FEATURE: Spotlight: Baby Queen — Music Musings & Such

FEATURE:

Spotlight

PHOTO CREDIT: Meara Kallistafor for NOTION

Baby Queen

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BECAUSE she played (slayed?) Reading recently…

PHOTO CREDIT: Parri Thomas for The Line of Best Fit

I am keen to focus on the tremendous Baby Queen. I have been following Bella Lathum’s music for a long time now. She is one of the most sensational and original Pop artists of her generation – though she might be keen to distance herself from being seen as ‘Pop’. I will bring in some interviews that give us a bigger picture of the London-based, South African-born artist. Last year, The Line of Best Fit spoke with an artist who, even then, was standing out as one of the strongest and most fascinating artists:

“When Bella Latham, aka Baby Queen, moved to west London as a wide-eyed, excitable 18-year-old, she was on a particular mission: to reshape the pop-sphere as we know it. Within a week of living there, she had settled in Fulham with her auntie and uncle, and had enrolled in a music course at a North London college to help kick start her career. So far, so good. But it wasn’t long before she threw herself in at the deep end; alone, she began to traverse the bustling pubs and the clubs of the city in an attempt to meet like-minded musicians and creatives, to little avail.

“I was totally unprepared for a city like London,” admits the 23-year-old singer-songwriter now, speaking over Zoom. “I had bright light syndrome, and I came here with all these ideas. I thought I was gonna arrive off the plane and Universal Records would be waiting on the other side for me with a contract! I came with the shit demo CD and everyone was like, ‘Who the fuck are you?’ My jaw was permanently dropped, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing around me and the people I was meeting – it was total sensory overload.”

The conception of the Baby Queen moniker, then, was key to a process of growth and becoming, and still figuring things out, it provided Latham with the sense of direction she so desperately needed. “One day, I was writing a song about a breakup and I wrote this line that said: ‘I’m your little baby queen’. It was just meant to be in a song,” she laughs. “And then I was like, that’s what I’m going to call myself! I had this moment of realisation where I felt like I was comfortable in my own skin. This name represents who I’ve always wanted to be.”

Baby Queen makes effervescent, high-octane pop full of transformation and discovery, mixing twinkling beats with sugary vocals to create hook-stuffed, earworm choruses, with two releases to her name as proof. For Latham, it’s important to write songs that reflect the world around her, all the while she excavates moments from her past. She details body dysmorphia, terrible breakups, internet culture, and above all else, the stigma of discussing mental health, a weighty subject that is most felt in her latest single, Buzzkill; “What doesn’t kill you makes it wish that it had”, she sings with a laidback drawl over a rough-edged, punchy electro pop arrangement.

But it’s this innate understanding of the virtual realm that makes the escapist aspects of her music so powerful: in both conversation and song, Latham is deeply ruminative, and is adamant that social media has proven indispensable to not only shaping the identity of Baby Queen, but to reaching an ever-burgeoning audience.

“It’s very clear to me that social media is a tool to connect with the people that are listening to music,” she says, earnestly. “And if I can leave somebody feeling less alone, as if their own self has been mirrored through my songs, then I think that’s the whole point of why I do this”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Bella Howard

I will come onto her debut E.P. and her mixtape. Both have been reviewed hugely positively. In another 2020 interview, NME had Baby Queen on their radar. She talked about her relationship with the Internet. We also learn why Baby Queen music is so personal:

“She describes her relationship with the internet as “a constant battle”, but points to her fans making it feel brighter. The Baby Kingdom, as she calls them, regularly make appearances in her Instagram Lives, while she has a group chat with them where they talk about relationships, Taylor Swift, politics and more. “We’ll be on FaceTime for hours and I genuinely have no idea what we’ve been speaking about,” she laughs. “These people that I’ve connected with over the past few months are more similar to me than any of my actual friends that I have in real life.”

One of the hallmarks of Latham’s music as Baby Queen is honesty and she says that is a big part of why she has such a close relationship with her fans. “When you write music that’s so open and so revealing, you’re sending out an invitation for those people to open themselves up to you in the same way,” she says. “It’s very difficult to stand for honesty without being prepared to have a really close and open relationship with these people.”

