Dirt Femme

‘Dirt Femme’ sees her juxtapose elements ingeniously. If she’s singing in a straightforward manner, on a more direct number, then the music is twisting and turning in offbeat ways.

Dirt Femme is sexy, smart, and most importantly; fun. It’s a step up for Tove Lo without losing any of her signature charm, and it might just be her best album yet.

If Dirt Femme is the sound of Tove Lo finding her feet, the future seems very bright indeed.

The result is an album that’s spiky, surprising and not quite cohesive, but never ever boring. Tove Lo was always much too interesting to be a slave to the algorithm.

Dirt Femme isn’t Tove Lo’s magnum opus but in revealing a more vulnerable side and digging deeper into her ethos, she excels at not losing what has made her such a standout in a saturated genre over the years.

Lo is maturing but holding onto the most important parts of herself. Dirt Femme gives the confessional, sexual, and danceable sides of her music equal time and offers a fuller portrait of her music than we've heard before.

The album, sees the pop maven realize her own strength and let it take her somewhere new while keeping with her characteristic candor and energy.

Dirt Femme is a pop record and the compositions can be a little too close to something you’ve heard before. ... When she finds the right direction though, Tove Lo earns her place in the canon of the great Swedish pop song craftsmen.

Dirt Femme is one of Tove Lo’s strongest collection of songs yet, and the acoustic fingerpicking collaboration “Cute & Cruel” with First Aid Kit shows the different directions Lo can take her sound. Unfortunately, tracks like the by-the-numbers ballad “I’m to Blame” and the less-insightful-than-it-thinks dance cut “Attention Whore” get lumped in on the album’s back half, as they somewhat pull down the otherwise stellar material presented.

The narratives are dependably punchy through this record, and they’re carried by solidly danceable Eighties and Nineties club beats. Not an original sound, then. But one that allows her more challenging or subversive thoughts to slide slyly into a night out on the town.

As a collection of slightly melancholic, occasionally catchy dance-floor filler, it would be hard to quibble with Dirt Femme’s simple pleasures. But it’s burdened with a concept that’s under-explored, weighing down an album that promises to be so much more than what it is.

A pandemic baby, the album is a mixed bag as the singer explores new paths for herself.