For Newkid, music is just as much about memory and emotion as it is about melody. From the first tentative piano chords to imagining the perfect live set.
Having carved out a distinct place in the Swedish music scene over the past decade, Newkid reflects on the different phases of his career, the personal experiences that have shaped his sound, and the evolution of his creative process. From club bangers to intimate power ballads, fatherhood and nostalgia.
In this conversation, he opens up about his current musical chapter, his visual expression, and the enduring passion that drives him to create. Here he presents a story about songs, synths, stagecraft, and the very human desire to make art that’s truly yours.
Elsa Chagot: You’ve been part of the Swedish music scene for a while now and gone through several phases – how are you feeling right now, where do you stand musically and personally?
Newkid: I’ve been around for quite a long time now. My first record came out in 2011, so quite a few years have passed, and during this time, I went through different eras. You change as a person. There was a period when I was single and making a lot of club music, playing in clubs all the time. Then I had a period where I wrote a lot of break-up songs, because I’d just gone through a break-up myself. I also became a dad two years ago, and that’s a huge thing in life. It changes a lot. I think the music has been influenced by that in some way.
An Interview with Newkid
text Elsa Chagot
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EC: Does it feel like you’re entering a new musical era compared to earlier chapters of your career?
Newkid: I call the new era my power ballad era. t’s a bit meta because I actually grew up with parents who listened to power ballads. When I was a kid, that’s the music they usually played at home. And now it almost feels like a full-circle moment.
The tempo is a bit slower as well. I’m not at the club anymore. I like gigs that happen earlier in the evening, where it’s not quite as intense. So in a way, life and music go hand in hand. I’m in a calmer stage right now, trying to figure out who this new version of me is. It’s still quite new.
EC: In that case, I have to ask, what is your all-time favourite power ballad song?
Newkid: Forever Young. It’s one of those songs that’s been with me since I was a kid, dancing to slow songs at school discos. It just has this incredible power – a really special kind of energy. I have so many memories in my life connected to that song that I can bring back whenever I hear it. I genuinely love it.
EC: In that case, I have to ask, what is your all-time favourite power ballad song?
Newkid: Forever Young. It’s one of those songs that’s been with me since I was a kid, dancing to slow songs at school discos. It just has this incredible power – a really special kind of energy. I have so many memories in my life connected to that song that I can bring back whenever I hear it. I genuinely love it.
EC: When you create music, where does it usually start for you: with a feeling, a lyric, a melody, or something else entirely?
Newkid: Nine times out of ten, I start by writing the chords and the melody. I basically write all my songs on the piano first. It’s a very intuitive process; you sit down, and you’re feeling a certain way that day. I try not to think too much about it. If anything, I try to think as little as possible. I just play and sing and see what feels right. Something in it sort of pulls you in a certain direction, and you realise, okay, this is the path to follow.
Once I have the melodies and chords, I usually start figuring out the lyrics. Sometimes when you’re sort of mumbling a melody to yourself, a random word slips out, and occasionally I’ll latch onto one of those words and start building from there. I’ll ask myself: what does this song feel like, even before there are any real lyrics?
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EC: What are you working on right now, and what can you tell us about the project and about your release, Hurricane?
Newkid: Right now, I’m working on the songs that will be released in the autumn; the whole project will have ten tracks in total. That’s really why I’m in the studio at the moment. I’m here about three days a week.
One day a week, I focus on content, which has become such a huge part of being an artist now. In recent years, it’s almost like you have to create content all the time alongside the music.
We’ve started planning the summer tour and getting ready to go out and play live. I often take a song and look at it from a live perspective – if it isn’t naturally a “live-friendly” track, I think about how I can adapt it so it works on stage. How can I weave it into a set that makes sense for the era I’m in?
EC: What makes a song more live-friendly, and what does meeting your audience live mean to you?
Newkid: That’s a good question. Sometimes you’re in the studio, and you just think, “This is going to be amazing live.”
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When I’m out playing live, I usually have about an hour on stage, and that hour needs a sense of dramaturgy. It has to take the audience somewhere. So I need some more up-tempo songs, then some that slow things down. They need to feel explosive at the beginning.
And then there are the big hits. If you’re lucky enough to have those, people usually just want to hear them the way they know them. But you might still tweak things a bit to make it more special. I care about my live performances a great deal, but it’s really like putting together a puzzle.
