Lykke Li Triumphs with ‘Wounded Rhymes’

“It is a dream scenario playing in front of sold out crowds so I’m very thankful and excited,” she said. “The underdog in me can rest a little and it gives me some space, freedom and courage to really give people what they need and not only what they want.”

The illnesses hit just two months after the February release of her sophomore album “Wounded Rhymes.” That’s one reason Li likely pared her schedule down to the bare essentials, so she could concentrate on her health. Even though she’s better, writing will wait until a break in the tour, she said.

“I’m terrible in the way that I really cannot write on the road,” she said. “I need privacy and tranquility around me in order to hear my thoughts and write them down and there is no silence or privacy at all on my tour bus.

“I’m stuck with over 10 guys who are constantly playing Yatzee and drinking whiskey so I usually see touring as a good time to catch up on films, literature, or simply taking the time to hear about other people’s relationship drama, over some glasses of whiskey of course.”

Before she became ill, Li told New York magazine that the dark shades in her album are a reflection of some of what she found in California.

“L.A. is probably the most mysterious, craziest, psychedelic place on Earth. There are people with perfect teeth and big smiles and good tans,” she told New York magazine. “But there are also millions of people who came with a dream and never made it. There’s a lot of sorrow in that city. I just think it’s a magnetic place.”

She let those emotions expand into her music and used a Phil Spector-type “Wall of Sound” technique to bring out its hues yet keep it as genuine as possible. That’s why she bristles when people peg her as an electronic musician.

“I can still hear people talk about me in that way,” she said. “I’m the least electronic person — I carry books around.”