Lykke Li Quotes & Sayings

Most things in life come as a surprise. — Lykke Li

I am such a complex person. I have so many different layers of my personality to choose from. I am super-sensitive, and I am super-strong. — Lykke Li

When I was very little, I was into Michael Jackson. At six or seven, it was Madonna, but she's not what she used to be. I've been into everything from Edith Piaf to Joe Strummer to the Velvet Underground to Suicide to A Tribe Called Quest to African music. — Lykke Li

I knew I wanted to be an artist, but I never took music lessons. I was just playing around in front of the mirror and being silly, then suddenly I started making songs. — Lykke Li

Some people watch comedy to relax. I watch '21 Grams.' I can recognize sadness and tragedy really easily because it's been with me forever. — Lykke Li

I had a period after touring the first record where I didn't agree with the way things worked in the music industry as far as how you release music, demand, the pace of everything. You don't know who's talking to you. Who's Spotify? Who's iTunes? Who are all those bloggers? Who says I have to do this? Why do you have to do all this press? Why do I have to do so many shows? Why do I have to do a regular album right now? I don't understand it. — Lykke Li

I want to get my music out there. I enjoy playing shows; I just don't enjoy airports. I want to be more creative, but it's hard to get into that zone on tour. — Lykke Li

Where I've been hasn't influenced my music. It's more what I listen to. You can find music everywhere, so moving hasn't really influenced my music, more me as a person. — Lykke Li

My whole art is based on escaping life and reality, which might not the best tendency to have when you're trying to be a good person in general. But people can escape into my world easily - artists are supposed to create a keyhole that people can look into. — Lykke Li

I hung out with some crazy desert people. One guy was just walking around with only shorts on - he'd been walking with bare feet for the last two years. He was totally scarred and eating on all fours like a dog. — Lykke Li

After you've been wounded a few times, it's hard to let somebody get that deep again. — Lykke Li

If anything, I want to be seen as a singer-songwriter rather than a pop artist. — Lykke Li

I was going on this desert adventure with some friends and we were like, "How amazing would it be to just drag all these mirrors out there?" A lot of times I do things as an impulse and find out my inspirations afterward. Even with songs and lyrics, it can take me years to find out what I was actually trying to do. — Lykke Li

I'm a vagabond. I live out of one suitcase. I feel very comfortable in black. I feel very uncomfortable in anything else than black. — Lykke Li

I always feel like I've been slightly misunderstood. As a woman, you get judged for appearances or things like that I don't really care about. — Lykke Li

I'm just not interested in getting judged or getting people to love me. Being seen and taking my photo and having to follow this schedule all the time, I don't enjoy it. — Lykke Li

The music that I listen to is very minimalistic. I listen to a lot of old blues that is just guitar and vocals. — Lykke Li

My favorite thing in the world is to have just a big dinner with friends and just sit and talk about their life and their difficulties and all of that. — Lykke Li

Being on tour really takes a toll, so you have to find ways to stay healthy. — Lykke Li

I am deeply in tune with my heart and core, and it's made me a better writer, artist, and most of all woman. It's made me more myself. — Lykke Li

I remember watching Romeo + Juliet when I was 14 and listening to the soundtrack. When I hear that soundtrack now, all those emotions come back. It's really beautiful when you're at a certain point in your life where most of the adventure lies ahead of you. And it's a sad thing when you feel like you've lost that. But you can get it back. — Lykke Li

I feel it's so important to have strong women around you. — Lykke Li

I believe life's too short for compromises and bad fitting jeans — Lykke Li

Music and fashion are a sign of the times and a reflection of what people want and need at this very day and age. — Lykke Li

Sometimes women are so great and powerful, but then they surrender to these vain things. They kind of fall for it. — Lykke Li

Sometimes when I write songs, I don't know what they're about, and it just suddenly comes to me. — Lykke Li

I'm a very melancholic kind of person. I don't know why; I think certain people are born a certain way. — Lykke Li

I love pouring my heart out. People don't want to hear you whine when you're with friends, so you can sing about it instead - it's the best outlet. — Lykke Li

It would be amazing if people listened to it when they needed shelter; it would be lovely if they didn't spit on it. — Lykke Li

Do you have to have emotional turmoil to create music? I'm not sure because I've never been without it — Lykke Li

The thing is, if you're in this world, you have to do things for yourself, not for others, because everyone will judge you for anything. — Lykke Li

