Now that concerns Nina Persson’s A Camp project would only be a once-off novelty have been somewhat satisfied by this year’s Colonia, 2001’s self-titled debut is worth spinning again with a little more leisure. With its grim tones at hyperspeed, or droning descending bars dragging the always against the flow vocals of Persson into gloomy vignettes The Cardigans, despite their out of left-field impulses, never quite risked whole-heartedly, Frequent Flyer is Persson’s post-MTV party bloodshot eyed slog on the empty streets of Stockholm. Her vocal motifs have never been so sweetly in tune with the bitter aftertaste her lyrics demand that she leaves. Persson and co-conspirator Niclas Frisk are never far from the money shots with dreamy little pictures into kooky, personally sheltered Swedish lives. Where the album’s opener flies off to, isn’t so much a case of nothing ventured, nothing gained, rather it’s how long does it take and when the hell can I get off. Frequent Flyer feels like the kind of single only released because even the most determined of modern artists can no longer get concessions on albums standing as the definitive article; that in itself brings the song closer into that tangled nexus of supply and demand, Persson and Frisk the chic art school puritans vs. the cocktail party qualifications even the most determined of artists seemingly have to pass through these days –

“I would love to tell my story/From the ending/But the story’s getting thin/From heavy spending”

Then again –

“I’m a frequent flyer/A notorious liar, ohh/But I can’t get close enough/I never get close/I can’t get close enough/To the ending”

One thing is for sure, Swedish sensibilities have always hidden the endearing whimsy that trickles an inch or two below their perky pop radars. A Camp come and go as they please, as the sunglasses and ballet pumps wearing Hitchcock-esque figures glancing through airports, sitting on the very last seat on short-hop ferries, releasing albums, disappearing and re-appearing again when the dust has settled. Colonia probably seeks out the masochists, their initial venture isn’t quite as revealing as to which way its web spins, they’ve landed and taken off again, catching them won’t be so easy.