The Hottest Breakout Stars of 2011

Swedish pop sensation Lykke Li was born with a broken heart. She knows this because two different psychics told her so. “I’ve been carrying that feeling my whole life,” says the doe-eyed 24-year- old. Her 2008 debut, Youth Novels, turned loneliness into indie-pop gold, winning her fans like Kings of Leon and Drake. It also landed her a gig soundtracking The Twilight Saga: New Moon. But Li seems more like something out of a Stieg Larsson novel: The Girl Who Loved Too Much. For her new album, Wounded Rhymes, Li rented a house in L.A. last winter. “For this record, too,” she says, “my soul was aching.” Girl-group-style laments like “Sadness Is a Blessing” are icy and haunting, delivered in her trademark breathy purr. “I’m actually very unhappy with my own voice,” Li says. “But it’s not for me anyway. I’m not the one who should come when I listen to it.”

-Josh Eells