While some people credit their favourite pop music with changing their lives, Latham doesn’t think she has that power but there’s still an importance to what she does. “The only thing I can do is be honest about my experience so you know you’re not alone,” she says, adding that she “definitely” wants Baby Queen to be a pop star who can support her fans through their struggles.

As any star will tell you, you have to learn to adapt on your way to the top. Her masterplan might need tweaking in the age of coronavirus, but nothing is stopping Latham from continuing her ascent. She’s already planning to spend 2021 working flat out ahead of releasing her debut album in 2022, aiming to graduate from being a buzzy new artist to someone on the cusp of greatness in that 12 months. “I’ll stop working after the second album,” she jokes after running through her game plan. By that point, she should be well on her way to achieving her superstar dreams – and then some”.

The Line of Best Fit reviewed the Medicine E.P. back in November. Delivering such a confident and flawless debut, they were clearly impressed by what they heard:

“As Bella Latham finally unveils her debut EP, Medicine, it's easy to get caught up in the South Africa-born and now London-based singer-songwriter’s upbeat melodies and dazzling pop-hooks. Yet, piercing through all the swirling saccharine is a cutting honesty, laced with satirical quips, that makes her music vital for a disaffected generation.

Opener “Internet Religion” is a stream of consciousness whirlwind of an anthem, exploring the nightmare of a life built online. Deconstructing online personas with snarky remarks, “it's a pity / we can't Facetune personality”, Baby Queen is striding out with her own unique brand of anti-pop and a firm resolution to talk about everything that the pop-industry isn’t.

Open about her struggles with depression and exploring themes of body dysmorphia and online dating, she’s writing music that’s both catchy and frighteningly relatable to anyone growing up in the digital age. “Pretty Girl Lie” tackles the glossy, photoshopped images of women plastered across social media, noting our role in perpetuating the problem as she quips “I’m so obsessed with being you / That I become the problem too”, whilst “Buzzkill” zones in on depression-caused apathy and the fear of becoming a killjoy to those around her.

As EP highlight “Want Me” kicks in, her confessional spoken word story of an imagined unrequited love is self critical in its sincerity. With a bridge in French that opens with “I don’t even really speak French”, her desire for constant self-reflection feels like the antidote to a bubblegum pop world we’ve all become far too complacent with.

With a clever critique of a society that gives kids depression and aims to crush individuality and self-expression, Baby Queen’s Medicine suggests that maybe she’s the type of “pop-princess” this generation really needs”.

I will stick with The Line of Best Fit. They featured Baby Queen in February as one of their rising artists that we need to keep an eye out for:

“When she was recording “Pretty Girl Lie”, a self-incriminating track about editing your legs “‘til the doorway bends”, and the unspoken truth that “I get more likes when I don’t look like me”, Latham was ready to point the finger at everyone but herself. But her producer, King Ed, helped her to climb down from the soapbox. “I was going to be like, ‘It’s you! It’s you!’ the whole time, but he said, ‘No, let’s go with “I” – because he knows me, that’s the thing,” she laughs. “He knows what I’m like, and I’m a guilty bitch! I think that’s what’s so likeable about the music. It’s about saying, ‘You’re all dicks, but me too’. It’s almost self-deprecating, in the way I spent like 10 hours on my phone per day – it’s horrendous.”

By taking aim at the artificiality of our lives, Latham draws attention to the idea of our ‘frontstage’ and ‘backstage’ personas. “That’s something I’ve struggled with my whole life,” she says. There is a divide between Bella Latham and Baby Queen. She explains, “Baby Queen is a constant show. It came from this belief – which is kind of a narcissistic belief, in a way – that you have to make everyone in the room happy. You have to be the source of laughter, the source of everything. But a lot of what I write is from Bella, when I’m alone. Baby Queen is a really big facet of me, rather than a character – but she’s not everything. I can talk in a million different ways, and Baby Queen is just one of them.

I’m not going to leave the house and speak to people, and be in front of the camera as the depressed version of myself who watches Drag Race upstairs, you know? We’re all so multifaceted. You will never get like the full picture of yourself, ever. We're never going to present all of our shit that goes on behind the scenes.”

