Billie Eilish still doesn’t care, and it’s still working
Life and Art from FT Weekend
Forhecz Topher
4.6 • 601 Ratings
🗓️ 24 May 2024
⏱️ 24 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Billie Eilish’s new album Hit Me Hard and Soft has been hailed by critics as her best album yet. She describes it as an “album-ass album”, meant to be listened to in its entirety, but it’s also provocative: it takes on fame and body-shaming ("People say I look happy just because I got skinny") and women she wants to please (“I could eat that girl for lunch, she dances on my tongue”). So what do we think? Lilah is joined by two experts, the FT’s music writer Arwa Haider and US media business correspondent Anna Nicolaou, to discuss the role Billie plays in our pop pantheon.
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We love hearing from you. Lilah is on Instagram @lilahrap. We’re on X @lifeandartpod and on email at [email protected]. We are grateful for reviews on Apple and Spotify. And please share this episode with your friends!
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Links (all FT links get you past the paywall):
– The FT’s four-star review of Hit Me Hard and Soft, by Ludo Hunter-Tilney: https://on.ft.com/4bP4rWH
– Arwa’s latest review is of the album A La Sala by Khruangbin, a mash-up of “Iranian rock, Jamaican dub and Thai folk”: https://on.ft.com/4dPdFnN
– For more from Anna, listen to our recent episode ‘Why Olivia Rodrigo might be our last pop star’. Search where you get your podcasts or click here
– Arwa is on X @arwahaider. Anna is @annaknicolaou
More or less:
– Arwa wants more Arabic diaspora voices. She recommends British-Lebanese DJ Salia (here’s Habibi Riddim), Lebanese singer songwriter Yasmine Hamdan and Palestinian-Canadian artist Nemahsis
– Lilah wants to see people use more stuff in your home: read your books, eat your food, wear your clothes. The book she picked up, which she recommends, is called Subway Lives: 24 Hours in the Life of the New York City Subway, by Jim Dwyer
– Anna wants less social media, especially around oat milk bashing.
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Special FT subscription offers for Life and Art podcast listeners, from 50% off a digital subscription to a $1/£1/€1 trial, are here: http://ft.com/lifeandart
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Original music by Metaphor Music. Mixing and sound design by Breen Turner and Sam Giovinco. Clips this week are courtesy of Interscope
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Life and Art from FT Weekend. I'm Lila Raptopoulos, and this is our Friday chat show. |
| 0:06.9 | Today we are talking Billy Eilish's new album, Hit Me Hard and Soft. This is her third studio album. |
| 0:13.9 | It's co-produced with her brother, Phineas. And the album is meant to be listened to in its entirety. |
| 0:19.8 | There were no advanced singles put out beforehand, |
| 0:22.3 | and as Billy put it, it's quote, an album-ass album. The album is a tight 10 tracks. In it, she talks |
| 0:28.5 | about breakups, body shaming, the pressure of growing up in the spotlight, having sex with girls, |
| 0:34.3 | and critics so far are loving it. So today we're going to talk about it. I'm Lila, and the old me is still me, maybe the real me, and I think she's pretty. Here with me in New York, I wish her the best for the rest of her life. It's the FTs U.S. media correspondent, Anna Nikolao. Hi, Anna. Welcome. And joining us from London, she's taking pictures in the mirror. Oh, my God, her skin's so clear. It's our great music writer. You've really chosen the best lyrics. Amazing, amazing, lyrical introduction. Thank you so much, Lime. Thank you both for humoring me yet again. I'm so happy to have both of you. Why don't we just get into it? Top line, |
| 1:12.2 | did we like the album? What did we think? Arwa. I loved it. I was really looking forward to hearing |
| 1:20.1 | it. I really find Billy Eilish just immensely likable. She just, I think, continually evolved into just such an interesting |
| 1:29.9 | artist and such an admirable one as well. And I actually think I probably felt a bit |
| 1:34.7 | ambivalent about the second album that came out in 2021. Happier than ever felt kind of fragmented |
| 1:41.6 | and subdued to me, even though I still wanted to like what |
| 1:44.9 | she was doing. But this, yeah, just got me from get going, yeah. Cool. Anna, what about you? |
| 1:52.0 | It has grown on me. I think I've reached the point where I can wholeheartedly say I really like it. |
| 1:58.4 | But it took me a long time to get to that place, which concerned me. |
| 2:02.8 | My preface is that I really like Bill Gailish, I consider myself a fan. I think my mistake was I listened to it for the first time on speakers, not on headphones. |
| 2:11.9 | So my first reaction was a bit like, it just felt a little bit like what she's always done before. |
| 2:20.1 | I found it a little repetitive. But then when I wasn't doing it on headphones the second time, |
| 2:24.8 | and maybe this is part of what she's trying to do, I mean, I literally heard a lot of sounds |
| 2:30.5 | I didn't hear when I didn't listen to it on headphones. So, yeah, I do like it. |
| 2:36.6 | I wouldn't say I loved it. I feel, I feel complicated about it. Yeah. Like both of you, |
| 2:41.8 | I really like her because, and I feel also protective of her because she grew up famous and she's way cooler than most other pop stars. And it took me a few |
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