CD CHOICE:This weeks CD Choiceis Youth Novelsby Lykke Li

 LYKKE LI
Youth Novels
LL
*****
Here's where pop may start to get interesting again. Lykke Li is all about reimagining where pop can go. Her songs start out in one direction but quickly veer this way and that. But Youth Novelsworks because the singer knows exactly what she is doing. She's as pop as pop can get, a mesmeric and delightful one-off with skills and songs to pay the bills.

Perhaps it shouldn't surprise us that this exotic, intoxicating, futuristic album comes from Sweden, which has become pop's home away from home when it comes to adventurous sounds. Few months go by without another Swedish name pushing its way into the frame. Next month, for instance, expect to see Kleerup shaking his tush in the limelight.

While some blue-chip Swedes have lent a hand here - chiefly Bjorn Yttling (of Peter, Bjorn and John), with assistance from famed pop producer Lasse Mårtén - the real kudos go to the 22-year-old singer. Her songs sound like absolutely no one else's, and she has written the wonderfully melodramatic and wry lyrics, and sculpted one sensational groove after another around that girlish, shy, hiccup of a voice.

You'll thrill to Little Bit, for sure, one of the many knockout punches thrown here. Of course, like everything else on Youth Novels, you just won't see it coming as it turns and twists from a simple, honed momentum into a killer tune. Then, she goes on to do this again ( Dance Dance Danceuses the bounce of a ping-pong ball as the rhythm) and again ( Complaint Departmentbuilds its groove) and again ( I'm Good I'm Goneis so breathtaking that your instant reaction is simply to press play again).

Youth Novelsis an album that will charm, seduce and tease you like you've never been charmed, seduced or teased before. www.myspace.com/lykkeli
Download tracks: Little Bit, Dance Dance Dance, Complaint Department