It's taking us behind the scenes, though, that has certified Baby Queen as a blue-tick Gen Z voice in an age of ‘authenticity’. The truth, she emphasises, is often ugly, and she’s more than ready to drop the charade. She set a precedent for this with the titular track “Medicine”, a glaringly honest depiction of her life on antidepressants. “I feel like people have touched on it before, but no one has said it quite this way,” she says. “I struggle with emotional blunting. I’ve got to tell you, I haven’t cried in years. Like, no matter what happens in my life, I’ll just be like…” She looks blankly into the camera. “I mean, all of a sudden, you can’t cry; you have zero libido. If someone talks to me about sex, I’m literally like, ‘Cool… I don’t know what to say to you.’ They take a way a lot – they take away your ability to think and feel; they box you in. And I’m desperate to cry. I would love to cry. I would love to literally sit here and weep right now, but I can’t.”

But as much as the song readily shows her struggles, it also acknowledges how important they are in her life. “I know for a fact I wouldn’t be alive without them,” Latham insists. “I would cease to exist. So I have to take them. It’s really important people realise that they saved my life. I don’t want people to not go on the medication, because I’m still on it. If they were that bad, I wouldn’t be taking them. It’s a double-edged sword.”

Latham continues to contend with their effects daily – it’s something in her life for which there is no answer, but she has found a silver lining. “I feel like my genius is in my depression,” she says. “My therapist and I talk about, like, when you’re really depressed, you find these nuggets of gold in the dark spaces you can’t make sense of. All those ideas that you write when you’re in that dark place – you don’t get those when your mood is up here.”

The release of her two latest singles, “Raw Thoughts” and “These Drugs”, follow in the same vein. “I feel like the music coming out this year is more personal in the way that it’s more of a true depiction of stuff that’s actually happened to me, as opposed to being observational. It’s more what I feel as opposed to what I think. I’m actually kind of terrified for other people to hear them, because they’re obviously fiercely honest.” Rather than a new era, the new music is a continuation of these very real, immensely personal stories”.

Before coming to a review of the extraordinary mixtape, The Yearbook, NME chatted with one of their favourite artists to find out more. It is interesting reading what Baby Queen had to say about the mixtape:

“The Yearbook’ shows there’s another side to Baby Queen’s honesty though – one that might not be quite as weighty but is just as important in building a picture of who she is as a person. ‘American Dream’, which features Aussie newcomer MAY-A, is a crush fantasy that boasts the immortal line: “The things I could do in a hotel room all alone with you/ That I can’t say aloud.” The baggy lope of ‘You Shaped Hole’ tackles heartbreak in the most cathartic, jubilant way. “Sometimes being honest is writing some stupid little love song about someone you fancy,” she reasons. “It’s just important to make sure that you’re always speaking your truth.”

Talking so freely about her life in her songs has brought Latham the biggest reward of all – a fanbase, dubbed Baby Kingdom, with whom she has such a unique and strong connection. Before she sits down with NME today, she’s greeted by a stack of letters and presents from her fans, who she writes her own missives to and hosts big Zoom hangouts with. “I’m really grateful for the decision that I made to be as honest as I was in songs like ‘These Drugs’,” she nods, “because that’s where this feeling of connecting to people in such a really intimate way comes from and I don’t think I would have achieved if I had not just let it all out.”

To the musician, ‘The Yearbook’ is a “coming-of-age” project that she describes as a being written during her “most developmental years”. To get to that part of our lives when we figure who we are out, we have to move through a lot of versions of ourselves and that’s reflected in the host of characters that make up the record’s visual identity. The cover features Latham dressed up as a goth, a cheerleader, a prom queen and more. “I wanted to bring the songs and story to life and make everyone listening feel like they could grow up with me and come on that journey,” she explains. While she admits some of the personalities she’s assigned to each track are “a bit of a reach”, she wanted to add that element in to give each song “a human element”.

It’s a moment of creativity that is typical of the world Latham has been building since her debut single ‘Internet Religion’ was released in May 2020. Like most artists who’ve started their careers in the last 18 months, all she’s known so far has been a very online pop star existence. But last month, she finally got to enter the real world, play her first festival shows and meet her fans IRL for the first time.

