Today's Pick

Swedish electro songstress Lykke Li has put out a stylish new video for her gorgeous centerpiece ballad new track "Sadness Is A Blessing," is one of the best tracks featured on her latest fantastic sophomore record "Wounded Rhymes." The video, a state that perfectly suits a song saturated in misery, is featuring legendary Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgård and directed by Tarik Saleh, the same one behind Li's "I Follow Rivers" clip, Li herself puts in a great performance as a young woman in self-destruct/act-out mode.
Li's girl-group influences are most obvious on "Wounded Rhymes," which peaks with "Sadness is a Blessing." This track itself is a gorgeously intense and deep look at love, with brooding drums and heartbreaking vocals. Despite its lyrics ("sadness is my boyfriend, oh sadness I'm your girl"), the chorus to "Sadness is a Blessing" recalls the exuberance of The Ronettes's "(The Best Part of) Breakin' Up." True to the girl-group genre, sorrow is delivered as triumphantly as joy.
Li fled her native Sweden and moved to LA where she trained to be an actor. The 25-year-old is sexy in that strong-willed-but-still-cute-and-innocent way. If you watch any of her live performances, you'll notice she has the on-stage presence of a big, male rapper dude rather than a small, Swedish girl. In her music, she reveals every aspect of her personality: her romantic passion, her lust, her broken heart, her strength, her fury. And when you look at those big, brown eyes, it's like you can see all of that at once too; and that's sexy. The new video is a perfect example of what I'm talking about, is one of her most emotionally bare, and she really bares her emotions all over this video.
It's a brooding affair, all simmering tension, vodka shots and improvised dance moves. The video sees Li having a disruptive dinner affair with her boyfriend, before she breaks into a dance making the other restaurant punters feel a little uneasy. It opens with nearly two minutes of Li getting hammered in front of a quiet, uncomfortable restaurant crowd, and it's an emotional rollercoaster that ends up with Li dancing around, much to the embarrassment of onlookers. She expresses so much through those wild dance moves while people look on or try and stop her. It all seems really personal, like you feel guilty for watching it. But, she wants you to. Based in a Rolling Stone article that Li's been told by three different psychics that she was born with a broken heart. This song kind of makes a lot of sense after hearing that. This is one of her best videos yet.