Poster Girl

Poster Girl is Zara Larsson’s third studio album, released on March 5th, 2021. This project is the follow-up to her sophomore album, So Good, which was released March 17, 2017. The latter was the most streamed album by a Female Artist on Spotify the years of its release and spawned several global hits such as ‘Lush Life’, ‘Never Forget You’ and ‘Ain’t My Fault’.

In an interview with Spain’s Los 40, Zara said that the album would be released after summer and it will have 12 songs. On January 2021, Zara has confirmed on Twitter that the deluxe version of the album will contain two bonus tracks.

After dropping ‘Ruin my life’ at the end of 2018, the single has charted on the Billboard Hot 100. Unfortunately, the following singles, ‘Don’t worry bout me’, ‘WOW’ and ‘All the time’ didn’t make it to the charts the following year, resulting in Poster Girl being delayed by RCA and SONY, because it needed some more work.

While waiting for news, Zara Larsson’s fans have been able to enjoy her very successful collaboration with DJ and producer Kygo and featuring American rapper Tyga, ‘Lke it is’. It ended up having the most watched EDM video on VEVO at the end of 2020.

Eventually, Zara has started teasing her album with the release of ‘Love Me Land’ in July 2020. During the song’s promotion, she affirmed that one of her inspirations for the upcoming album was ABBA, and that she plans to adopt a more mature sound, whether or not it charts.

In August 2020, ‘WOW’ has seen a resurgence in charts and has been getting lots of Shazams because of being featured in the Netflix movie Work it, which stars singer and actress Sabrina Carpenter. The two women have met before and decided to remix the track. Once SONY pushed it as a single and it started charting in the UK (mostly thanks to radio plays), fans started speculating ‘WOW’ would be included in the tracklist.

In an interview for EUPHORIA magazine, Zara gave some details about the producing process: ‘’‘Love Me Land’ was the last song that I wrote for this album and that was written one day before lockdown in LA, so back in March. I went back home (to Sweden) and have been putting it together since. We’ve had a little shoot for the album and are wrapping it up, it just takes time. The track listing is now there. Everything is there. I’ve been able to record a few things and I’ll send them to people who are way better than I am at producing. A DJ might have something and they’ll send it to me so I can put down an idea and send it back. […] I actually didn’t write anything during lockdown. I think maybe future music will have some nods to lockdown, but I wanted this album now to be a form of escapism. I don’t want to think about lockdown here. This next one is normal life.”

“I’m a perfectionist and wanted to learn how to produce, but when I open Logic, I’m so frustrated that it doesn’t come out and sound like Max Martin made it, or like why doesn’t it sound like a No. 1 hit? That’s why I don’t want to play the piano because I want to be instantly good at stuff and that’s a really bad trait of mine. It’s either all or nothing, but that’s what I’m going to learn is how to produce.‘’

Still during Fall 2020, Zara has confirmed to The Forumist that Poster Girl is a pop album:

‘'I love how pop music can be allowed to be simple, and accessible to anyone. Though there aren’t any clear political statements in my music, I believe I can change lives just by making pop."

“The title track is really about weed, another love song so to speak, as I don’t want to be the poster girl for it, but I do love it. The album title itself refers to me wanting to be the poster girl for many things, while also being a private person my Instagram followers don’t actually know. There is a complexity to a person that cannot be printed onto a poster, but then again it’s not up to me whether I’m a poster girl or not.”

“If you like what I have released before you will also enjoy Poster Girl. I have given this album a lot of thought, and now I finally feel ready to release it. Poster Girl has highs and lows, just like life, and I have written it with people whom I really love.”

A few days before announcing the album in January 2021, French media Charts in France released an interview with Zara Larsson made through Zoom in December 2020. The singer describes Poster Girl as having a more mature sound and she develops on her artistic growth and not feeling the need for her music to chart from the moment that she is satisfied with it.