It seems an age (2017 I think) since I saw Resmiranda (Åsa Larsson) perform live at a festival in Sweden, practicing her scales before her slot and then presenting ‘Lilith’s Roar’ about the first partner of Adam, one that was a lot less docile than Eve.
I knew straight away that (1) she was a little different to say the least and (2) that she’d never be mainstream. Actually I got the second bit wrong. She went viral with her video about the ancient Swedish tradition of kulning, or calling the cattle in from far-flung meadows, and with another one in which a dog sang along with her in a TV talent show.
But these little diversions apart she’s been ploughing an often lonely furrow these last few years, sometimes collaborating with poets to produce deep, introspective songs that are tied either to feminism, sisterhood or environmentalism (she’s especially supportive of trees), or all of them. Included amongst her output was a 2019 album, unsurprisingly titled ‘For the trees’, that includes a wonderful 33-minute long conceptual second side, titled ‘The Calling.’
Our first review of 2025 was of ambient electronic specialist AKB (Anna-Karin Berglund) and her track ‘Noir’ from the compilation album ‘Because we love music’ from the Lamour label which is based in Gävle, a small town in central Sweden which is or has been home to these and many other musicians.
I had a sneaking feeling that it wouldn’t be the only track we’d feature from that album and lo and behold up pops Resmiranda with the ninth performance from it, ‘Slowly’.
She says she took a break during the autumn “to learn more about music production and working on some of the many songs that are lingering inside me, itching to come out.”
One of the songs she has been working on is ‘Slowly’ and she reveals being nervous about it as “it feels more vulnerable, more revealing than many of the other songs I’ve written.”
Like many other songs, including some we’ve featured only recently, it is a child of the pandemic, social distancing and isolation. Just as the harsh working class conditions of post-industrial Manchester were the catalyst for a new breed of songwriter in the 1980s, for Resmiranda Covid was the spur to learning more about closeness and its importance.
Out of that consideration arose ‘Slowly’, about how intimate and slow love can be allowed to be.
It was also, she admits, “a kind of reckoning with a relationship drama that completely broke me six years ago.” She adds, “It’s taken time to piece my heart back together and dare to trust again. My slow healing process has gone hand in hand with the song’s creation, and now that the song is being released, I’ve finally reached a point where I’ve dared to entrust my heart to someone again.”
To which she adds a little <3. Aw, bless.
She never ceases to surprise me. Had someone sent me this song incognito I would never had guessed it was Resmiranda.
I was expecting a slushy ballad (not that I’m aware of any of those that she has written before now) but instead was served up with something that is experimental, powerful, ballsy, suggestive, even a little raunchy and disturbing.
The best way I can describe it, before you listen to it, is to think of that infamous ‘love scene’ between Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie in Venice, in ‘Don’t Look Now’.
Take away the soppy piano, guitar and flute accompaniment to that scene and replace it with this more gutsy song, which even has rapidly beating hearts and a couple of metaphorical orgasms thrown in and the film would have been twice as good.
I think the girl is in lurve.
Find her on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/resmirandamusic
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/resmiranda/
