From everywhere ..

Here's some interesting bytes about Aqua from e-frens everywhere. If there's any inaccurate info, please let me know!

• Soren started writing music since 11 or 12 years. He wasn't much of a sports freak, though :)
• How did Lene and Rene got together? Seems that the two were on a cruise, and Lene had the luck to sing there. Rene, the DJ then, was impressed and asked Lene to do a demo-tape for him. The rest, they say, is history. Oh, and Rene thought that Lene looks "very feminine" there (?)
• Where did Barbie Girl come from? No, not the assembly line :) Soren was returning from an exhibition featuring Barbie dolls in Denmark. While cycling, the words : I'm a Barbie Girl, in my Barbie world... popped out. Whatta inspiring tale ;)
• Before starting a singing career, Lene was the Vanna White of a game show, which was just like Wheels Of Fortune. hmm.
• (during the group's tour in US, after the release of Lollipop).. and every interview in teen mags from US quoted almost the same thing : the group thinks that US is a great place. It was the first time for Rene and Lene. Soren and Claus have been to US before, but it was a **long** time ago..
• Aqua thought that the music scene in Denmark was rather sad, and depressing. They sure brightened up things a little, don't you think?
• The four weren't expecting a success of this magnitude with their debut single, Roses Are Red. All they wanted was to get a single out of Denmark <tsk tsk, such modesty>. The sudden fame and fortune hit them hard -as Lene puts it- : "BOOM!" Everybody wants Aqua...!

M 3 (Oct 97) ..

.. did an article. Here are some excerpts :

Imagine characters from a cartoon come to life and you'll get a pretty accurate picture of Aqua, the pop-sensation from Denmark currently flooding the airwaves with their happy, foot-tapping brand of synth-pop from their debut album, AQUARIUM

"It's kind of difficult to decide who's the most striking of the four. Could it be Lene, whose hair is dyed half reddish-orange ? Or is it Soren, with his hair gelled to resemble a blond durian ? Or Rene, who looks like a younger Patrick Stewart, except for his long dark blue eyebrows ? Or Claus, with his shocking mop of bright orange hair that looks as if it's on fire ?"

(Lene) "We couldn't agree on any of the names that each of us came up with. And all the time, it was in front of ut, or rather, at the back of us. It was a poster advertising the Danish Aquarium, with lots of fish, a very colourful poster. We thought Aquarium was too long so we shortened it to Aqua. We thought it was a very beautiful name - it's very clean, it's a word that everyone knows." (Soren) "It connects very positively with water. It's positive name and our music, similarly, is very positive as well."

"On the fast numbers, Lene sounds like she's on helium, but once you listen to the slower tracks, you realise that she is capable of being mellow and sultry too. Rene, on the other hand, has a low, booming quality to his voice that adds a humorous contrast with Lene's Minnie Mouse voice on the fast tracks."

"... in Denmark, they're the fastest-selling act, and are at present even more popular than their fellow Danes, Michael Learns To Rock. In their country, Aquarium has sold more than 250,000 copies since its release in March.."

"Lene's dating someone back home in Denmark. Soren, apparently the group's romeo, is dating 2 girls (!). Both Claus and Rene are single at the moment, although Rene has a daughter from a previous relationship."

"Although Aqua are at present more popular than MLTR in Denmark, Rene concedes that being a relatively new group, they have yet to establish a strong presence in Asia, unlike MLTR. But from the way things are going, it seems that it's only a matter of time before these weird, wacky oddballs do so."

Lime Magazine (Issue 12, Oct 97) ..

.. published a splashingly great interview with Aqua, plus some FUN FACTS.. oh, and a nice pin-up! Thanx to Lina from Singapore for this !

• Lene and Rene are singers in the band, but all of them write the songs.
• The guys are all Danish while Lene is Norwegian. She sometimes gets 'lost' during interviews and depends on the boys to translate questions for her !
• Soren is the joker of the group. Too bad the joke he told LIME is too saucy to be printed !

Quotes from "Day & Night" magazine, Issue no. 83 ...

"There's a new group making waves on the Euro-pop scene."

"Combining pop and dance sensibilities with a truly quirky sense of humour."

(Claus) "Aqua is about seeing the world a bit brighter."

(Claus) "We just go with the flow and have fun with it."

Quotes from The Star (July 28, 1997) ... "Diving Into Aqua Realms" ...

The band received platinum for the single, Roses Are Red, and was also nominated for a Grammy for the Best Local Dance Release in Europe.

Aqua's second single, My Oh My, was released in February 97 and entered the Danish single charts at NO.1. It was awarded gold only SIX days after its release - which is quite an achievement in the Danish market.

(Soren, on Barbie Girl) "The song really reflects what Aqua is all about bcoz you'll hear a lot of humour abd that's mainly what we're like. But of course there's always a little seriousness in the happiness as well."

(on video clips and album cover) So why did the band want to use cartoons? According to Soren, the idea came about while making the video for Roses Are Red, 'we thought it would be fun to use cartoons'. (Rene) "If you see us now, you might laugh bcoz we look like this <cartoon characters> everyday."

(Rene) "We're freaking out even more now." If you take a good look at its album cover, you'll know why. Rene's shaved off all his hair, Soren sports spikes like the Statue Of Liberty, Lene has hair like Marge Simpson. Claus is the most normal looking one among the four.

(Rene) "We like to have strong images." (Soren) "We're just very colourful."

Soren and Claus do all the writing and arranging but "we like to write the lyrics together," says Soren, who attended high school in US for a while.

(Rene) "We have four very different but strong personalities which shine through, and when we're performing, we give 120 percent."