Loreen – SOLD OUT
10th November 2023

Just over a decade ago, in May 2012, pop iconoclast Loreen changed the game with her electropop stomper, Euphoria. Not only did the aptly-named, emotionally-loaded banger cruise to victory at that month’s Eurovision Song Contest, it also crashed into multiple charts worldwide, including the UK top 3, where it spent four months in the top 100. Having single-handedly helped shift the perception of Eurovision, Loreen then continued to create intricate, emotional pop in her homeland of Sweden.

11 years later, she’s back making history as the second person & only woman ever, winning the competition twice. Together with her song ‘Tattoo’ she quickly made her ways through charts globally & entered the global Spotify charts days after the song was released (25th of February), ready to stake her claim as a global pop force. A typically skyscraping, emotionally tingling force of nature, Tattoo scored 1m plays on Spotify in just 24 hours before eventually peaking at number 1 in Sweden. “I felt intuitively that something was going to happen with me and this song,” explains the ever thoughtful and spiritual Loreen. “I felt it instantly when I listened to it and it scared the shit out of me because that’s how I felt with Euphoria.”

Trusting this instinct is vital to Loreen’s artistry, which she’s honed over the course of two soul-searching, dancefloor-ready albums. On 2012’s Heal – a Swedish chart-topper – she built on Euphoria’s success via the skyscraping My Heart is Refusing Me and the Patrik Berger-produced, Ester Dean-assisted We Got the Power. This was followed at her own pace, five years later, by the more experimental, hip-hop-influenced Ride. The album also marked a shift in Loreen’s creativity, with each of the album’s ten atmospheric tracks co-written by the star alongside the likes of Fred Ball (Rihanna, Beyoncé) and Sterling Fox (Lana Del Rey, Britney). Last year, she shifted her sights towards synth-drenched, 80s-inspired electropop with the single Neon Lights. “I’m a huge nerd when it comes to synths, especially analog synths,” she explains. “So much so that I now build my entire live shows just on them. I felt I wanted to bring that sound into the studio and just play around like I was in a Terminator movie.”

It was while exploring this new sound that Tattoo arrived in an email from her regular collaborators Peter Boström, Jimmy Jansson and Thomas G:Son. She instantly liked the song, but also sensed an impending issue. “They asked me ‘would you consider being in [Sweden’s pre-Eurovision singing contest] Melodifestivalen again?’ and I said ‘hell the fuck no’,” she laughs. “But it just flowed. Then it was a process. It was not an instant yes. For me, it’s ‘what is the narrative? What is the purpose of doing this?’. I need things to have a purpose.” As it’s done with millions of listeners so far, Tattoo, which Loreen tweaked lyrically to suit her personality, quickly sunk its claws in. As did its central message: “It’s about fighting for love. Sometimes people today, with the way we live, we have the mentality that the grass is greener on the other side, so I feel that we have forgotten one important law which is there is no darkness without light; there is no love without hate. If you want to experience love then you have to ok with the dark stuff that comes with it, that’s the basis of the song.”