ZARA LARSSON WAS A NICHE EURO POP STAR FOR 10 YEARS—THEN CAME ONE MEME

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From Olympic ice to TikTok dolphins, Zara Larsson’s U.S. success reveals how memes, patience and timing reshape careers.

Zara Larsson recently celebrated her first top-10 U.S. hit, despite having been in the music industry for 18 years.

When Alysa Liu performed Larsson’s collaboration with PinkPantheress, “Stateside,” on the Olympic stage, the track surged across streaming platforms, lifting the 28-year-old Swedish singer to the top of the U.S. charts for the first time. And almost instantly, social media began rewriting the narrative. If you scroll through Larsson’s own posts, or fan-made edits, the same line appears again and again in the comments: "a dolphin meme saved her career."

On the surface, that might sound about right. But Larsson’s slow yet sudden rise to the top tells a much more interesting story—one about timing, cultural literacy and what happens when pop stars stop fighting the internet and start listening to it.

“There’s a specific kind of internet moment that people can’t stop talking about,” Maria Rosey, founder of Viral Nest PR, told Newsweek.

“Not the slow, quiet comeback. The full, messy, chaotic reclamation. The artist who got written off stumbled into something viral and had the good sense to hold on tight. That’s what Larsson did.”

For years, Larsson occupied a familiar space in pop. She broke out young, dominated European charts, even landed international hits and maintained a steady career. Yet in the U.S., or even the U.K., she never quite crossed the threshold into "main pop girl," and in recent years it seemed her impressive career was dwindling.

Online, particularly on TikTok, she was increasingly folded into conversations about the so-called “Khia Asylum”—a tongue‑in‑cheek term used by chronically online music fans to describe artists who appeared to stall after early promise. Charli XCX, Sabrina Carpenter and Addison Rae were all, at different points, placed in the same category.

Larsson is talented. She was also, as Rosey puts it, adrift.

“She had the catalog, the experience, the voice,” Rosey said. “But she never had that cultural tipping point—the moment that turns you into a pop girl.”

That moment arrived, improbably, in the form of AI-generated dolphins.

From left: Zara Larsson in the music video for "Midnight Sun," and Larsson performing at The Hippodrome on March 17, 2017, in London, England. Credit: SOMMER HOUSE / EPIC RECORDS / SONY MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT / GETTY IMAGES

In late 2024, Clean Bandit's 2017 song “Symphony,” featuring Larsson's vocals, went viral on TikTok, paired with surreal, hyper-cheerful dolphin edits layered over darkly comic captions. The internet trend was funny, self-aware and impossible to escape.

“But here’s where most artists get it wrong,” Rosey said. “You either ignore the meme, or you lean in so hard that you turn yourself into the joke.”

How Larsson Owned the Meme

Larsson, whose fans often dub chronically online due to how frequently she comments on TikTok, clearly chose a third option. During her first live performances after the meme took off, she projected the dolphin visuals behind her onstage. It was a small gesture, but a telling one—acknowledging the moment without surrendering to it.

“She was in on the joke without selling the joke,” Rosey said.

What followed was not a dramatic reinvention, but a gradual realignment. Dolphin imagery began to appear across her visuals and performances. A maximalist, tropical, early‑2000s‑leaning aesthetic emerged—neon, glossy, bedazzled, slightly chaotic, and knowingly unserious. By 2025, that visual language fully crystallized with “Midnight Sun,” both the song and its video leaning heavily into the same aquatic, hyper‑online energy that first found her a year earlier.

From the outside, it looked like a rebrand sparked by internet luck. But from a branding perspective, it was something more precise.

“Larsson’s team didn’t create the meme,” Rosey said. “What they did was recognize the window and move through it.”

Rather than borrowing fan culture, her team folded it back into Larsson’s world. The audience was not just watching a comeback unfold; they were actively participating in it.

“That’s why so many people feel like they own a piece of her success now,” Rosey added. “It doesn’t feel like a campaign.”

The Visual Language of Pop Culture

Riannon Palmer, founder and CEO of the PR agency Lem‑uhn, sees Larsson’s trajectory as part of a wider shift in pop culture.

“Zara’s rebrand is a showcase of how stars need to lean into cultural conversations and community,” Palmer told Newsweek. “This wasn’t driven purely by brand research. It was inspired by what fans were already doing.”

Rather than distancing herself from meme culture, Larsson embraced it, reintroducing herself in a way that felt organic, nostalgic and slightly tongue‑in‑cheek. Crucially, the moment did not end with the initial meme.

“What matters is what you do next,” Palmer said. “They used it as a springboard rather than a one‑off viral spike.”

That follow‑through is visible in the cohesion of Larsson’s current output—from styling and visuals to musical composition—and helps explain why her Olympic‑boosted chart success feels earned rather than accidental.

There is also a broader recalibration happening in pop, Palmer explained. Artists once written off as stalled—Sabrina Carpenter, Raye,

Charli XCX, Addison Rae—are now central to the cultural conversation, and longevity is being increasingly understood as an advantage.

“A slower rise allows for a stronger, more defined brand,” Palmer said. “It’s built with the audience, not presented to them.

“You can’t manufacture what Zara got...But you can absolutely fumble it if you’re not paying attention.”

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