What music artist would you really like to see Breakout?

For me, after just seeing her at Brooklyn Paramount last week, she's already making waves in Europe, but I would love to see C-M-M-A-M-A-Rae.

I was just blown away by that show.

Wait, who is this?

C-M-A-T. She's this country-inspired indie pop artist out of Ireland, and she's just making fun, dope

music, can sing crazy, incredible energy on stage, super fun fan interaction.

I, like, walked in familiar and walked out a super fan.

Oh, I love when that happens. I love when that happens. Okay, I'm into that. What about you, Isabella? You know, I mean, I think this is already kind of happening, but I think Slater has been having a big year, and I'm thrilled. I'm thrilled. That album has been going platinum for me at the gym. It's fun. I can't get enough of it. And I'm happy for her. I love that. I love that. I have to say for myself, I believe that if I'm into an artist that they've already broken out. Period. Period. That's how I'm like, if I'm into you, you've broken out. Any success beyond that, of course, I hope finds them. But there's

somebody that, I mean, technically she has broken out. But to me, I'm like, she could always

break out even more. I think she's a queen. I'm always going to ride for Tanashi. Oh, yeah.

Absolutely. So there's this place. A lot of artists have yet to break out from.

We're talking today about the Kia Asylum.

This is a place for E and F-List pop stars to wait patiently until that moment when they finally cross over into real mainstream fame.

We've seen it with Charlie X-CX, Sabrina Carpenter, and even more recently, Zara Larson.

These girls sang, promoted, and marketed their way out of Bush League pop stardom and into the major leagues.

But what does it mean that we're using a mispronunciation of the rapper

Kaya's name as a way to describe middle-of-the-road pop stardom for mostly white women?

And what does the endless push to escape the asylum say about the current state of fandom

and pop music?

To find out, I'm here with Isabella Gomez Sarmiento, NPR music reporter,

and Kyle Dennis, billboard staff writer. Isabella, Kyle, welcome to It's Been a Minute. Howdy.

Hello, hello. Hello. I'm Brittany Luce, and you're listening to It's Been a Minute from NPR, a show about what's going on in culture and why it doesn't happen by accident.

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