{"id":2067120,"date":"2026-07-29T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T21:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2067120"},"modified":"2026-07-29T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T21:00:00","slug":"wonderland-296","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2067120","title":{"rendered":"Wonderland"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t
\n\t\t\tWonderland<\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n\t\t<\/a>
\n\t<\/h1>\n
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\n\t\t\tLYKKE LI<\/span>
\n\t\t<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n
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Lykke Li calls herself the master of a French exit, so the announcement that her sixth album, The Afterparty, was to be her last felt out of character. As it happens, the alt-pop icon isn\u2019t one to be bound by conclusions.<\/h3>\n
\n
\"Lykke<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

It can be a drawn-out swan song or nothing more than a nightcap, but the afterparty is always the beginning of the end. <\/p>\n

You might, therefore, think it\u2019s no surprise that Lykke Li looked to this particular nightlife ritual when naming her sixth studio album. Released on 8th May via Neon Gold Records, The Afterparty<\/a><\/em> came four years on from predecessor EYEYE<\/em>, and 18 years since the alt-pop artisan\u2019s debut, Youth Novels<\/em>. It would be her final outing \u2013 at least according to the press, and, to some extent, Lykke herself. \u201cI said that when I was drunk at my own listening party,\u201d she says when we connect three weeks post-release. \u201cBut I can assure you that it\u2019s not.\u201d<\/p>\n

The decision to loudly call time on particular activities is a \u201ccoping mechanism\u201d Lykke deploys whenever she\u2019s doing something that scares her. \u201cI say that [for] every show I do too. Every time I smoke, I\u2019m like, \u2018This is my last cigarette.\u2019 Every flight. It\u2019s about living balls to the wall, fully in the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

She\u2019s just returned to LA from Brazil and, this morning, from the school run (Lykke has two children: Dion, aged 10 and Ilian, two). She chats sans camera. Today is partly devoted to \u201cputting [my] eyebrows back on.\u201d They have been bleached during The Afterparty<\/em>\u2019s promotion, so Lykke wants a break from the invisible look. \u201cAnd now that I\u2019m putting them back on, there are only a few left,\u201d she laughs. \u201cI\u2019m like, \u2018That was a good party.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

When it comes to parties, Lykke says she\u2019s the \u201cexpert\u201d at a French exit, so maybe the fact she announced her so-called retirement in a public setting was a clue that it was a hollow threat. Framing a piece of work as a final bow is a well-worn marketing tool. In Lykke\u2019s case, any such motivations seem like a stretch. \u201cIf you look at the choices I\u2019ve made, I\u2019m the least strategic artist ever,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

It is true that none of her biggest commercial wins has been achieved by design. While the candied but penetrative vocals and skeletal productions of Youth Novels<\/em> conferred indie-darling status on a 22-year-old Lykke, it wasn\u2019t until three years later that she first visited the charts. A remix of \u201cI Follow Rivers\u201d, from her sophomore Wounded Rhymes<\/em>, by Belgian DJ and producer The Magician, claimed the top spot in multiple European countries. Today, it boasts nearly one billion Spotify streams. Incidentally, the week of our conversation, the song sees her at number one again \u2013 this time stateside, via Drake, who interpolated it on his single, \u201cJanice STFU\u201d.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not the first time he\u2019s drawn from her discography: in 2009, he remixed Youth Novel<\/em>\u2018s cut, \u201cLittle Bit\u201d. His latest rework \u2013 taken from album ICEMAN<\/em>, dropped a fortnight before her Wonderland interview \u2013 gives Lykke her first career credit at the peak of the Billboard Hot 100. The stats don\u2019t charm her, however. \u201cIt is only males who text me to clock this type of thing. I think it\u2019s about masculinity, about numbers and winning.\u201d But, \u201cIt is validating as a writer.\u201d <\/p>\n

