1969-1970 :

When he was 10, the first record that Morten listened to at home in Asker was  "Bridge over troubled water" from Simon&Garfunkel. His older brothers listened to it all day long. That beautiful song has always been one of Morten's favourite song and it occurs that he himself played it for several public events. (NRK in 1992, Tekst Melodie on NRK in 1999 with Karoline Kruger and more recently at  Sunnaas hospital in September 2004). Officiel Site : http://www.simonandgarfunkel.com

 

1970-1975 :

Johnny Cash : Morten has been very much influenced by Johnny Cash's voice during his teens's age. Johnny Cash died in 2003 but will stay, forever, an international icon, very important for the music culture.
Official site : http://www.johnnycash.com/index_intro.html

Uriah Heep : Morten's cousin has brought back from England a record of that rock band, totally unknown for Morten at that time. Their music completely blew Morten's head off.   Indeed Morten was more busy with botanic and nature than music at that time.
official site : http://uriah-heep.com/newa/



1976-1979 :

The Doors, mythic band of the 60's and the 70's who also influenced Morten very much as well as a-ha background.  The tortured atmosphere of Jim Morrisson and his poems have got a very big influence on a-ha music. The Doors atmosphere had been there before Morten joined the band and after the beginning of a-ha.
Official site : http://www.thedoors.com/band/jim/?fa=home


Jimi Hendrix : One day, Morten heard the song "Hey Joe" at school. One more time that record blew Morten's head off. The same day, he stole the record to bring it back at home because he reckoned that it was in better hands with him. The worst is he just listened to it once ! He was conscious that he was too much immature to listen to that music. It was too soon.
Official site : http://www.jimihendrix.com/


Queen : After Johnny Cash, Morten discovered Freddie Mercury's voice which has been maybe the biggest influence for him. Very often Morten tried to sing the same way as Freddie Mercury. 
Official site : http://www.queenonline.com/



Bob Dylan : Other musical influence very important for Morten. The particular voice of Bob Dylan and his guitar made part of Morten's teens age. Many years afterwards, Morten has even played a Bob Dylan song in Norwegian. "Forever young" became "Evig ung".
Official site : http://bobdylan.com/albums/


David Bowie : For a while, Morten's tastes were split between  very popular artists like David Bowie and other artists less popular. He all the same admitted to have listened to David Bowie for a while.
site officiel : http://www.davidbowie.com/


1978-1980 :

Souldier Blue : In the 70's, Morten hated Black and Blues music. For him that kind of music was hollow and uninteresting. Nevertheless one of his friend compelled him to listen to R&B as a lot of great artists were influenced by it. As Morten has always been someone very demanding and conscientious, he decided to join a Blues band in due to absorb Black music in his own musical culture. As a consequence, he became the singer of Souldier Blue. One of his brother, Haakon, was also making part of the band. Morten reckoned that they weren't good enough to play as a professional band so they never released anything. Anyway, Morten quit Souldier Blue to join Paul and Mags to form a-ha.
 

1980-1988 :

Leonard Cohen : Leonard Cohen is a very respecful and popular artist in Norway. All over the world, a lot of professional artists acknowledge Leonard Cohen's huge talent. Morten is far to be the only one to have been influenced by Leonard Cohen. Morten also took up one of his song, "Hallelluya" in duet with Espend Lind in 1999.  Leonard Cohen has also acknowledge a-ha talent and has once, in 1988, attended an a-ha concert. 
Official site : http://www.leonardcohen.com/


U2 : A-ha and U2 have both acknowledge their mutual talent for many years. Morten particulary likes the song "One" from U2 released in 1988. More recently, Bono admitted to have been unconsciously influenced by "The sun always shines on TV" in the U2 song "Beautiful day"
Official site : http://www.u2.com/


2000-2005 :

Coldplay : For several years the new pop generation has been coming up and Morten  acknowledges new talents as a professional. Chris Martin himself admitted to have been very much influenced by the first a-ha album, and in particular the song "Hunting high and low. Chris Martin has recently worked together with Magne F on his first solo album  "Past Future Tense".
Official site : http://www.coldplay.com/site.php