Album Review: Tove Lo – Dirt Femme
2 min read
‘Cool Girl’ Tove Lo, known for flashing on stage and her raunchy lyrics, is not one to shy away from controversy since she burst onto the scene in 2014 with Habits (Stay High). So it makes sense after four provocative album releases on Universal, Lo has gone her separate way to launch her own label, Prett Swede Records, with its first release being Dirt Femme.
Lo’s first album since 2019 is an electropop exploration of love, sexuality and body image. Dirt Femme opens with ambient eighties synths on the track No One Dies from Love, which makes for a worrying start as we see yet another 2022 album pull repetitive inspiration from the eighties. But overused synths aside, as we move through the record it becomes clear there’s nothing boring about Dirt Femme. On Suburbia, Lo uses an enticing electric beat with sad undertones to discuss how she doesn’t want to become a ‘Stepford wife’, now that she is a married woman. Before opening up about her eating disorder on Grapefruit and experimenting on the track 2 Die 4, which samples the 1970s hit Popcorn by Hot Butter, which was also used in the 2000s by Crazy Frog.
Another reason which makes Dirt Femme so lovable is Lo’s amazing collaboration with popular producer SG Lewis on Call On Me and Pineapple Slice. Call On Me has remnants of the Hi-NRG dance music that dominated clubs in the eighties, and Pineapple Slice’s cool, electrifying beat is sprinkled with Lo’s sexy lyrics that she doesn’t hold back on: ‘I lift my hips, that’s your go ahead’ and ‘You gotta taste what’s in front of you’. The beat also gives parallels to the unforgettable classic deep house track Child by George Fitzgerald, making it hard not to love.
Lo’s first release as an independent artist has done herself justice. Her versatility shines through by her ability to create fun electropop beats laced with synths and explicit lyrics that are sure to get people up on the dancefloor. Whilst also diving into more serious topics around body image and domesticity, highlighting her growth as a musician.
