Zara Larsson: ‘My Album is For the Girls, Gays, and Thems’

The Swedish pop star revealed that the LGBTQIA community inspired some of the tracks on Midnight Sun

via: Pink News

“No, no… no few days off,” smirks a recently awoken Zara Larsson. I’ve asked whether she’s having a moment away from her slot as opener for Tate McRae’s tour.

In fact, the Swedish musician does have a couple days off performing. But from everything else? No chance. Zara Larsson is having possibly the biggest moment of her career.

Looking at the numbers, it seems improbable. Since winning Talang – essentially Sweden’s Got Talent – back in 2008 aged just ten, Larsson’s polished pop and powerful belt have been ubiquitous on playlists the world over.

She’s got three tracks in the Spotify billions club, “Lush Life”, “Never Forget You”, and “Symphony”, the latter of which topped the UK charts in 2017 and went five times platinum in Australia. However, recent offerings, like 2019’s aching heartbreak bop “All The Time” and 2023’s frenetic “Can’t Tame Her”, haven’t matched such dizzying commercial heights.

Neither has “Midnight Sun”, the flittering recent single from her fifth album of the same name. On social media though, the song, with a woozy pre-chorus that erupts into a brain-frying vocal run, has gone megawatt viral with all the right people.

“I feel like my career is kind of funny like that, because it’s almost like people are rediscovering me every couple of years or so,” Larsson says, squinting, as if trying to visualise her career’s skew-whiff path. Or perhaps she’s still waking up, despite looking remarkably fresh-faced, calling over Zoom from a hotel.

Last year, “Symphony” resurfaced thanks to a bizarre TikTok meme which put the song’s treacly chorus over photos of dolphins, alongside depressing messages. But this time “it feels different,” she says. “The air for me feels different and the people are responding to what I put out differently.”

There’s been a domino effect. As videos of Larsson performing that jackhammering “Midnight Sun” chorus reached multi-million views, she kicked off her slot on McRae’s US Miss Possessive Tour, flaunting her pop star acumen – and ability to drop into the splits – to a whole new physical and virtual audience.

Her brand for Midnight Sun the album crystalised, with the era’s emblem becoming a pink and yellow hibiscus flower and neon nymph attire. She leant into the buzz, posting clips of her dancing to the song in the aisle of a plane and giving it a Halloween remix. With every video, there’s been virality.

Following “Lush Life”, Larsson’s 2017 debut album So Good brought heady success. The comedown saw Larsson spend four years agonising over how she’d top it. “I used to be so not in the moment and I used to just think about the next big thing and that this wasn’t good enough,” she says, “or like, ‘I sold this much or this many people came to my shows, well, why not do stadiums?’ It’s always something more, there’s always something bigger and better.”

Midnight Sun is Larsson’s first record where she’s felt fully in control – she co-wrote every song – and the first she’s been able to enjoy completely. In life, she’s spent more time in nature under actual midnight suns, feeling “joyful and present,” she says. “I’ve been practicing that a lot throughout the years.”

The buzz has been natural rather than forced, and she’s capitalised on it by just having a good time. “When people are responding and connecting with this music, it’s so good for my confidence and just trusting myself,” she says. “Maybe that’s why people are connecting because they can feel it’s genuine and authentic.”

“I can’t predict the future, and that’s fine”

There’s irony in this being the album that has ignited, as it’s also the first on which she’s admitted to craving that spark. Over panicky synths on “The Ambition”, Larsson wistfully confesses to comparing herself to her pop peers: “What does she have that I don’t?”

On ethereal career highlight “Saturn’s Return”, she sends up her own fears: “Said by 20 I’d be filling up stadiums. Didn’t happen, so I changed the deadline. Might take another twenty years and that’s OK.”

It was the last song she wrote, during a period of being obsessed with the moon – “I was into horoscopes for some reason. I think I was very bored” – and she carries that sentiment with her today: “I can only do my best and that’s it. That’s all I can do. I can’t really do any more than that or be in control over my life and I can’t predict the future, and that’s fine.”

