Name: Billie Eilish interview: Growing up in public a 'bruising experience' - BBC News
Uploaded: 2022-10-11T17:00:15.000Z
Duration: 12 min 56 s
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To-infinitive

Billie Eilish is the first artist born this century to hit number one in the billboard charts.

The superlative

From signing a record deal at 14, she's gone on to become an era defining star along the way, she's picked up seven Grammys two brits become the youngest star to headline, Coachella and Glastonbury and won an Oscar.

Gerund

She's grown up online in the public, gave connecting her to a global digital generation, performing to sell out arenas with her songwriter brother Phineas Phineas, also joined by her environmentalist parents on tour.

She's also got over 100 million followers across social media, making her one of the most influential young stars of her generation.

And this is the final night of her world tour and I've come to have a chat with Billie Eilish, welcome to BBC 100 women, thank you so much for doing this, thank you for having me, how you doing?

I'm doing very well, so I'm gonna read you a couple of descriptions of you.

An icon, The hope for pop music's future.

I feel like I might have known how to answer that question like a couple of years ago.

I don't know anymore because I don't look at myself in that way, I don't look at myself like I'm something to explain, You know what I mean?

You know what I'm saying, a person, I'm just a person, I'm just existing and doing my part in life.

You said a couple of years ago that you don't think there are many headlining opportunities for women and then look at you, the youngest person to headline Glastonbury, What do you think has changed for women in that time or has anything changed?

I think like we're in such a I mean, I'm just in awe of the time we're in right now because of women are just like at the top right now.

I mean, top of all the charts, it's women, women, women.

I mean, it's like the most incredible thing for me to see.

There was a specific period of time where I was just like, in this like this, like, pit of just like, hopelessness about myself because I didn't have much to look up to in terms of girls like me being in that, you know, looked at taken seriously in that, in that regard.

It's just like, I remember just like crying in my bed because I was I was thinking about the kind of show that I would want to put on and I would just feel so like, hopeless because I was like, I'm a girl and so I'm never I'm never gonna be able to have a show like that I'm never going to be able to just be, you know, free up there and wild and like not, you know, not have this and this going on and like, you know, performing this way and be more physical and be more be more about the performance and less about the at all the little things and I just, I just felt like that would never happen because it hadn't really happened just behind those windows.

We've got people camped out, they were here last night when we popped here and they were having so much fun, like listening to your music, getting to know each other and stuff.

Do you feel the kind of pressure of being that role model for so many young women with this huge platform that you have?

I feel so excited about it and I don't even feel like I'm a role model, let me do this and this.

I just feel like I just feel like truly in love with him in love with him and it's like you don't even when you're in love with someone, you don't think about how you might be affecting them because they're affecting you so much and that's kind of how I feel about them.

I'm like, I just, I don't know, I'm just like over time and like with different experiences and relationships.

I've just been like felt more and more like committed to them.

It's like, it's like I feel like I'm like in a relationship with them so any friendship or relationship romantic, whatever they're like one of the first things I say, I'm like, just so you know, you're getting me but you're also getting them.

So, You know, if you want to get with me, you gotta get with 44 days, four days.

We've been here since Tuesday night tour.

We've kept over 300 hours close to 400 hours.

And then I've got playing cards on my forearms, which are the Joker and the king.

And then I've got a devil and an angel for all the good girls go to help.

It just meant so much to me since the beginning, since she was so young the way that she is so open about her emotions and let everybody else feel like it's okay to feel that way.

It's unique and it's very different just to speak about love songs as much she speaks more about personal issues.

I find really interesting body image, just like everything.

Pretty much everything growing up in the public eye is a very bruising experience.

And it's really hard to develop and change um for a lot of reasons.

And so it was it was hard for me and I was I just didn't really know what to do, and so I was just grasping at straws and like yeah, just like things things were, I just didn't know what I was doing.

I mean I just had such severe uh impostor syndrome.

I've had that so many times in my life and really just like some parts of last year and the year before, just like I was just in a downward spiral of imposter syndrome and just grasping at whatever I could to make me feel like myself again.

But I didn't know when you say impostor syndrome, you mean feeling that you don't deserve the success more.

Just like, you know when you see yourself in the public eye, especially after me, I'm I'm an internet kid.

Like, I see I saw everybody else in the public eye when they were and then suddenly it's me and I'm like, I'm on the internet, just much as just as much as anybody else's, but then it's like, oh, I'm part of the discussion now, instead of just in the comments, which is like a very strange little thing and when you see yourself and your name everywhere, it's really hard to know who the hell you are, and also just like what you like and don't like, because you kind of especially because I got I got known as a thing when I was 15, mainly that was when that was when it kind of started really, even though I started at 13, like 15 was when people decided that that was who I was.

So it's really hard to change and grow and grow up and mature and like become a human when people decided that you were one thing because then they think about you, they think that that's you forever.

I mean it absolutely drives me insane that you can look up billie eilish and videos that come up are things I said when I was 15, like almost almost nothing, I said before.

What you did say though was like when you think about your identity, you like sort of amalgamating masculine and feminine.

Yeah, I mean, I feel the most powerful when I feel masculine in my life and I, I, I also can find power in femininity.

I don't know, I've like depending on how I walk and stand in my clothes and my face and my jewelry and my fingers and my, like every, just everything that I, everything that I am day to day, like I feel, I like to feel more more masculine than feminine.

It just makes me feel better um which I struggled with for a long time because I wanted to feel feminine and like it, but I just didn't really and so, um, but then it's like finding moments where you can have that and it feels good still, you know, like right now I'm wearing a tighter shirt and I'm wearing more low cut shirt and like, you know, the older me would have been like, please don't.

But I like it, it makes me feel good now and it's just the balance of The two, you know, in your documentary or Apple documentary, there was a lovely moment in there where Katy perry pulls you to the side and she said, you know, if you ever need someone to have a chat with, just give me a call about to get crazy in the next few years, have you taken her up?

Like, you know, I never called her, I should call her up.

I mean, but it's so funny thinking about that now because at the time I just didn't believe her.

Like I just didn't, I just didn't think it would keep going.

You know, I mean, I think that it's really hard to see your future like that, you know, when, when your future is so um kind of in the hands of not just you because I would hear that a lot I would hear and not only is it hard to believe, but it's hard to process, you know, and like know what the hell to do at all.

And when somebody says like, you know, it's about to get crazy, it's about crazy.

Yeah, it's yeah, it was already so crazy.

And also I was just like You just can't possibly imagine it's like, you know, trying to explain a color that doesn't exist.

My final question is, you know, this theme for this year's 100 women is progress as a woman in music.

I feel, I feel, you know, I was excited with the idea of this being about progress because I feel that there has been a lot and there's been a lot of back pedaling also, you know, with more like the world and the laws and all of that, but I think the law is like, yeah, you know, we're going back in time in certain areas, which makes me want to throw up.

But I do, I do think there has been a lot of progress and again, the way that women have been just like absolutely towering over everyone in this industry right now is so exciting to me and it just makes me feel really, really hopeful and inspired and, and it's not only women doing one thing, it's women doing all kinds of different things and looking different and acting different and having different styles and different, just like I just love it so much, there's such a range right now and it's so nice to see and it's just so, it's just refreshing.

I don't know, it's new, it's never been like that and it's just really, it's exciting and it's really cool to be a part of it, so you're hopeful.

Thank you so much for giving us so much of your time Course.