Here are a bunch of album reviews for Lykke Li’s new album, which is due to be released tomorrow! According to the reviews it must be pretty good, so buy it!
When the Swedish pop ingenue Lykke Li first arrived in 2007 at all of 21, she was an adorable little thing, singing and shimmying with gumption. Her debut album, 2008’s Youth Novels, was as resolute and irrepressible as the best of her compatriots — Robyn, Nina Persson, Jens Lekman, even ABBA. And she enchanted a few notables along the way, including the rapper Drake, who sampled her “Little Bit” for an arresting mixtape deep cut. But there was a chill in the music — sax skronks, woozy keyboards, Kewpie-ish voice lurching to the brink of sadness — that her co-conspirator Bjorn Yttling helped install to keep things from ever getting too cute.
Three years and one broken heart later and that chill is hitting bone. Li’s new album, Wounded Rhymes, is equal parts seething ice princess and lonely snowwoman, vacillating almost track by track between fury and despondence over a scotched relationship. “Unrequited Love,” a sort of Spector-ish torch song, with its lightly strummed guitar and girl-group shoowop-shoowas, is one of the year’s saddest, prettiest moments. And then on follow-up “Get Some,” for which Yttling imports heaving tribal drums, Li is back on the prowl, tenaciously conflating herself with a prostitute as she writhes all over the track. The dual objectives — weep for me, fear me — collide throughout, creating a dicey, but gripping album. So much for the cutie-pie routine.
Ever since Abba went global, Sweden has been a pop paradise, a factory of mathematically perfect hooks. Lykke Li is a different kind of Swedish wunderkind: an ingenious oddball. Her second album is a weird-pop gem — torchy love songs that nod to Sixties hits but are stretched into all kinds of shapes. Li dips into garage rock and wintry folk, but her guiding spirit seems to be Phil Spector, and she laces the music with booming percussion and girl-group-style romantic melodrama. Li is no revivalist. “I Follow Rivers” places her neo-Shangri-Las sentiments (“He the rebel/I’m the daughter”) against an eerie swirl of synths, reverb-swathed guitars and pinging electronic percussion. As for all the catchy tunes: That’s just a Swede, exercising her birthright.
4/5
Bearing in mind our tendency to dissect female celebrities’ every move, it comes as no surprise that Lykke Li’s return has been met with cries of, “What the absolute fuck happened to you?” Those who mistook 2008’s ‘Youth Novels’ for a compendium of “little girls’ lullabies” – as one tragically under-attentive reviewer put it – gawped in wonder as Swedish pop’s reluctant princess donned her leathers and sexxxed up for (frankly terrifying) comeback ‘Get Some’. The video sees Lykke Mk II glow with fury; garbed like an occult lady of the night, she makes, er, unambiguous gestures at her crotch while straddling an unsuspecting mic stand. Nursery rhyme this is not.
Of course, for those who looked beyond the cosy oriental-folk exterior of her debut, the signs were always there: “For you I keep my legs apart/And forget about my tainted heart”, she muttered on ‘Little Bit’, a moment of poetic honesty typical of a disarming, rough-hewn record. But until now she has been a quiet storm, shrouding quaint musical scenery with a lyrical chill, never threatening to upturn houses or blow doors off.
Older and wiser, ‘Wounded Rhymes’ is a calculated effort to set the record straight – a subversive statement of fiery female intent from the last voice you might have expected. For all her feisty panache, Lykke is something of a lioness trapped in the body of a neutered kitten.
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If you don’t already know ‘I Follow Rivers’ (‘True Blue’-era Madonna chasing The Knife through the jungle) you’re signed up to the wrong blogs (or have a life outside the internet?). Meanwhile ‘Love Out Of Lust’ – the twilight slow-dance tune Joy Division never wrote – morphs ‘Youth Novels’’ chirps of “dance, dance, dance” into anguish: “dance while you can… ’cause you must”. In an age in which majors consider artists waiting two years between pop albums grounds for divorce, Lykke Li is that rarest of creatures – an antidotal popster blooming on a self-run label, free to evolve as she sees fit.
Her growing pains make for a fascinating listen, but without the dichotomy of treacly shy husk and voracious lyrical bite that made ‘Youth Novels’ so intriguing, this can be a harder record to love than its predecessor. Ultimately, for all its wailing codas, swollen strings and silky production, ‘Wounded Rhymes’, while a bold statement, doesn’t quite strike the same lugubrious groove. But while we bemoan flash-in-the-pan pop stars, it’s encouraging to see someone like Lykke sparking attention. The simple fact she’s intent on change makes her and the rest of her career infinitely more intriguing.
