Schedule a video call with Karin Dreijer, and you might not know what to expect on the other end of the screen. The enigmatic recording artist has been something of a shadowy figure since they first broke through as one half of The Knife, a culture-busting electronic duo formed with their brother Olof near the turn of the century in Gothenburg, Sweden. The pair largely eschewed interviews and public appearances amid runaway success, sporting beaked plague-doctor masks in rare press photos and snubbing awards ceremonies as they racked up repeat Swedish Grammys in major categories like Pop Group and Songwriters of the Year.
Dreijer carries on this tradition with their solo project, Fever Ray, whose singular self-titled 2009 debut marked a new era for an artist with an impish reputation for biting their thumb at the establishment. Inhabiting macabre costumed characters to match their pitch-shifted vocal style — a standard Fever Ray club banger can catapult from a grime-stained growl to a bird-like flutter in the span of a single chorus — the 14 years since have found Dreijer expanding the map of possibilities as they push the boundaries of sound, style and gender performance.
On their ghastly and groove-forward third LP Radical Romantics, released in March via their own Rabid Records, Dreijer applies this time-tested toolkit with a new vulnerability on earthbound subjects like love and aging. Take a line from the album’s dancefloor-ready lead single, “Kandy,” which finds the artist grappling with the long game of creating art under the grim specter of the grave: “What if I die with this song still inside?”
Dressed in a nondescript black hoodie and ballcap, Dreijer was a far cry from their gruesome stage characters when they met over Zoom with Boulder Weekly during a recent interview. The 48-year-old iconoclast opened up about life, love and their sublime new record ahead of the Nov. 10 Fever Ray show at the Fillmore Auditorium in Denver — one of only five cities on the artist’s forthcoming U.S. tour.
The following has been edited for brevity and clarity.
It’s been about seven months since the release of Radical Romantics. How does it feel now that your third Fever Ray LP is out in the world?
I mean, I think I’m very happy. It’s been very well received, and I guess it feels very good. We’ve mostly been touring since the album was out, and I have enjoyed that a lot. But now it’s been a while since I finished it, so I’m starting to feel like I would like to go back to the studio.
Do you feel more comfortable there than you do on stage?
No, I don’t think that anymore. It’s two very different kinds of work. In the studio, I’m mostly by myself for a very long time writing, recording and producing. On tour it’s very much a collective, being around a lot of people. So it can also be a bit lonely to be in the studio, but I enjoy both.
When you look back on these last three Fever Ray records, what sets apart Radical Romantics in your mind?
I’m much older. [Laughs.] For me it’s almost like three different lives, because so much time passed in between. And I guess in a way, the last one is slower and a bit more from a place where you have thought stuff through a bit. The Plunge [2017] album is a bit itchy and restless — which I definitely have those sides still. But for me, they’re like returning from very different times in life. It’s like stuff you have gone through and then put behind.
Critics have called this a ‘vulnerable’ album. Does that feel right to you?
Yes. Because you have to be vulnerable to be honest, I think. And if you want to tell a story in a very true, clear way, then you have to go into that space of vulnerability. It is a scary place. You have to be a bit brave, I guess, to go there.
I would describe your music as brave.
To be brave you have to be afraid of things. And I am afraid of a lot of things. Then it becomes brave.
What are you afraid of?
So many things, but it has become better. I’m afraid of losing my mind. And I had a lot of stage fright also in the past. Which, I think this tour is our first tour that I really enjoy doing, and I’ve been doing this for more than 30 years now. So it’s interesting to see that things can change. You can actually overcome fear.
What led to you becoming more comfortable on stage?
I think there was a lot of things. One thing I realized is we’re doing some kind of storytelling. And I acknowledge the whole history behind me: all the people who have done this before me. I think it’s like a continuation that I am part of now. So I just have this tiny small role in a long line … and that has made it much easier for me. Because then it’s not so much about me. It’s about what we do on stage.
You inhabit these often grotesque-looking characters in your performances and videos and often obscured your face in public appearances with The Knife. Did that grow in some part out of that fear of being on stage?
I actually think there is no such thing as authenticity. Everything is performance. Every time you go up in the morning, you choose what to wear, how to look, how your hair looks and everything. So I don’t think there is a natural way of being.
I work very close to Martin Falck, who is a collaborator I worked with also on the Plunge album. We make the videos together and he does the costumes and everything around the tour. We work very intuitively. We want it to be fun and humorous — which I think it is, but I know it’s also a bit dark and more emotional and sad sometimes. I think the characters are needed to express the things that we want to talk about in a more clear way.
And as far as that relates to gender performance, your vocals have always played in a space between what people might call ‘male’ and ‘female.’ How has that specific type of performance changed for you over the years?
I mean, when we started with The Knife — this is, like, 25 years ago — we played around with the sound of the vocal a lot. It was not so much thinking about gender at that time. It was more intuitive and just feeling what kind of voice and what kind of character would want to tell this story or sing this song. And to make it as clear as possible. Then you feel like there’s a lot of people, and maybe yourself sometimes: When you hear a voice, you feel a very strong need to categorize it. Like, “What is this person singing?” We thought that was very fun to play around with. This was before I knew of the expression or identity of non-binary. In Sweden at that time, it wasn’t a common thing.
That is something I just continued with, because when I think of songs and vocals in my head, I have different voices. How do I want to say this in the best way? It has different sounds. It’s a tool, I think, for expressing things — and it makes it more open. It’s a very free space in my recording studio. I can do whatever I want, almost.
What was it like working with your brother again on some of these songs?
It was fun. We didn’t really have a plan when we started. I just asked: “Would you like to help out with this track?’” And then he was like, “Yes, sure!” And then we just did a few more. We have our studios next to each other, and there’s a window in between. But yeah, it was nice to work together again.
So it sounds like the idea was always that these would be Fever Ray songs. There was never a thought that you might be getting The Knife back together?
Yes, because I had already started the songs — finished lyrics and everything. And when we do Knife stuff, we always do everything together. We start from scratch and talk about what it is that we want to do. And here it was very clear. So for me it was much easier because I had sort of the last say in everything.
I know bell hooks’ All About Love was an influence on this record. What did you find so radical about the ideas in that book, and how do they show up in the music?
I think to understand that love is a verb — it’s something that you do — that was a very radical thing to me. Then putting it to practice: It’s actually what we do for each other. It’s not what we say or manifest in different ways. It comes through in the lyrics here and there: the doing. The music is more about feelings.
What do you think makes a good love song, and do you have any favorites?
Me and Martin realized there are probably no love songs on the album. [Laughs.] I was thinking the other day about this old ’90s song “Górecki” by Lamb. That is a good one.
If you ask me, ‘Heartbeats’ [by The Knife] is one of the greatest love songs of all time.
Yes, but I couldn’t use it. [Laughs.]
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ON THE BILL: Fever Ray with Christeene. 7 p.m. Friday, Nov. 10, Fillmore Auditorium, 1510 N. Clarkson St., Denver. Tickets here.