“I was so depressed before those festivals, I felt really powerless and I had a complete identity crisis,” she says, but those shows were transformative for her. “It reignited this feeling of ‘This is why I’m doing it’. It’s a fucking dream come true – I could never have been prepared for what that feeling is when you come off that stage”.

I will finish with a review of The Yearbook. Indie Is Not a Genre had their say on a fantastic work that strengthened Baby Queen’s position as one of the most important young voices in music:

“The Yearbook consists of 5 pre-released singles and 5 new tracks that seamlessly meld together, stand strong on their own, and perfectly capture Lantham’s Baby Queen persona. It’s honest and critical without being gimmicky or self-serving.

Opener Baby Kingdom is a spoken declaration of unabashed nostalgia for Lantham’s past self set to a dreamy synth beat that perfectly encapsulates the dichotomy of this album. You can easily imagine her leaning against the wall outside her school disco a la Effy Stonem with rips in her tights and a cigarette between her teeth – a drawling, pessimistic monologue layered over a distant bedroom-pop beat.

The first half of the Yearbook sees Baby Queen struggle through a breakup with three absolutely banging tracks dripping in vulnerability and addicting electric pop beats. Raw Thoughts and You Shaped Hole, originally released in January and July of this year respectively, detail Lantham’s hedonistic, self-destructive efforts to move forward – “I kissed all our mates to procrastinate the pain / Then I felt ashamed and kissed them all again” she reflects in You Shaped Hole.

American Dream, featuring MAY-A, is Lantham’s first cultural and political critique on The Yearbook and a true display of her metaphorical and lyrical capabilities. Lantham regards her infatuation and desire for her lover as delusional and inaccessible as the American Dream. An escalating, irresistible beat as enticing as the myth she sings about is the backbone of the track, dropping at all the right moments and leaving nothing to be desired.

If American Dream is a thinly veiled metaphor knocking quietly on the door, Narcissist breaks the hinges off. Narcissist is Lantham’s Gen-Z anthem, an outright f*ck you to older generations and their hypocrisy. Quiet rage undercuts her apathetic tone as she laughs “I find it kinda weird you’d critique your own creation / But you still go online and call me self-obsessed / Wait did you forget? / Who made the internet?” Narcissist’s loud, layered wall of sound expands and cuts off at just the right moments, making it an incredibly satisfying listen.

The Yearbook. Dover Beach, first released this past April, begins quietly, and quickly accelerates into a bouncy, beachy, drum driven track with vocals that display Lantham’s upper register beautifully. Dover Beach Pt. 2 adds further depth to the desperation and loss of identity that too often follow the end of a relationship. “I’d change the shape of my mouth if I thought you’d kiss me” Lantham admits.

Baby Queen follows the thread of vulnerability into These Drugs, a gutsy and direct exploration of her own destructive escapism, and reveals what happens when you believe you deserve to suffer. Ethereal background harmonies give this track a slight hopeless, existential edge that compliments Lantham’s portrait of her downward spiral beautifully.

PHOTO CREDIT: Parri Thomas for The Line of Best Fit

I’ll admit that I’m a sucker for scathing, banging musical critiques of hypocritical American religious culture (ie. Jesus Christ 2005 God Bless America), so it’s no surprise that Fake Believe really sold me on this album. Latham’s vocals meld with the beat as she delivers line after line of incredibly satisfying sharp-tongued criticism – “I’m in love with apathy / Nothing on the planet ever gets to me / When I’m living in the world of fake believe.”

The Yearbook culminates with I’m a Mess, an immaculate capstone to Lantham’s debut and encapsulation of her musical and cultural persona. Though by far one of the least complicated tracks, essentially just Lantham crying “I’m a mess” with several spoken interludes, I’m a Mess bleeds emotion and leaves you craving more. The imperfect vocal breaks that define the climax communicate the desperation and self-loathing of The Yearbook, and serve as a masterful conclusion to Baby Queen’s triumphant debut”.

Go and follow Baby Queen and check out her music. I know that we are going to see so much incredible stuff from her. After a wonderful E.P. and mixtape, she will be keen t perform live. After a celebrated performance at Reading, there are some dates coming up. Go and check her out if you can. In Baby Queen, we have an artist…