Sigrid says she’s never had this much fun recording an album as she previews third record

Sigrid Solbakk Raabe, the Norwegian singer-songwriter known simply as Sigrid, describes her forthcoming third album, There’s Always More That I Could Say, as "an energetic extrovert album with introvert lyrics." In a BBC Newsbeat interview, she discussed the record and its lead energy, Fort Knox, the second single from the record, which she says gives a flavor of the energy she is aiming for.

Despite having performed on some of the biggest festival stages in the world, including Glastonbury, Roskilde, and Reading and Leeds, Sigrid says she remains an introvert at heart. She recalls crying during a group performance in school and says the piano offered a safe space to grow her craft. "Piano is more of an introvert instrument," she explains. "It’s the type of instrument where you’re facing away from the crowd, you’re looking into the piano. I just disappeared into that world and I was singing into the piano. I wasn’t singing out into the room and it felt safe. It felt like I was creating my own world there."

What she loves about live music, she adds, is the sense of control it gives her. "What I love about live music is that I’m in full control, I don’t like having a lot of faffing around me. I just want to do the thing." She describes the upcoming album, There’s Always More That I Could Say, as an "energetic extrovert album with introvert lyrics" and says Fort Knox, her second single from the record, captures that energy. "I feel like I’ve released a lot of myself in this. It’s a song that’s quite angry, but a joyous rage. Sometimes it can feel quite liberating to just release the energy."

Fort Knox is the second single from the record, and she says it gives a clear flavor of the energy she is aiming for on the full project.

Looking back, Sigrid says she had a crash course in growing up. She wrote her first email to a record label and briefly enrolled in a politics course at university before dropping out after three weeks to pursue music full time. The year leading up to her breakout single, Don’t Kill My Vibe, was, in her words, the best education she could have received. She spent seven years in the grind of writing and touring, hopping between London and Norway and finishing song after song under pressure to deliver pop bangers. "You’ve got the pressure of ‘we’ve gotta have some bangers here, we’re in the pop industry,’" she recalls. "But the point was to just finish something. It was very stressful doing that for seven years, song after song after song. It makes you blur the lines between music creativity and content - quantity over quality."

For the current project, she says she changed the recording approach with her producer to take the pressure off. Much of the work was done outside a traditional studio, in parks and coffee shops, allowing ideas to marinate and evolve more naturally. "Sometimes a song needs to marinate for a year, six months, it can take some time," she notes. "I’ve never had this much fun recording an album before."

Her career to date includes high-profile festival appearances and a top spot on BBC Music’s Sound of 2018 list, making her the second-youngest artist to achieve the honor after Adele in 2008. Those early achievements have not erased the sense that growth is ongoing. She says the new material preserves the energy of her live shows while exploring deeper, more intimate lyrics.

The new album, she says, is designed to be an energetic collection that still allows room for reflection and lyric-driven detail. Fort Knox serves as a marker of the direction she is taking: a fusion of punchy, anthemic moments with lines that reveal the quieter, more introspective impulses that have long guided her songwriting. As she moves toward release, Sigrid emphasizes that the creative process has become more collaborative and less burdened by the external pressure that once dominated her writing routine.

With this approach, she hopes listeners will hear a balance: the bright, arena-ready energy she’s known for, tempered by the introspective storytelling that first drew fans to her music. For now, Fort Knox stands as a signal that the third album will push the boundaries of her pop sensibility while staying true to the instincts that helped her emerge from a piano bench to festival stages around the world.