“I’m sweating…Is everyone?” Frida Hyvönen wipes her brow, telling of -25°C and snow two metres deep in her native Sweden, a world away from the stuffy, sticky Bella Union room and the sweltering Melbourne summer.

Early support came from Melbourne’s ridiculously talented Pikelet (Evelyn Morris), who joined Hyvönen later behind the drums. While both artists are on Chapter, Pikelet’s experimental pop sounded like a strange choice for support but seemed aptly fitting on the night, extending the platform of solo female musicians.

The new album Stem is out in a few days, and word is Pikelet has now expanded into a four-piece – an exciting prospect – though Morris remained in her solo incarnation tonight using loops, a floor tom and keyboard. While there is a definite spectacle in watching Morris craft and build songs before your eyes, drumming out infectious rhythms with nonchalant ease, layering harmonies and a well placed plastic koala castanet here and there, you sometimes feel that the DIY approach, while endearing, is holding her back.

Morris didn’t play her newest single, Weakest Link, and there were two delightful new pop songs, stripped back and performed solely on acoustic guitar, suggesting a new reliance on a fully-formed outfit, and a further leap away from her days playing with Baseball .

There were a few clunky moments, but old tunes such as Bug In Mouth and A Bunch sparkled as always, wrapped in their lush, swirling vocals and percussion, and the shimmering New Zeal, planted on a swinging hi-lo sing-song vocal, stood out as a highlight and an exciting taste of things to come.

In the midst of working on a film score in Bali, Frida Hyvönen is touring Australia for the first time. Much adored in Sweden, Hyvönen’s records were released in Australia on Chapter Music only last year, and apart from a room composed of the faithful and the curious, the singer-songwriter remains relatively unknown here. She wears a long backless salmon-pink dress, moving with grace. Her electric blonde hair is in “ghost mode,” she jokes, referring to its fantastic hairspray-induced billows, blaming her “Finnish hair.” Before she begins to play, Hyvönen stands by her piano and slides a silver knife into an apple with a devilish grin.

Backed by an all-girl band with Evelyn Morris returning to stage as a drummer and vocals from Monica Sonand, while introducing songs with nods to American minimalist painter Agnes Martin or modernist writer Djuna Barnes, Hyvönen places herself in a lineage of independent female protagonists. This influence can be heard in her music, echoing strong female singer-songwriters such as Joni Mitchell or Martha Wainwright. At first listen, her piano-based tunes may sound like simple, tinkling pop songs and big chords propping up a beautiful voice that flirts at times with melodrama. But Hyvönen’s songwriting offers more than being simply ‘pretty.’

Her intimate songs speak directly of something darker, disguising sweet melodies with smart lyrics, more like poetry, that are defiantly honest and sexually-aware. From the sumptuous power-play of Pony – an imaginative response to Smog’s I Break Horses, meeting his facetious masochism with her own – to lines from Once I Was A Serene Teenaged Child like “Once I felt your cock against my thigh/ You said you were a poet, man your poetry wasn’t obvious to me,” it’s clear Hyvönen is not at all afraid to play around with representations of femininity. While the shock of an attractive woman using the word ‘cock’ in a pop song should’ve long worn off by now, the titter of giggles that circled through the room suggested not.

The song’s haunting refrain, “The feeling of pride and the loneliness to it,” proves Hyvönen’s feisty female is not simply a novelty act to evince smirks with obscenities, but part and parcel of the candour of her delivery, which has the power to emotionally belt you. These songs are tainted with longing and loneliness, painted in scenes from the long Nordic winter, but jewelled with moments of wit and beauty.

Hyvönen’s strongest songs possess this dual character; December relates a visit to an abortion clinic with heartbreaking detail disguised beneath a charming melody, while the magnificent Dirty Dancing presents the reunion with a childhood lover through powerful imagery and gorgeous soaring vocals.

Playing a set which picked from both albums, sadly omitting Hyvönen’s exquisite cover of Judee Sill’s Jesus Was A Crossmaker, but highlights included the upbeat satire of Scandinavian Blonde, London and the lilting I Drive My Friend. The songs are broken up with Hyvönen’s dry humour and the occasional pause to slice off a bit of apple. (I heard of her picking at grapes in a London show.)

While Morris and Sonand played the role of fill-in band impeccably, their minimal arrangements were more reminiscent of Hyvönen’s debut Until Death Comes, missing the lush orchestration, the synths and strings which propelled her voice on the 2008 follow-up Silence Is Wild. This absence ultimately flattened Hyvönen’s sound, but also provided the extra space for her wonderful lyrics to hit home. It was a polished, solid performance that never particularly soared or flagged, leaving the audience only hungry for more.