Lykke Li: Youth Novels

On her full-length debut, Lykke Li sounds like

she's been waiting to refashion the classical torch song her whole life. Youth

Novels is

all teasing and heartbreak, with production (from Peter Bjorn & John's

Bjorn Yttling) that plays on empty spaces as much as well-chosen backing. Li's

voice is spacier and breathier than her forebears': Her whisper floats in the

upper registers, refusing virtuosity. She's lewder, too: The first single, "Little

Bit," has her promising "for you I keep my legs apart," though the rhyme brings

her back to a familiar image, a "tainted heart." Her suggestive instrumentation

drives the songs home with minimal resources: "Little Bit" lives up to its

name, using little more than a bassline and a time-keeping percussive section

for the verses. It's a template of sparseness more or less followed throughout.

Li wants to make an album, not just a series of future singles, which leads to

ill-advised connective tissue: A spoken-word intro and "This Trumpet In My

Head," a moody trumpet solo and acoustic guitar, are hardly as haunting as

intended. Mostly, though, Li adeptly straddles the line between instant

gratification and minimalist smarts.