Axwell: Swedish House Mafia's Label Rejected 'Don't You Worry Child'

The Label Said No

Speaking with Brian Fink on America's Dance 30, Axwell recalled how Swedish House Mafia nearly left their biggest anthem unfinished. When the trio played the track for their record label in 2012, the response was lukewarm at best.

"I think 'Don't You Worry Child' was pretty close to not getting finished," he said. "And when we played it to the record label, they said, 'Ah, this is not it.'"

The response could have sent the track back to the studio, where another round of revisions might have stretched into weeks or killed the song altogether. Instead, Axwell and his bandmates, Steve Angello and Sebastian Ingrosso, decided to trust their own instincts.

Trust Your Gut

"We were like, 'Listen, we have this last show that we're going to do. So we need to release it. We don't care. We believe in it, so let's go,'" Axwell recalled.

The trio released the track featuring vocals from John Martin before what would become their final show, a headline set at Miami's Ultra Music Festival, prior to their split in March 2013. The song quickly became a global EDM hit and earned a Grammy nomination for Best Dance Recording. Its soaring chorus continues to soundtrack festival singalongs around the world.

The Producer's Dilemma

The story offers a glimpse into a familiar predicament for electronic music producers, who can spend months or even years revisiting an arrangement in search of an elusive final adjustment. A harmony might need another take, a synth might sound slightly off or a vocal that once seemed irresistible can begin to lose its appeal after the hundredth listen.

Axwell said the tendency to keep working on music can become an obstacle in itself. "You have to sometimes just let things out in the world and let it live its life," he said. "You can work on something forever and then you can, in the end, destroy it or never release it. This is something that we battle with all the time."

The full interview clip is available on Instagram.