Hell no!
Quick note from the shower!
It’s been too long! While I’ve been finishing up the next album, it seems the world has spun further out of control and into dark absurdity and destruction. I will share more about all this and more and less, in the time to come.
But for now: I just came out of the shower thinking about substack. Or rather, I was giggling, thinking about how songs sometimes are strange assignments that you give yourself to keep moving and stay sane.
Tomorrow (Saturday November 8, 2025) I am doing an in-person songwriting class here in Oslo. Next Saturday I’ll do it in Trondheim and on November 22 I’ll do one in Bergen. That’s not the point — although there are still a few free spots for the Trondheim and Bergen classes.
In preparing for this I’ve been thinking about my own patterns, tricks, fiascos and memories of songwriting attempts. The one that came to mind in the shower was regarding the song the ended up being called Hell No.
Hell No ended up being one of the original songs for the Dan In Real Life movie in 2007. But it originally started long before that project came my way. The brief, so to speak, that I gave myself, was: Doncha Go Way Mad performed by The Jazz Passengers (with Debbie Harry on vocals) featuring Elvis Costello — meets Don’t Know Why by Norah Jones.
One of these you have probably heard a million times, the other you should definitely hear. It’s a most charming and silly duet from the great American songbook, recorded in the 90s with great chemistry between Costello and Harry and the band.
So I went to work, trying to merge these two inspirations into one more silly little song. My original idea was to pitch it to a pair of other, more famous singers, who I wanted to hear duet. And my first idea was Norwegian god and goddess of song, Morten Harket and Sissel. My pitching abilities were not pro, mainly because I believed so deeply in the power of a song, that I didn’t even bother to record a propper demo. I simply had my guitar player Kato sing the female part in a deeply uncomfortable falsetto, on top of my solo acoustic demo.
I asked my manager at the time to please pass it on to the relevant people, but I am not sure he ever did because it sounded completely bonkers.
A few years later, I was looking for a duet for a moment in Dan In Real Life, and I thought of the original Hell No demo and blushed. I felt bad for having put Kato through that. And I felt awkward about Morten and Sissel potentially having heard that demo and thought WTF?!? Hopefully it never reached them.
So I went to work again, did some rewriting, rearranging, and recorded the song with my band at the time, including Kato on guitar. I did not ask him to sing this time. I asked Regina Spektor to join me as my Debbie Harry — we even did it live in Oslo one night, the very same night I met my drummer Dave for the very first time. It was love at first sight! And the song became the soundtrack to clumsy, clandestine romantic encounters between Steve Carrell and Juliette Binoche at a Bowling parlor in Rhode Island.
Ok, that’s all I had for now. Since last I have released a new collaboration with my cousin Lars Vaular who is Norway’s finest rapping poet. It’s called Ler Meg Ihjel and I’ll tell you more about it next week. Promise!
Only love!
SL
If Morten and Sissel took it— where would WE be?? I shudder to think!
Something I've learned as a writer (of fiction) is that sometimes my ideas are a bit more complex than my ability to execute them at that moment. Sometimes, I have to go live life and come back with some new experiences and wisdom to be able to make good on an idea. I didn't think about that happening with songwriting as well but that sounds like part of the reason "Hell No" took some time to be fully realized -- you weren't were you needed to be as musician and songwriting yet to make it what it was supposed to be. I'm sure you have more songs like that even now! 💖 Thank you for sharing this!