Marie Ulven, the 22-year-old singer-songwriter from Norway better known as girl in red, writes music that sounds as volatile, passionate, and dramatic as the final scene from a great romance film. Her early songs about queer identity — singles like 2017’s “we fell in love in october” and 2018’s “i wanna be your girlfriend” — amassed hundreds of millions of streams, and they turned Ulven into a Gen-Z it-girl, with the phrase “do you listen to girl in red?” becoming code for young queer girls to ask other girls if they like girls. In April, girl in red released her debut album if i could make it go quiet. Ulven retains her diaristic lyricism on the album, refusing to sand down the rough edges of heartbreak or mental health struggles. At the same time, girl in red pushes into the future, maximizing each element of her sound, whether it’s blinding guitar pop bombast or tender, aching balladry. A few days before the release of the album,

Marie Ulven, better known as girl in red, tells The FADER’s Jordan Darville about how working on her mental health makes her a better songwriter, what she learned about love from creating her new album if i could make it go quiet, and the music she’s been working on since.

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