Slowgold - Lugna (Black Vinyl LP)

Facts When Slowgold returns with a new album, we meet an artist who has chosen to strip her expression down to the bare essentials. The result is a record where the lyrics take center stage, dressed in simple yet clever arrangements. The aim has been to find contrasts in the music, to seek change with small means. To let things happen in the simplest possible way.

"I've realized for myself that I've been very focused on simplifying and stripping things back in my life in general," says Amanda Werne. "Stripping back to get clearer contrasts that are easier to relate to. A lot of it is about relationships in the music. You might first see one side, and then suddenly you realize there's another, and maybe one more. But I'm always trying to reach a clarity that comes with simplicity."

As on previous albums, Werne wrote the songs herself, alone in a cabin in Skåne with no electricity or running water.

"I sat there and wrote a huge number of songs. I was pretty scared many times! The process looked much like before, but this time I wrote with the idea that it would just be me playing everything. Simplifying is something enriching. The real comes through, the matter-of-fact and the true come through. Simplifying requires you to return to yourself."

"Lugna" is Slowgold's eighth album and is released on Knippla Records.