Lover (demo, 10 August 2011: Tits & Ass) — Per Gessle (2:41)

Mixes and edits

The Bassflow remake of “The Sweet Hello, the Sad Goodbye” was supposed to be included in the album, but unfortunately, Peter Böstrom couldn’t complete it in time. That’s lucky for me since it pads out this tracklisting a bit.

  1. The Sweet Hello, the Sad Goodbye (Bassflow remake) (4:48)
    Remixed by Peter Böstrom
  2. The Sweet Hello, the Sad Goodbye (Bassflow remake – radio edit) (3:47)
    Remixed by Peter Böstrom

I did say that we should prepare for fewer bonus tracks with the last few releases, but 25 tracks is a shockingly low number. I was tempted to label this one as an “L Edition” instead of an “XL Edition,” to be honest.