If I Could Make It Go Quiet

Marie Ulven Ringheim[12][13] was born in the town of Horten on 16 February 1999.[14] She grew up in the town with her sisters and her divorced parents,[15] and described it as "quiet and kinda boring" in an interview with Triple J in October 2019.[16] Her mother worked with technology and her father worked as a policeman.[11] Her grandfather could play the guitar and piano; however, she grew up without instruments in the home.[17] Ulven received her first guitar as a Christmas gift from her grandfather in 2012, but didn't start playing it until 2013 after losing interest in fingerboarding.[16] She credits her grandfather for sparking her interest in music.[16] While in high school, Ulven was curious about becoming a teacher before she was introduced to the guitar and songwriting at the age of 14.[10] She had taught herself piano, guitar and music production from the comfort of her bedroom.[18] Ulven began by writing and releasing Norwegian music and planned to study music, but never concluded that she was going to become a musician.[10]

Career

2015–2017: SoundCloud and "I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend"

After getting a Blue Yeti microphone from her father in 2015,[16] Ulven began writing and releasing Norwegian music to SoundCloud under the moniker of "Lydia X".[10][19] She stopped attending guitar lessons after six months once her teacher refused to acknowledge her interest in songwriting and producing.[16] Ulven coined the stagename "Girl in Red" after attempting to identify herself in a crowd to a friend via text.[20] Using the new moniker, she published her debut single "I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend" on SoundCloud in November 2016,[21] where it got about 5 thousand streams within five months.[22] Following the single's feature on the Norwegian music website NRK Urørt, "I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend" amassed thousands of streams and gained Ulven a large online following.[23]

2018–2019: Chapter 1 and Chapter 2

Girl in Red in Los Angeles in September 2019

Ulven's 2018 singles "Summer Depression" and "Girls" gained millions of views and streams online.[24] In early 2019, she won her first award when she was presented with "Norwegian Newcomer of the Year" at the 2018 GAFFA Awards.[25] Ulven released "I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend" on Apple Music in March 2018.[26] After the release of Ulven's debut EP, Chapter 1, on 14 September 2018. "I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend" was listed at number 9 on The New York Times list of "The 68 Best Songs of 2018".[27][28] Ulven opened for Clairo in Dublin and Paris in September 2018 and released "We Fell in Love in October" in November 2018 which peaked at 14 on the US Rock Charts in October 2019.[29][30][31] In October 2018, the song "I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend" won "Årets Urørt" at the P3 Gull awards.[32] She performed the song as an interval act at the award ceremony in 2018, alongside names like Astrid S, Dagny, and Emilie Nicolas.[33] Ulven embarked on her first North American tour supporting Conan Gray in March 2019.[34] She released her second EP, Chapter 2, as well as Beginnings, a compilation of her entire single catalogue into one exclusively vinyl album on September 6, 2019 under AWAL.[35][36][37] She embarked on her first international headlining "World in Red" tour in October 2019, performing in cities such as Dublin and San Francisco.[38][22] Ulven was nominated for "Newcomer of the Year" at the 2019 P3 Gull awards.[39]

2020–present: If I Could Make It Go Quiet

Girl in Red performing in 2019

In December 2019, Ulven signed a worldwide recording contract with British music distribution company AWAL.[40][41] In a rare phenomenon for most new label signees, her entire existing discography, which had all originally been self-released, was subsequently registered under this label on all digital music platforms. Ulven appeared on the front cover of both Gay Times and Dork in December 2019,[42][43] as well as the cover of NME in January 2020.[14] She provided the single "Kate's Not Here" for the original soundtrack of the 2020 supernatural horror film The Turning.[44] Ulven was nominated for the Newcomer of the Year award and, as a result, the Gramo scholarship at the 2020 Spellemannprisen, also known elsewhere as the Norwegian Grammy Awards.[45] In May 2020, Ulven was included in the annual Dazed 100 list after her hit single "I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend" clocked 150 million streams.[46] In mid 2020, she became a popular symbol of queer identification on the online platform TikTok, where users would adopt the common phrase, "Do you listen to Girl in Red?" as a way of asking if someone was a lesbian.[47][48] In November, she released the standalone holiday single "Two Queens in a King Sized Bed",[49] shortly before she was awarded Artist of the Year at the 2020 P3 Gull Awards.[50]

Ulven released her debut studio album, titled If I Could Make It Go Quiet, on 30 April 2021.[51] The album has thus far been supported by four singles, "Midnight Love", in April 2020,[52] "Rue" in August 2020,[53] "Serotonin" in March 2021,[9] and "You Stupid Bitch" in April 2021.[54] The cover artwork for the album was made by the Norwegian painter and artist Fredrik Wiig Sørensen. Originally an oil painting on a 80x80 cm canvas, by the title of The Antizero. Ulven named Taylor Swift as one of her biggest musical influences.[55]