Lykke Li: "I Was In Such Deep Pain" • Interview • DIY Magazine

The focal point of ‘I Never Learn’, Lykke Li’s intense, often heartbreaking third album, is a song called ‘Gunshot’. Track five of nine, it appears just before the flipside and revolves around one particularly brutal gut-puncher of metaphor. ‘And the shot goes through my head and back / Gun shot, I can’t take it back,’ Li broods in the most intense, but most upbeat chorus on the album. Elsewhere, there are shout-outs to poison, cracked hearts and cancer. Even by her standards, this is rather macabre stuff. ‘I was pretty surprised about that myself,’ she admits. ‘That’s probably the highest point, and then it kind of goes back. That’s as far as you go and then you retreat. And every song around it tells a story.’

Lykke Li has always been a little glum, yes, but this record plummets to new levels of spleen. No doubt about it. Honesty is the key motif, as avoids the character-playing wiffle-waffle, pours her heart and soul, and fills the space by riffing on real-life emotion. Apparently, the album title surged out of the subconscious, and evolved into a powerful dictum for Li. ‘I was kind of stuck in a haze, and I was like, ‘What the fuck? How can I be here again?’ she says. ‘Everything around had changed but I still struggled with the same thing. And I hate the fact you always feel like you have be going somewhere, like the end destination is to be finished, or to be happy. But the truth is a lot of us are completely lost, and we don’t know, and that is also a state of mind, to not know who you are and where you’re going.’

First single ‘No Rest For The Wicked’ is an incredibly lonesome thing. Chockfull with negatives and singular images, it’s the refrain (‘Lonely I, I’m so alone now’) that really wrenches the heartstrings. But nothing aches like ‘Love Me Like I’m Not Made of Stone’, whose title is self-explanatory. Just guitar and voice, it signals a change in aesthetic for the enigmatic musician. ‘That version is the actual demo,’ Li reveals. ‘When I write, things just come to me and I simply try to record them. I had a tape machine and I recorded it. Sometimes when I write, it’s so subconscious that I hardly even know myself what it means. Like, I’m trying to figure out as I’m singing it. That song really captures that, all the sentiment: like, ‘Oh my God, is this how I feel?’ It’s only now that I can reflect on it and understand how I was in such deep pain. I think that song carries a lot of deep guilt and shame. It was painful being me.’

Her new stripped-back, nearing minimalist aesthetic allowed Li to work on her music and lyrics in a more refined, more meticulous manner. ‘It was wonderful,’ she says. ‘But it was also difficult to capture, because all I wanted was to capture something really alive, like I wanted you to feel like you held my beating heart in your hands. And sometimes I nailed it.’ In the main part, she’s referring the aforementioned demo, as well as ‘No Rest For The Wicked’, recorded in one take. Overall, she says, this paring down meant she had to step up to the plate. ‘The older you get, it’s all about refining and it’s really difficult to make something simple, so it became a real challenge,’ she reminisces. ‘Every word and every chord had to have its place and kind of be perfect in its imperfection.’

‘I Never Learn’ is the third part of Li’s vision, and the third in her trilogy of albums (following 2008’s ‘Youth Novels’ and 2011’s ‘Wounded Rhymes’): ‘I basically just got signed, you know, when I was 20 and I signed a three-record deal, so I knew that I had embarked on a journey that I somehow had to finish.’ Her overarching aim? ‘To try and capture something really…’ She hesitates. ‘Basically, to try to write the modern version of the perfect classic song.’

Throughout her career, she’s aimed to stay as far removed from the industry as possible, to only work with friends, and she’s had the same band for quite a while now. But even if her surroundings haven’t changed much, her approach to music certainly has, chiming in with the newfound bareness. ‘It’s become more and more about trying to reply,’ she explains. ‘And trying not to not to hide behind anything and make something very raw, and honest, and simple, and less about the beat, more about the message, and more about the vocal performance and delivery.’

Her long-time collaborator and producer Björn Yttling (the ‘Björn’ in Peter, Björn & John) has been accommodating with the change in direction, but she says the process was combative and dialectical. ‘We’re always in a type of war,’ she continues. ‘I think that’s what makes our collaboration so interesting, that we don’t always agree and you can also hear that tension in the songs.’

The minimal arrangements should by nature be quite straightforward to translate to the stage. ‘I wrote it on the piano and the guitar, and then we just get my drummer to do some stuff, so it’s kind of just reliving the album, and that’s what’s so fun for me. This is how it’s going to be live.’ Notably, she sees live shows as a mode of expression and not a means to fame. ‘I’m such a shy person, and I’m not a… how do you call it? An attention-seeker? Nothing like that. I don’t have that need to have fame. My only need is to express, so I just have to kind of get back in shape.’

