Ana Johnsson
Ana Johnsson |
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Ana Lovisa Johnsson (born October 4 1977 in Gothenburg, Sweden) is a Swedish singer and songwriter. Her longplay disc Cuz I Can appeared in April 2004 in Sweden. However, her worldwide debut The Way I Am was released some months later. Her sophomore effort little Angel is to be released in October 2006. She is sometimes known as Ana.
Biography
Johnsson was born in Gothenburg, Sweden to Rolph and Carina Johnsson but later moved to Sunne, a village in the province of Värmland.
She became fed up with school and went to USA as an exchange student. She took up skiing as a hobby and is now a semi-professional snowboard artist. She competed and traveled around the US and at one point, she came 5th and 6th in a championship in 1996. Eventually she came back to Sweden in 2001, finished high school and started working at various jobs.
She is fluent in 4 languages - Swedish, English, German and Norwegian.
Musical career
Johnsson's singing talents started when she was a teenager and became a singer of coverband @groove and moved to Karlstad.
But her big break started when she heard about the first season of Popstars in Sweden and decided to give it a go. She succeeded in the final and Ana, Jenny Karolina, Kristina Bergfoth, Malin Catharina Olsson and Susanna Emily Anna Patoleta formed the band Excellence. They were a huge success, scoring 5 top 10 hits and sold many albums and completed a sold out tour.
However, Excellence wasn't Johnsson's style of music and she left the band (who only released one further song as a four-piece), working as a solo artist. In the autumn of 2003, she released "The Way I Am" on the radio and it developed into a radio hit in Sweden and Germany and it gave her a nomination for the 2004 NRJ Awards in Stockholm. She released her debut album "Cuz I Can" in 2004 soon after. This album was only released in Sweden.
She was approached by the head of Colombia Tristar during a cruise and was invited to contribute a song to the soundtrack of Spiderman 2. The song was called "We Are" and it became the first single to come off the soundtrack and was released worldwide. It became a big hit and she released her second album "The Way I Am", which took her a year to make and features some songs from Cuz I Can. She says that the 14 songs in the album all have a deep meaning to her. Next singles released include "Don't Cry for Pain", a rock ballad where she advises a wife being beaten up by her husband to stand up for her rights, and "Coz I Can", a rock song about teasing the man, showing that women have power too. Both songs were less successful than "We Are" though.
According to the website of Bonnier Music in Sweden, Johnsson's new album will carry the title of Little Angel. Her Swedish official website announced that the official release date for the lead single off the album, "Days of Summer", was July 12. The single debuted in the Swedish Singles Chart at number seven, and dropped to number eight the next week. The following week, the single dropped out of the charts. The album is expected on October 18, 2006, according to her official website. The second single, "Exception", is to become the theme song to the Swedish thriller movie Exit. For more information about the film, see its page on IMDb. Watch the music video for "Exception" here. "Fate" is the title song for Finnish-Chinese movie Jadesoturi (Jade Warrior). The song is by the rock band Bleak, featuring Ana Johnsson dueting with Caleb (lead singer of Bleak) on vocals, and highly acclaimed Finnish accordionist Kimmo Pohjonen, who also composed the score for the film. "Fate" will be available on the Jadesoturi soundtrack that was released on October 11th. The film premiered on October 13th in Finland. A music video has also been shot for the song, watch it here on YouTube
Discography
Albums
All regularly released albums and their chart peak position in Sweden (SWE), Austria (AUT), France (FR), Switzerland (SUI), and in Japan (JPN).
| Year | Cover | Album | Chart positions | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SWE | AUT | FR | SUI | JPN | |||
| 2004 | 
|
Cuz I Can
April 14, 2004 (Sweden only) |
- | Not released | |||
| 2004 | 
|
The Way I Am
August 2004 |
27 | 20 | 58 | 19 | 1 |
| 2006 | 
|
Little Angel
October 18, 2006 (Sweden) |
Not released | ||||
Singles
All regularly released singles and their chart peak position in Sweden (SWE), Germany (GER), Austria (AUT), France (FR), Switzerland (SUI), Norway (NOR), United Kingdom (UK), Netherlands (NL), Ireland (IRE) and the World Singles Top 40 (WO40).
| Year | Single | Chart positions | Album | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SWE | GER | AUT | FR | SUI | NOR | UK | NL | IRE | WO40 | |||
| 2003 | "Cuz I Can" | - | Not released | Cuz I Can | ||||||||
| 2004 | "Life" | 17 | Not released | Cuz I Can | ||||||||
| 2004 | "The Way I Am" | - | - | Not released | Cuz I Can | |||||||
| 2004 | "We Are" | 8 | 16 | 7 | 21 | 28 | 2 | 8 | 16 | 28 | 25 | The Way I Am Spider-Man 2 soundtrack |
| 2004 | "Don't Cry for Pain" | 19 | 39 | 70 | - | 83 | - | - | - | - | - | The Way I Am |
| 2005 | "Coz I Can" | - | 73 | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | The Way I Am |
| 2006 | "Days of Summer" | 7 | Not (yet) released | Little Angel | ||||||||
| 2006 | "Exception" | 10 | Not (yet) released | Little Angel | ||||||||
| 2006 | "Fate" | Not (yet) released | Jade Warrior soundtrack | |||||||||
External links
- Official websites
- Ana Johnsson Official UK Website Template:En icon
- Ana Johnsson Official Germany Website Template:De icon
- Ana Johnsson Official Sweden Website Template:Swe icon
- Ana Johnsson at IMDb
- Fan sites
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