Next Wave #586: Tove Lo

Raw, emotive pop from Sweden…

Exploding onto the radar with her debut single ‘Love Ballad’ in 2012, Swedish pop-star Tove Lo finally released her debut EP, ‘Truth Serum’, earlier this year.

“It’s a bit scary to give so much of myself away, but I’m so proud of all the songs and it feels good that a lot of people say they can relate,” she tells us.

Having also written songs for the likes of Icona Pop and Girls Aloud, Lo garnered some major UK chart success with ‘Stay High’, the Hippie Sabotage remix of her own single ‘Habits’, peaking at number six in March 2014.

“I still haven’t met them, which I’m dying to do,” she enthusiastically confesses, discussing the brothers behind her most commercially successful release to date. “A friend of mine sent me a link to their remix, and I loved it, so I hunted them down and tweeted them. They emailed me the song and I just said, ‘I love this! I want it on my EP!’ And here we are.”

From the ridiculously catchy electro-pop of ‘Not On Drugs’ to the melodic swoons and striking lyrics of ‘Habits’, the hype surrounding Lo’s ‘Truth Serum’ is justified.

“It was a very scattered recording process, since I wrote and worked on these songs over a long period of time, before there was a plan and a label in the picture. But there were no obstacles. Some of it is studio vocals, some are my bedroom recordings, and it’s been written all over the world.”

The EP was in the works for almost two years, so a debut album must be due to surface in the near future?

“It’s in the works! I’m kind of ignoring the deadline, but it will be before 2015. It has to be cohesive and not stressed together.”

So, with plans to release said debut album, and to write more music amidst dreams of conquering the globe, at the rate that Lo is blowing up, those dreams seem closer to a reality than she thinks.

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Tove Lo, ‘Habits’

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WHERE: Sweden

WHAT: Raw, emotive pop music

GET 3 SONGS:  ‘Habits’ (video above), ‘Not On Drugs’, ‘Stay High’ (Habits Remix ft. Hippie Sabotage)

FACT: Tove Lo was born with not two, but three kidneys.

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Tove Lo online

Words: Jonathan Hatchman
Photo: Trinity Ellis
Fashion: Lola Chatterton

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