That element speaks to her defining dream: to be respected as a writer. Similar acknowledgement came when she co-penned \u201cBeautiful That Way\u201d for Miley Cyrus, for Gia Coppola\u2019s The Last Showgirl<\/em>. Her close friend Andrew Wyatt \u2013 behind some of the most ubiquitous songs of the 21st century (Lady Gaga, Dua Lipa, Billie Eilish) \u2013 suggested Miley sing it, midway through the track\u2019s creation. \u201cShe just jumped on and sent back the song immediately. It was a very beautiful flow.\u201d Lykke first became transfixed by Miley through \u201cThe Climb\u201d. So, \u201cTo have a song that we all wrote together, and have her sing it, was just so incredible. She has one of the best voices alive, and she\u2019s an OG star.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBeautiful That Way\u201d was perhaps a rare instance where a standalone song brought Lykke creative fulfilment in itself. She is, by definition, an \u2018albums\u2019 artist. \u201cI don\u2019t know why we moved on from vinyl A-side, B-side. For me, that was the perfect format.\u201d She wants The Afterparty<\/em> to be listened to front-to-back. \u201cThankfully, I made it very short, so everyone with a short attention span can get through it.\u201d She says people have critiqued its swift sub-25-minute runtime. \u201cBut I just think about the arc. Is this work complete? Do you measure how many minutes sex was? Or how many breakthroughs you had?\u201d<\/p>\n

Given the fear she finds in crafting and releasing a body of work, you would be forgiven for questioning if it\u2019s a process she enjoys. \u201cEvery single step, every choice in making an album pushes me to the absolute brink. And when it\u2019s finally out, then it\u2019s dead. So you just let it go.\u201d But she can\u2019t live without the cycle. \u201cWhen [the process] gets hard, I\u2019m like, \u2018Oh, I can\u2019t do this.\u2019 Then I\u2019m like, \u2018But what am I supposed to do? How am I supposed to do life without making art?\u2019 When I\u2019m working on something, that is when I\u2019m most awake.\u201d<\/p>\n

You believe, therefore, that The Afterparty<\/em> won\u2019t be her last. However, there\u2019s still a finality looming over it \u2013 thematic rather than career-related. In a statement accompanying the project, she said: \u201cI was twirling around in love addiction for all [my previous] albums. Now I\u2019m going into my existential era.\u201d The change of lane loosely coincided with her turning 40 in March. \u201cThankfully, in every decade you do go into a new topic.\u201d If circling the meaning of life \u2013 mortality, religion, love, joy and all its other component parts \u2013 is to be the fodder of her forties, it will certainly keep her busy. Not least, given the world\u2019s current state of play. As she said in a previous interview, raising children in an era of global turmoil, whether at the hands of Trump or AI, makes the planet itself feel like it\u2019s in the midst of an afterparty careering off course, with no foresight for the morning\u2019s alarm clock.<\/p>\n

However, for all of the apocalyptic connotations, The Afterparty<\/em> actually contains some of the most concentrated joy in Lykke\u2019s discography, with a 17-piece string section put to good use on songs that, in places, steer into disco-inflected, Balearic confectionery. There is, after all, a need for parties in hard times. But the higher the highs, the harder the falls, and the comedown always comes.\u201d <\/p>\n

There is something tragic and dark to the afterparty,\u201d Lykke reflects. A silent acknowledgement in each who makes it to a night\u2019s final act that, for one reason or another, they\u2019re resisting its conclusion. Closing track, the beguilingly-titled \u201cEuphoria\u201d, delivers time-stopping balladry reflecting on the transience of joy. The album\u2019s arc traces both that of the night and of life itself, with its final lyrics reading like deathbed reflections as much as those of a weary head (\u201cLeast we knew ya, euphoria\u201d). <\/p>\n

While a dawn ride home brings a sobering clarity, in the album-making process, that comes via a homecoming too. Each record has seen Lykke follow the same path: writing in LA, before recording in Stockholm. \u201cIt\u2019s kind of like I venture far west and have all these cosmic experiences,\u201d before coming back to the cut-throat candour of her collaborators in one of Europe\u2019s pop capitals. She needs their honesty. \u201cSweden is art, America is commerce,\u201d she explains. \u201cAnd you can\u2019t always trust commerce because the intentions are not pure.\u201d<\/p>\n