Ultimately, a good live song is one that the audience can connect with. Ideally, it gives them a similar feeling to the first time they heard the recorded version – even though it doesn’t sound the same as it does on Spotify. It’s more like another version of that moment.
I think capturing the same feeling, or something close to it, is the most important thing.
EC: Is there still a dream show on your bucket list, maybe a specific venue or city that would feel especially meaningful to you?
Newkid: I’m from Uddevalla, and this summer I’m playing there. I’ve played for incredibly big crowds before, but I’m always the most nervous when I go back to Uddevalla. I know I’ll see people in the audience that I grew up with. And just the thought of standing on that stage, the same place where I used to go and watch artists when I was a kid… it makes it feel incredibly important that those shows turn out exactly the way I want them to. It’s my hometown. Uddevalla is always the one that makes me the most nervous. And I guess that’s probably because, deep down, it means the most to me when I’m there.
Newkid: I’m from Uddevalla, and this summer I’m playing there. I’ve played for incredibly big crowds before, but I’m always the most nervous when I go back to Uddevalla. I know I’ll see people in the audience that I grew up with. And just the thought of standing on that stage, the same place where I used to go and watch artists when I was a kid… it makes it feel incredibly important that those shows turn out exactly the way I want them to. It’s my hometown. Uddevalla is always the one that makes me the most nervous. And I guess that’s probably because, deep down, it means the most to me when I’m there.
EC: You have a very cool aesthetic and personal style. How important is style and visual expression to you as an artist, and how does it connect to the music you make?
Newkid: If you look back to when I first started making music, you could spend so much money on music videos and all sorts of things. You could spend huge amounts on the whole packaging around a song.
Today, with social media, things move so quickly that sometimes it actually works better, purely in terms of reach, to just sit down and sing a song straight to the camera. People want to get to know you as a person. It feels like knowing who you are as an ordinary human being has become a much bigger part of it. However, I still really love the idea of building big worlds around the music, even if they cost a lot of money.
Visually, that side of things is very important to me. My real passion lies in being an artist rather than just a singer. And part of being an artist is creating these worlds around the songs, making sure the visual expression speaks the same language as the music in some way.
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EC: Almost like a persona?
Newkid: More like an amplified version of me. Like me on steroids, in a way. Ultimately, I want to be recognised for who I actually am – not for a character I’ve invented. That’s very important to me.
EC: When you look five years ahead, how do you envision yourself and your music career?
Newkid: I have to play Ullevi before I retire. Whether that’s in five years or ten doesn’t really matter to me, but I have to play at Ullevi. It’s a classic and iconic venue, and it’s on the West Coast, close to where I’m from. That’s something I really want to do.
On a day-to-day level, what I really want is simply to keep making music and be able to live off it. That alone is such a blessing. It’s actually kind of crazy that this is my job. I sit here, messing around on instruments and doing what used to be my hobby. It still hits me – what an insane job this is.
EC: Is there any artist or producer, in Sweden or internationally, that you’ve long dreamed of collaborating with?
Newkid: If you look at the fifteen years I’ve been making music, I’ve actually done relatively few features. Of course, I have idols, but sometimes it’s actually quite nice not to meet your idols. Every time I get that question about who I’d like to collaborate with, I feel like I just end up saying something random because I’m not entirely sure.
The truth is, I think I simply enjoy making music by myself because I write them on my own. After that, it doesn’t really matter who helps me finish them, as long as the process is fun and the result captures the feeling I’m looking for.
EC: Finally, if music hadn’t become your path in life, what do you think you would have been doing instead?
Newkid: There are other things in life, besides music, that have spoken to me. I’ve always loved architecture. From a pretty young age, I used to download 3D software and design houses in it, and furniture too.
Also, trying to design the perfect chair would be so great. There are already so many great chairs out there, but still… There’s something so cool about the idea of standing in a workshop, building a chair yourself, bringing it home and thinking: I actually made this.
It’s still about the same thing in the end — creating something. Taking an idea and turning it into something you can touch, listen to, or see.
Architecture might be a bit more complicated, but designing furniture could definitely be something I do when I retire. That would be amazing. And at some point, I’d love to build a house for my family.
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