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Europe - Trivia


Europe's logo was created by Tony Reno's brother.
Joey Tempest has stated that his favourite Europe song is "Scream of Anger".
When Carlo Tränhardt set the new world record in high jump in 1988 "The Final Countdown" was played. He sent Europe a letter and thanked them.
Ian Haugland has his own radio show on the Swedish channel Rockklassiker.
In 1999 when Europe reunited for one gig on New Years Eve, there were 700.000 people in the audience in Stockholm.
In 2005 Kee Marcello participated in the swedish semi finale for Eurovision Song Contest.
Ian Haugland had succeeded to stick in 19 caps under his foreskin.
Kee Marcello earlier played in a band called Kee & The Kick - the band was not named after him, but the singer Kee Möller.
When John Norum was young he tried to burn down his school, but the only thing he succeeded to set on fire was himself.
Europe recorded a video for the song "In the Future to Come", but the video was only broadcast once, on Japanese television.
As the flip-side for "Rock The Night" single Europe re-recorded the song "Seven Doors Hotel". They had plans to re-record the entire first album, but it never happened.
Europe participated in a movie On The Loose in 1985 and played themselves. They also performed three songs for the movie soundtrack, but on two songs only Joey was playing.
The keyboard riff in "The Final Countdown" was originally written to be played before a discoteque in Stockholm, and not meant to be a hit at all. When John Levén heard it he asked Joey if he could write a full song of it.
In 2000 an exhibition about Europe was held at Hard Rock Cafe in Stockholm. A Europe cover band was playing, and at the finale Europe walked up on stage and played one song.
The Prisoners in Paradise album was initially meant to be produced by Bob Rock, but when Metallica asked him to produce what became their self-titled album (released in August 1991 after several months of recording) he declined Europe's request.
Half of the songs on Start from the Dark were originally intended for John Norum's forthcoming solo album.
"Prisoners In Paradise" was named after their situation at the time, when they for financial reasons were living on the islands Turks and Caicos. They felt they were prisoners there in the paradise.
When John Norum played with Eddie Meduza he was once fired because he became a too big star, and took away the focus from Eddie, but when Eddie realized he had a gig the same day he had to take back John, just to fire him again after the gig. He then took him back again to finish the tour, but fired him again after the tour.
The song "Hero" is a tribute to Phil Lynott (co-founder of Thin Lizzy, and solo artist before his untimely death at the beginning of 1986).
In 2003 John Norum was offered the job as the guitarist in UFO, replacing Michael Schenker, but had to say no when he instead chose to participate in the reunion of Europe.
Joey Tempest took his name after Shakespeare's play "The Tempest"
In 1989 Europe made a gig on the Hollywood pub The Whiskey under the name Le Baron Boys, to test some new songs.
John Norum made his record debut on a single by the infamous Swedish singer Eddie Meduza. Later Europe recorded an instrumental version of one of Eddie's songs, for their debut album. The song was called "Boyazont".
Europe got their breakthrough in Sweden through a national competition Rock-SM, which was broadcasted live on Swedish television. All the members of the jury voted for Europe as the winner, except for Thomas Erdtman, who later would be their manager.
A first pressing of "The Final Countdown 2000" misspelled the title to "The Final Cuntdown 2000".
Bruce Fairbairn was asked to produce The Final Countdown, but turned the offer down, because he couldn't find one single hit on the album.
Rod Stewart wanted to record Europe's song "Coast To Coast" after hearing a demo.
Europe was offered a song by Diane Warren for their album Out Of This World, but turned the offer down. The song "Look Away" was later number one on billboard chart with the band Chicago.
Ian Haugland recorded the drums to the '88 version of "Open Your Heart" naked.
All songs from The Final Countdown album, except "Carrie" and the title track, appear in the movie Hot Rod.
Europe are Sweden's 4th and Scandinavia's 6th best-selling band (with 20 million albums sold), behind ABBA, Roxette, Ace Of Base, A-ha and Aqua.