Lykke Li had a good South by Southwest. Mostly. The 22-year-old Swede (whose name is pronounced "Luke-ee Lee") played 11 shows in three days before "literally falling offstage and going eurrrrgh," she says, evoking the ailing larynx that made her cancel a 12th gig at the festival.

In a nutshell: Brought together in 2003 by a love of lager and lyrics about odd animals, singer/guitarist Matthew "Murph" Murphy, drummer/singer Dan Haggis, and bassist Tord Øverland Knudsen met while enrolled at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, cofounded by Paul McCartney.

In a nutshell: Thrown out of her school choir at age eight for being too loud, Welsh native Aimee-Ann Duffy poured all her energy into a pink karaoke machine, a gift from Santa. On it she recorded countless original songs, sending CDs off to record companies. "That machine was my dear friend for about six years," the singer says over a latte in a London café.

Heckling Bono as he gave a speech in London. Wobbling through a cover of Michael Jackson's "Beat It" on a British television show. Smacking a fan for bad-mouthing her after a gig. In the U.K., soul singer Amy Winehouse, well known for public displays of drunkenness, has been accused of all of these things. But when her former manager

Many claims to Robyn's greatness are made in "Curriculum Vitae," the spoken-word intro to her new album: "World-record holder with a high score of two gazillion in Tetris…she split the atom, invented the X-ray… choreographed the fights for Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon…" But the most improbable boast of all?