The first thing you do when you get off tour is let off some steam and, you know, have some type of big breakdown. — Lykke Li

A lot of times females are in charge because they kind of have the pussy power. If they say, "I'm you're prostitute," then they mean, "I'm the power." — Lykke Li

I don't want to break someone's heart, but you can't control that. A broken heart happens; that's inevitable. — Lykke Li

I'm from Sweden, so I don't enjoy winter at all; there's nothing cute about it. — Lykke Li

You can't stay in the desert, you go nuts after 24 hours. — Lykke Li

I know that I'm dealing with some kind of wound through my music. — Lykke Li

I'm more old school: I want to be like Keith Richards on stage. It's not interesting to see straight-from-runway clothes slapped on an artist. It's more interesting when you see people who have their own style. — Lykke Li

I'm not so interested in being indie just for the sake of being indie. — Lykke Li

It's important that the way you dress tells a story and reveals something about you and your philosophy. — Lykke Li

Life is greater when I'm dealing with something than when I'm just dreaming away. — Lykke Li

I'm a really restless person; I'm tired of the way I sounded or looked yesterday. So it's hard to hang onto this image of me as this young Swedish female in this world. — Lykke Li

Mum is a photographer, and Dad does world music and plays almost every instrument except for drums. — Lykke Li

I don't think Neil Young has a beautiful voice, but it's something that grabs you, and the songs are so good. — Lykke Li

I've always been a person that is searching for truth and always wants to go further, deeper. — Lykke Li

I always strive for freedom: freedom of thought and expression. — Lykke Li

I don't relate to the 'Twilight' books or movies at all, but I'm obsessed with it as a pop culture phenomenon - all these people just screaming like it was the Beatles. — Lykke Li

I'll always be in some type of turmoil. So what I've tried to do is just surrender to that. — Lykke Li

Driving, for me, means power and freedom. The feeling that I can go anywhere I want at any time is exhilarating. — Lykke Li

The problem is, when I talk about heartbreak or whatever, people want to melt it down to some break-up of a relationship, but it's not about that. If you're a sensitive person, just stepping outside can be heartbreaking. — Lykke Li

There's more discomfort being an old soul or a person who questions a lot of things. I'm young, but I'm old. — Lykke Li

If you're being ignored, that's a good time to concentrate on finding yourself and creating your own mystery. — Lykke Li

When I play, I'm so in the moment that I can't really remember what happened afterwards. It's a rare experience for a thinking person like me. — Lykke Li

I'm looking forward to some peace and quiet. I fantasize about having a home, which I've kind of never had. — Lykke Li

It's amazing, coconut oil. I use it as a moisturizer. I put it in my hair when I want a kind of greasy look. I take off my makeup with it. I put a little bit in my coffee. I have coconut oil with everything. — Lykke Li

Touring is really about being on edge the whole time - you're like a racing horse: you've just got to be on. You've got to pull it together. — Lykke Li

It's a very proactive thing to be dealing with your darkness and getting it out of your system. So it doesn't have to be in your system. — Lykke Li

I was a total floral hippie as a child so when I finally could make my own choices, I've been living in different black suit jackets and been really drawn to masculine clothes. — Lykke Li

I love listening to demos. They're so raw. — Lykke Li

If you take the hard facts of a failed relationship, it's pretty grim. But if you make an album out of it, and if the violins represent all the tears, you create something magical out of something very normal. — Lykke Li

I used to get really sick. I would go to the doctor with all these ailments, and they would tell me I needed to be at home. I didn't even really understand what that meant because since I was a baby, I've always been moving, moving, and then touring. — Lykke Li

I had to do this album. I tried thinking, "I'm not going to do it." But then I'm sitting there getting all suicidal and depressed, and I just start writing. It's like this inner drive. If I could choose, I would probably be living in the countryside and be fine with that, but I'm not. — Lykke Li

I honestly kind of hate shopping. My favorite places to shop are rich old lady consignment stores. — Lykke Li

I don't necessarily love all the collaborations that I've done; the more I work with other people, the more I realize that I want to work with myself. — Lykke Li

I don't feel Swedish. In fact, my father tells me to get out of here as soon as I can. — Lykke Li

I dove into the craziness and did things that maybe I would think twice about when I get older. — Lykke Li

I think everything in life comes in threes: heartbreak and all that. You've got to do the full round in order to learn. — Lykke Li