Jazz Monroe
7/10
After touring 2008’s post-pop debut ‘Youth Novels’, the Swedish singer-songwriter acquired a failed relationship and escaped to the LA hills to write away her anguish and birth this brilliant second album.
While opener ‘Youth Knows No Pain’ and the feisty single ‘Get Some’ both display Li’s ‘don’t-fuck-with-me’ sassiness, ‘Wounded Rhymes’ really takes off when she allows her vulnerability to leak.
The magnificent campfire ballad ‘I Know Places’ and the confessional ‘Unrequited Love’ are perhaps the finest songs she has written. Another lush ballad suggests that ‘Sadness Is A Blessing’ – Lykke Li seems to have made it work for her.
8/10
Swedish indie darling Lykke Li‘s 2008 debut Youth Novels took the world by storm with her irresistible brand of sugary pop. Her high-pitched, fragile vocals paired alongside well-crafted, but not overdone, toe-tapping beats told stories of love, exuding youthful energy that one couldn’t help but smile listening to. Two years later, details of a followup to be titled Wounded Rhymes were released – fear of the dreaded sophomore slump abounded. Would Li’s cutesy vocals and catchy hooks be as captivating the second time around?
Anthemic first track “Youth Knows No Pain” quickly takes care of that question. Triumphant declarations of “Come on get down, make a mess” alongside pulsating percussion and a playful organ melody sounds nothing like the Lykke Li that serenaded us just two and a half years ago. She’s hardly making a mess, though; the vibrancy and energy on Wounded Rhymes are as crisp and clean as Youth Novels, but are radically different and, ultimately, immensely successful. In a true demonstration of growth and progression as an artist, Lykke Li’s Wounded Rhymes is a soulful, intricate album that showcases a more vocally confident and mature Li amidst a score of equally powerful and impressive instrumentation.
The most stark contrast between the fragile material on Youth Novels and Wounded Rhymes is Li herself. Whether it’s the playful banter on “I Follow Rivers” or the less-than-subtle “I’m your prostitute, you gon’ get some” on “Get Some”, Li’s lyrics throughout are sexually charged and delivered with punchy confidence, usurping her previous meek playfulness. She wears it well, as harmonies are piled on in choruses alongside soulful verse delivery; whereas Youth Novels could easily wash over the listener, Wounded Rhymes aggressively demands attention and compliance. Naturally, it’s not too difficult to oblige. Alongside a more passionate delivery, Li adventures through a variety of sonic styles throughout the album, adding depth to the already compelling listen. “Unrequited Love” pits a nearly a capella multi-part vocal harmony with a Western twang over a minimal tapping beat, showcasing the versatility of her vocal talents and convincingly mourning a lack of returned affection. “Jerome”, however, features quick verses and a breathy chorus over its heavy reverb and handclaps. The two are vastly different, but cohesive in the consistency of her powerhouse presence in the songs.
As previously mentioned, the other notable shift in Li’s sound is the instrumentation that supports her trademark vocals. Reverb-heavy base alongside scattered piano melodies and wood block tapping characterized the majority of her memorable old material. Wounded Rhymes, though, offers a less atmospheric soundscape with more percussion alongside organs and frequent layered harmonies. This intensification of the sound mirrors her vocal performance perfectly – rendering Wounded Rhymes’ tracks immediate and inescapable, especially visible on “Get Some”‘s pounding African drums. The addition of fuller music functions not only on the meticulously-crafted, superb pop songs, but on the slower, lengthier tracks as well. Lethargic grower “I Know Places” epitomizes this, as its strumming acoustic guitar grounds her ethereal vocals through the first half, only to develop into an entrancing, reverb-laden soundscape for the last two minutes. Such an endeavor would not have nearly the affect without the richness and depth of the composition.
On the third track of the album, Li croons, “That’s why you must love out of lust/Dance while you can.” While lust is generally frowned upon as irresponsible, this indulgence in the immediate, in the physical, this embracing of reckless abandon, is what makes Wounded Rhymes so triumphant. Li’s explosion of confidence and fearless experimentation add together to create an album that is sensual and immense, as substantial as it is enjoyable. She may say she’s our prostitute, but she’s the one completely in control and the one anxiously leaving us in anticipation of whatever she comes up with next. In the mean time, we’ll just keep dancing.
4/5
1 Reply to "Album Reviews: Lykke Li - Wounded Rhymes"
GENRE HOP 3. March 2011 (12:32)
can’t get into this album. just not enjoying it like youth novels.