You’ve said it’s easier to sing about your feelings than talk about them. But I am very personal with all my lyrics and they can write me really personal things and I can write them back personal things. They might not have a personal, straightforward relationship to their fans. Some have an artist persona that they build. It all depends how you choose to talk to your fans. What you think of this more immediate connection to fans? It makes the artist more of a human being. It’s much easier now to have direct contact with fans. When I was young you couldn’t reach out on the Facebook page. I thought, I don’t want to get my hopes up. There were not many Swedish artists, so they were mostly from the States or the U.K. I dreamed about reaching out to them, but I felt so far away from them to begin with. Did you ever write to a musician when you were growing up? Not really. Your fan base seems particularly connected to your lyrics. “Stuff will be fucked up and I can still be happy.” She continues to make a case for seeing her as not the saddest girl, but rather the one with the darkest humor. “Swedes have a different view of what’s dark and not,” she says, like she’s letting me in on a secret. In a conversation, during the New York portion of her American tour, she speaks with an untroubled lilt. But the way she sings it is like Cyndi Lauper by way of the Beach Boys, all playful euphony. The first time was only seven minutes in, during “I Like ‘Em Young,” when she coos, “I can’t tell a lie and, we’re all slowly dying.” Of course, written out, it seems dark. The first time I listened to her first album, Queen of the Clouds, I didn’t cry once, but I laughed twice. It wasn’t long after Tove Lo’s “Habits” began playing from radios and headphones everywhere that she was described by Rolling Stone as “Sweden’s darkest pop export.” Soon, Tove Lo was rarely mentioned without the descriptor that she was “the saddest girl in Sweden.”
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