The first tape I got was Madonna's 'Immaculate Collection.' I'm inspired by the way she started from nothing and didn't have a big musical talent, but had a big dream. — Lykke Li

I was 19 when I recorded my first album, and I've been exposed to many things during these last few years; all the baby fat is gone. — Lykke Li

Los Angeles is such a mysterious place because there's so much evil in that city, but there's also so much light. You can be totally alone on a hillside and I love that kind of secluded, deserted rawness. — Lykke Li

Because you're a woman, the music industry puts you in another corner. I want to be fighting with the men. I want to be amongst the men, topless, throwing things onstage.
Pitchfork: Whe — Lykke Li

It's in every person's life, around 27 to 29 years old, the stars and the planets align themselves to exactly the way they were when you were born. You're faced with yourself. There's no running away. — Lykke Li

I hate the fact you always feel like you have to 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. — Lykke Li

I would want to create an amphitheater outside of California where I would play everyday, and then people would have to come to me. I would create all this crazy stage decor and film it. Or I would just stay inside my home and do films. I would be like the modern Maya Deren. — Lykke Li

I was 21 and homeless - such a broken, lost woman. — Lykke Li

People comment on how you look; it's so unnecessary. I just wanted people to listen to what I have to say instead of focusing on anything else. — Lykke Li

I do everything: I'll have a green juice, then a melted chocolate ice cream. I stay up very late, I get up very early. — Lykke Li

I don't live anywhere. I have always dreamed of moving out of my country because Sweden is boring. — Lykke Li

I remember watching films in my teenage years, and you'd be in love with Leonardo DiCaprio, and then a song would come on. You'd love that song forever; it changed your life. — Lykke Li

I always want to keep things unwritten. I'm inspired by Bob Dylan, who's kept evolving and changing his sound. I think that's what you should do as an artist. Why be comfortable? — Lykke Li

You can become quite blase, and also, I have no sense of home; I don't have roots. I've never had that feeling that someone else is going to take care of me, ever. I don't trust people. — Lykke Li

My favourite festival experience is a show at midnight with the moon blazing and a crowd full of open hearts ready to dance. — Lykke Li

I'm interested in a lot of different sounds and types of music. — Lykke Li

I went to 11 different schools. It was a fantastic adventure, but I was incredibly sensitive and needed a bit more stability. — Lykke Li

I will never get to Lady Gaga's status. That's not something I want. — Lykke Li

I will grab any opportunity I can to learn something new. — Lykke Li

I'm a girl from Sweden. I took a lot of risks and went to New York by myself when I was 19 just because I read about it in a few books. I came here knowing nobody, having no money, and now I'm doing all these things like making records and videos every day. — Lykke Li

I'm going to be like Benjamin Button; I'm just going to grow younger. I will probably be happy, fat, with kids and looking back and thinking, 'I was such a angry young woman.' — Lykke Li

It's not about being a sex prostitute. It's about this power play in the war of the sexes. It's a rat race, like, "I'm in charge," "No, I'm in charge." — Lykke Li

I struggle with myself every day - I am a lonesome person. I talk to my family - and I connect to some people deeply along the way - but I am a restless soul. Singing is the most immediate relief. — Lykke Li

I lived five years in Portugal and then spent winters in Nepal or India. — Lykke Li

I do it live on tape with a band. It's not like I'm doing electronic music with a laptop. — Lykke Li

I probably thought that about most of the things I did. But you wind up in situations where you have to make decisions very quickly, and you just go for it a lot of the time. — Lykke Li

I was totally romanticizing the idea of Los Angeles when the Doors, Joni Mitchell, and Neil Young were hanging out there. — Lykke Li

For men, it's about finding the perfect shoe or the perfect pants that will last you through the years. That's how I want to shop: sustainable, classic, great quality. — Lykke Li

I'm actually a really shy person. I just really enjoy being in studio; I don't go out much. — Lykke Li

It's not a very sane thing to try to be great all the time. You want to make something magical; you want to make something wonderful; you want to give to everybody; you want to heal people; you want to still be inspired. That's not easy. — Lykke Li

I was inspired by [Michelangelo] Antonioni's Red Desert - very big and moody. — Lykke Li

I wanted to create something really aggressive and psychedelic — Lykke Li

The profession I have keeps dragging me into drama and taking me away from baking, flowering and gardening. — Lykke Li