Ready or not, Molly Nilsson is gonna break your heart again – in the best kind of way, of course. Her sixth album, Zenith, is out September 25, thirteen more tender yet defiant songs that manage to capture the human condition with little more than wit and a Casio keyboard. Berliners will be treated to a live preview on September 15 at Berghain, with over 3,300 people expected to attend (that is, if Facebook can be trusted, which obviously it can’t). Music vids for Lovers are Losers, 1995 and Mountain Time have helped build anticipation over the last several weeks.

SIEGESSÄULE asked the Swedish songwriter how she feels about channeling her handcrafted, lovingly imperfect pop creations through the techno temple’s massive soundsystem: “It's like the time when I saw Peter Jackson's The Hobbit on a flight once, on a tiny and crackling screen, with the pilots announcements interfering every so often. I had to laugh to myself, wondering what Jackson would think of his technical masterpiece in this context,” says Molly. “It reminded me how one shouldn't really rely on the technicalities for their work – the idea is within the viewer and listener already, and no soundsystem could ever carry it on truly. So, yeah, I'm gonna feel great.”

Indeed, her songs have sonic flaws (not to mention emotional scars). The music would have been state-of-the-art in 1980, and her album covers, consistently in strict black-and-white, also hark back to a simplicity of a pre-digital era. But Molly leads us not into nostalgia. If anything, she holds our hand into the future, offering solace during instability, an antidote to “neoliberalist bullshit”, a celebration of vulnerability. With Zenith, she helps us imagine our own new ways of moving forward and our own definitions of success, just as she has done throughout her short but impressive career.

This is Ms. Nilsson’s second appearance onstage at Berghain; the release concert for her last album, The Travels, was originally scheduled for the Kantine next door, but overwhelming response shifted the show into the main club (where, by the way, she formerly worked at the coatcheck). In the meantime, she released a 7” single and a 10” EP, played over 50 shows in North and South America and Europe, and got her haircut stolen by Sia.

Joey Hansom

Shameless/Limitless presents
Molly Nilsson w/ Apostille, Alex Cameron, DJ Planningtorock
Sep. 15, 20:00, Berghain