Zara Larsson has entered her mythological nymph era. She\u2019s got a new album called Midnight Sun, a muddy video with glittering cuts, and enough \u201cdon\u2019t give a fuck\u201d energy to cancel your algorithm. \u201cI don\u2019t give a fuck\u2014but I do care a lot,\u201d she says, somewhere between a smirk and a prayer. \u201cThat\u2019s the vibe.\u201d<\/p>\n
Coming quick on the heel’s of 2023\u2019s Venus, the Swedish pop powerhouse is finally breaking her own cycle of perfectionist paralysis. \u201cIt took me four years between So Good and Poster Girl. Now it\u2019s been one,\u201d she says. \u201cLooking back, one of my biggest mistakes was not releasing anything. I was just in my head. Is it good enough? Will it be as successful? And now I\u2019m like… whatever. I just want to have fun.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the kind of artistic about-face you get when you stop chasing hits and start chasing energy. For Zara, that meant assembling what she calls her dream team. \u201cIt was immaculate vibes,\u201d she says. \u201cEvery day we walked into the studio and made three bangers. We were like, what is happening?\u201d<\/p>\n
What was happening, apparently, was a pop girl quietly transforming into a pop artist. \u201cI didn\u2019t start off writing,\u201d she admits. \u201cI just wanted a mic in my hand and a stage to perform on. But the older I get, the more I want to be an artist\u2014not just a performer. I want it to be my words. I want to create the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
She credits MNEK for creating a space where she could be both confident and vulnerable. \u201cNot just the sassy fun girl,\u201d she adds, \u201cbut comfortable being myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
Zara describes the Midnight Sun sessions like she\u2019s talking about a s\u00e9ance. \u201cWe would just connect our little brains to the song god,\u201d she says, dead serious. \u201cYou get into that creative flow and the ego disappears. There\u2019s no right or wrong. The songs just appeared.\u201d<\/p>\n
And then there\u2019s Pretty Ugly, a deliciously bratty lead single that sounds like someone spilled glitter all over a Garbage record. \u201cWe were like, I want to shout on a song,\u201d she laughs. \u201cI\u2019m not trying to be pretty. It\u2019s not clean. It\u2019s not polished. And that\u2019s the point.\u201d<\/p>\n
Enter Margot XS, who specializes in trance, punk, and other genres that would normally panic a major label A&R rep. \u201cShe brought that world into the pop world,\u201d Zara explains. \u201cShe\u2019s still got her sauce, but over the top of my pop toplines. It\u2019s way more exciting than trying to force a pop producer to be edgy.\u201d<\/p>\n
The spiritual core of the record is the title track, \u201cMidnight Sun,\u201d which functions as both a literal ode to Sweden\u2019s endless summer days and a love letter to simply existing. \u201cIt\u2019s about joy. About life. I wanted to capture that feeling of being at my summer house, with my friends and family, when the sun never sets and it feels like it could last forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
The whole album is wrapped in a kind of Scandinavian folklore filter\u2014like what would happen if a wood sprite from a Bj\u00f6rk video got a record deal and moved to L.A. \u201cI wanted to be this little nymph that goes to the city,\u201d Zara says, somehow making it sound both enchanting and feral.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s bringing that energy to her upcoming tour with Tate McRae. \u201cShe\u2019s a hustler,\u201d Zara says admiringly. \u201cAlways working, always on the road. I\u2019m excited to share the stage\u2014and maybe steal some of her fans.\u201d<\/p>\n
And while Midnight Sun won\u2019t officially drop until the fall, Zara\u2019s already debuting tracks live, road-testing new material like it\u2019s a punk zine. \u201cEvery song deserves its moment. Honestly, I\u2019d make them all singles if I could.\u201d<\/p>\n
Or as she puts it in one of her more cosmic philosophies: \u201cEvery song already exists. It\u2019s just an ice sculpture waiting to be carved out.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Watch the full interview above and then check out the video below.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Zara Larsson has entered her mythological nymph era. She\u2019s got a new album called Midnight Sun, a muddy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25260,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[64,63,134,136],"class_list":["post-25259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-entertainment","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25259\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}