Zara Larsson created Midnight Sun with a small, select group who “just get” her, including her long-time collaborator MNEK. She’s figured she prefers working with queers and women. “I, like, really try to hire women, and in the writing session, I’m like, ‘Please no straight man,’” she laughs. “Generally, the core group is like, it’s for the girls, the gays and the thems. It has really changed how I feel in the studio. I think that’s the biggest difference [with] this album.”

During her commercial fallow years, it’s queer folk who have kept her believing in her records. “I feel like I’ve been so [supported by] the community with all my music honestly. Some of the songs that I have loved that the general mainstream public, the radio listeners, haven’t really appreciated, the LGBTQ community have definitely showed love to [like] ‘All The Time’, ‘Love Me Land’, that I felt deserved so much more,” she says. “It just feels great to know that OK, there’s people out there with amazing taste.”

With their appreciation for impeccable pop, her queer fans have inspired her to stand her ground musically.

“Previously I’ve been very, not concerned, but like I’ve cared a lot, you know? Like, what will people think about this? Will radio play this? Now, instead of looking so much out, I’ve been looking inwards at what do I want to do? What do I think is cool?” She spends most of our conversation looking into the distance, clearly genuinely impacted by her changing mindset. “I am not the same person I was when I was 23… my perspective of life has changed and how I feel about myself.”

Larsson’s resonance with the queer community is also intrinsically linked to her ability to tap into online pop culture. New song “Hot & Sexy” features a sample of Tiffany Pollard laying into Gemma Collins on Big Brother, for instance. “Pop culture is queer culture, you know what I mean?” She offers a ballroom finger clap to the camera. “Everyone’s clocking it right now. Like, it’s the tea! That culture is pop culture.” Larsson is garrulous company, only able to be 100 per cent herself. A late night sauvignon blanc with her could change lives.

“Trans people’s health > limp dicks”

Deeply online – before ultimately leaving Twitter-turned-X – Larsson has also gained notoriety for her brazen opinions, often shared with comic nonchalance. She’s a noted Chris Brown critic, went viral before it was even a thing by calling out men who say their penis is “too big for condoms”, and has been advocating for a free Palestine before most pop stars grasped what the phrase meant.

In 2017, she dragged the Trump administration for banning trans people from the military over healthcare costs, despite continuing to fund the service’s massive Viagra bill. “Trans people’s health > limp dicks,” she posted.

“Yeah, of course,” she says, when I bring up her near-decade-long support of trans equality, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “For me, treating people with kindness and just being fair, I think it’s something that is just in my being.” She holds her hand to her heart.

“I don’t know if it’s because [of how] I was raised or the people I was around…” – her mother was a nurse, her father a naval officer – “but to me that’s just like, it’s so weird the opposite way around? Why can’t [people] respect people’s lives or identities? I don’t understand that and I’ve never really understood it.”

It sounds like one of the reasons she distanced herself from X. “Every time I see [transphobia], it just gets me so mad and I have to… Rah! Rah! Rah!” She mimes an animal defending its family. “I just stay away from the internet a bit more because it really affects me.”

No doubt the LGBQ+ community will be the biggest backer of Midnight Sun. It’s not her most cohesive work – Brazilian funk (“Hot and Sexy”) meets UK garage (“Girl’s Girl”) meets Alexandra Stan-era europop (“Eurosummer”) – but it is her best.

Once her support slot with Tate McRae wraps up in November, she’s taking it on a tour of its own. Will we see splits? “For sure.” Will queer favourite “All The Time” be on the setlist? “Yes.” Is she touring Europe again in 2026? “Yeah, that’s the plan.” What about a deluxe version of Midnight Sun? It’s only ten tracks, after all. “I would love that. I would love love love love love a deluxe. I really would, and I think there’s definitely a lot of material for that.”

So there’s a lot going on in Zara Larsson’s world; definitely no few days off. “I also feel like, maybe I’ve prepared myself for this moment and what’s about to happen for all these years,” she smiles. “And now I’m finally, like, ready.”

Midnight Sun is out now. Tickets for Zara Larsson’s tour are available now.