Starting from YouTube Since her video "What Languages Sound Like to Foreigners" was posted on YouTube on 3 March 2014 on her channel Smoukahontas Official (which subsequently has been changed into SAARA), it has been seen over 20 million times as of June 2018. Her ability to mimic
accents and speech melodies of different languages, which included Japanese,
Estuary English, American with
California accent, Swedish, French, Arabic and Spanish, using mainly
nonexistent words, was praised by media in a number of countries. In the first sequel, she re-impersonated some of the languages from the initial video and added new ones, including "Something African" and "Scottish". In another sequel, her "One Girl, 14 Genres" video, a number of musical genres were mimicked.
Musical career In July 2014, it was revealed that Forsberg had signed a record deal with
Capitol Records with
Rodney Jerkins acting as her executive producer. Capitol Records chairman and CEO
Steve Barnett said that the only artists that he had the same feeling about other than Forsberg were
Adele and
Sam Smith. She is the first Finnish person to be signed to a major American record label. Her debut single "
Ur Cool" was released on 21 April 2015 and became a Top 10 single in Finland. In February 2016, Forsberg left Capitol Records. She told in her YouTube video that the producer Jerkins had left Capitol Records and she was left stranded, contractually not being allowed to work without him. Owing to the unwillingness of the producer to let her out of the contract, Capitol Records agreed to terminate her contract and let her go create freely again. Saara also said in the video that she felt bad promoting a single she absolutely hated. In April 2016, Saara's manager Johannes Ylinen announced that Saara had signed with Universal Music Group, with which she would continue releasing music independently. Forsberg released her debut EP ''Hello I'm Saara'' on 27 May 2016. The EP's lead single, "The Urge", was released in June 2016. In 2017, Saara published three singles: in February, "Permission to Love"; in March, "Superpowers"; and in October, the single "All the Love ft. Jillionaire". On 2 May 2018, her birthday, Saara released her second album
Almost Acoustic EP with four new songs and one remix. On the same day she also had her first YouTube live concert. Forsberg also writes music for other artists. In July 2015, it was revealed that Forsberg has writing credit for the K-pop band
Girls' Generation song "
You Think" in their album
Lion Heart. The song charted on Billboard's digital song list at nr. 3 September 2015. In 2016, Forsberg co-wrote the song "
My Heart Wants Me Dead" by
Lisa Ajax for
Melodifestivalen 2016, as well as the song "Drip Drop" by
Taemin from his second solo album
Press It. In June 2015, Forsberg was featured on the song "
Vauvoja" by Finnish singer
Kasmir. The song went on to reach number-one on the Finnish downloads and airplay charts. In the summer of 2017 Saara was featured on the song "Can't Buy Love" by THRDL!FE.
In TV and film In April 2014, Forsberg signed a development deal with production/distribution company Omnivision Entertainment/
My Damn Channel. In May 2014, Forsberg relocated to
Los Angeles to perform on a YouTube channel affiliated with My Damn Channel called "WestToastTV" in addition to maintaining her own personal channel. In October 2014, it was revealed that Forsberg has a small role in the Hong Kong-Chinese-American film
Skiptrace directed by Finnish director
Renny Harlin. In December 2015, the news broke that Forsberg had spent the last 18 months working with
Lucasfilm and was the creator of an alien language used in
Star Wars: The Force Awakens. In July 2016, it was revealed that Forsberg had created another alien language for a Hollywood film, this time for the film
Star Trek Beyond, in which she has also a minor voice role as an alien named Kalara. In 2016, Forsberg worked as a judge on the fifth season of
Talent Suomi, the Finnish version of
Got Talent. On 5 February 2017, a new Finnish game show called
Kaikki vastaan 1 ("Everyone Against 1") began airing live on Sunday evenings on the Finnish network,
Nelonen TV, with Forsberg as a co-host. The first season ran until 9 April 2017. Also, in February 2017, Forsberg began hosting
Remotely Funny, a British game show on
CBBC. In 2018, Forsberg went on appearing on Finnish TV, in spring on the contest
Pallon ympäri ("Around The Globe"), where she has been travelling around the world by performing tasks as one of the three competitors. She has been told to go on co-hosting again the studio contest
Kaikki vastaan 1 in autumn 2018. == In media ==