Her biggest UK show comes as she headlines the BBC Radio 6 Music stage at Latitude in July. ‘It’s overwhelming and daunting,’ she forebodes. ‘But I’m also the kind of person that loves to put myself in situations that scare the shit out of me. I won’t think about it too much until I’m there.’

Somehow, she winds up telling the story of the most discouraging thing anyone has ever told her about her music. ‘I think it was in Germany,’ she sniggers. ‘But I thought it was quite funny too. Someone said… I mean I actually think it’s brilliant… They said that watching my show was like waiting to have sex with a hot woman, just to find out that she was a man.’ Unmissable, in other words.

Lykke Li’s new album ‘I Never Learn’ will be released on 5th May via LL Recordings / Atlantic Records.

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“Every word and every chord had to have its place and kind of be perfect in its imperfection.”

First single ‘No Rest For The Wicked’ is an incredibly lonesome thing. Chock-full with negatives and singular images, it’s the refrain (‘Lonely I, I’m so alone now’) that really wrenches the heartstrings. But nothing aches like ‘Love Me Like I’m Not Made of Stone’, whose title is self-explanatory. Just guitar and voice, it signals a change in aesthetic for the enigmatic musician. ‘That version is the actual demo,’ Li reveals. ‘When I write, things just come to me and I simply try to record them. I had a tape machine and I recorded it. Sometimes when I write, it’s so subconscious that I hardly even know myself what it means. Like, I’m trying to figure out as I’m singing it. That song really captures that, all the sentiment: like, ‘Oh my God, is this how I feel?’ It’s only now that I can reflect on it and understand how I was in such deep pain. I think that song carries a lot of deep guilt and shame. It was painful being me.’

Her new stripped-back, nearing minimalist aesthetic allowed Li to work on her music and lyrics in a more refined, more meticulous manner. ‘It was wonderful,’ she says. ‘But it was also difficult to capture, because all I wanted was to capture something really alive, like I wanted you to feel like you held my beating heart in your hands. And sometimes I nailed it.’ In the main part, she’s referring the aforementioned demo, as well as ‘No Rest For The Wicked’, recorded in one take. Overall, she says, this paring down meant she had to step up to the plate. ‘The older you get, it’s all about refining and it’s really difficult to make something simple, so it became a real challenge,’ she reminisces. ‘Every word and every chord had to have its place and kind of be perfect in its imperfection.’

‘I Never Learn’ is the third part of Li’s vision, and the third in her trilogy of albums (following 2008’s ‘Youth Novels’ and 2011’s ‘Wounded Rhymes’): ‘I basically just got signed, you know, when I was 20 and I signed a three-record deal, so I knew that I had embarked on a journey that I somehow had to finish.’ Her overarching aim? ‘To try and capture something really…’ She hesitates. ‘Basically, to try to write the modern version of the perfect classic song.’

“I don’t have that need to have fame.”

Throughout her career, she’s aimed to stay as far removed from the industry as possible, to only work with friends, and she’s had the same band for quite a while now. But even if her surroundings haven’t changed much, her approach to music certainly has, chiming in with the newfound bareness. ‘It’s become more and more about trying to reply,’ she explains. ‘And trying not to not to hide behind anything and make something very raw, and honest, and simple, and less about the beat, more about the message, and more about the vocal performance and delivery.’

Her long-time collaborator and producer Björn Yttling (the ‘Björn’ in Peter, Björn & John) has been accommodating with the change in direction, but she says the process was combative and dialectical. ‘We’re always in a type of war,’ she continues. ‘I think that’s what makes our collaboration so interesting, that we don’t always agree and you can also hear that tension in the songs.’

The minimal arrangements should by nature be quite straightforward to translate to the stage. ‘I wrote it on the piano and the guitar, and then we just get my drummer to do some stuff, so it’s kind of just reliving the album, and that’s what’s so fun for me. This is how it’s going to be live.’ Notably, she sees live shows as a mode of expression and not a means to fame. ‘I’m such a shy person, and I’m not a… how do you call it? An attention-seeker? Nothing like that. I don’t have that need to have fame. My only need is to express, so I just have to kind of get back in shape.’

Her biggest UK show comes as she headlines the BBC Radio 6 Music stage at Latitude in July. ‘It’s overwhelming and daunting,’ she forebodes. ‘But I’m also the kind of person that loves to put myself in situations that scare the shit out of me. I won’t think about it too much until I’m there.’

Somehow, she winds up telling the story of the most discouraging thing anyone has ever told her about her music. ‘I think it was in Germany,’ she sniggers. ‘But I thought it was quite funny too. Someone said… I mean I actually think it’s brilliant… They said that watching my show was like waiting to have sex with a hot woman, just to find out that she was a man.’ Unmissable, in other words.

Lykke Li’s new album ‘I Never Learn’ will be released on 5th May via LL Recordings / Atlantic Records.

Tags: Lykke Li, Features