As our conversation nears its end, I get the sense that her US city of residence \u2013 the centre of the global entertainment industry \u2013 with its muddied motivations, conventions and beauty standards, might jade Lykke on many fronts. In particular, currently, the latter. \u201cAnytime I go into Instagram, I want to die. I\u2019m so tired of this false narrative and looksmaxxing,\u201d she says.\u201cI love a freak.\u201d She struggles with some of today\u2019s generation of pop stars. \u201cI can\u2019t look at these faces anymore. All these girls with pumped lips and Botox when they\u2019re like 28.\u201d<\/p>\n

Can she understand the draw of such procedures? \u201cI would do Botox, but I\u2019m so morally and spiritually against it that I can\u2019t. But then of course, one part of me doesn\u2019t want all these wrinkles. So I might succumb. I\u2019m unresolved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whether Botox, smoking, the permanence of her bleached eyebrows, or album making \u2013 Lykke, like the best artists, rarely deals in conclusions. She has mixed feelings on the merits of the afterparty, too. Yes, she notes their tragic undertones, but she doesn\u2019t discount them. Her favourites, to date, have been in Mexico City (\u201cThey do require a live salsa band\u201d) or in Stockholm (\u201cWhere you can just jump off into the water\u201d). <\/p>\n

It\u2019s at this point that you might find that Lykke\u2019s standard of after-hours activities outstrips most. \u201cThat is something you must experience before you die,\u201d she enthuses. So viva la afterparty? \u201cI mean, it\u2019s an important exercise.\u201d<\/p>\n

WONDERLAND SUMMER 2026. GUEST EDITED BY MILEY CYRUS. SHOP NOW.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Photography<\/strong>\u00a0Mario Sorrenti
Chief Creative Officer & Styling\u00a0<\/strong>Alastair McKimm
Words<\/strong>\u00a0Andrew Wright
Hair<\/strong>\u00a0Bob Recine
Make-up<\/strong>\u00a0Diane Kendal
Set Design<\/strong>\u00a0Philipp Haemmerle
Executive Producer<\/strong>\u00a0Dana Brockman
Producer<\/strong>\u00a0Max Bonbrest
Casting<\/strong>\u00a0Alexandra Antonova for Samuel Ellis Scheinman<\/p>\n

Lighting Technician<\/strong>\u00a0Lars Beaulieu
1st Photo Assistant<\/strong>\u00a0Kotaro Kawashima
Photo Assistants<\/strong>\u00a0Paolo Afante, Kurt Mangum
Digital Tech<\/strong>\u00a0Charles Meyer
Fashion Assistants<\/strong>\u00a0Taylor Wood, Kassidy Taylor
Hair Assistant<\/strong>\u00a0Jeelan Aleem
Make-up Assistants<\/strong>\u00a0Eduardo Jiminez, Breanna Harmon
Set Assistants<\/strong>\u00a0Oscar Haemmerle, Xavier Mozejewski
Production Assistant<\/strong>\u00a0Din Morris<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t29 July 2026\t\t\t<\/div>\n
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Magazine<\/a><\/div>\n
Music<\/a><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t070 Shake\u00a0<\/span> <\/span><\/a>\t\t\t<\/div>\n
\n\t\t\t\tSky Ferreira\u00a0<\/span> <\/span><\/a>\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wonderland LYKKE LI Lykke Li calls herself the master of a French exit, so the announcement that her sixth album, The Afterparty, was to be her last felt out of character. As it happens, the alt-pop icon isn\u2019t one to be bound by conclusions. It can be a drawn-out swan song or nothing more than […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,257],"class_list":["post-2067120","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-wonderlandmagazine-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2067120","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2067120"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2067120\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2067120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2067120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2067120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}