The hottest gigs of the year have already happened. Last week, Chappell Roan played three sell-out nights at Brixton’s O2 Academy, with tickets harder to get than those to the Oasis reunion.
Elton John was side of stage one night, saying ‘it’s been a long time since [he’s] witnessed someone master the art of performing so early in their career’. One friend, who works in the music industry, told me she’d never heard a voice quite like it live.
Her UK concerts follow a truly mind-bending, stratospheric rise to fame for the 26-year-old drag artist. This month marks a year since the release of her debut album, The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess, a ridiculously fun and raucous album. She’s been honing her craft for a decade, but it’s only within the past few months that she’s been catapulted to insane heights, accelerated by the release of single Good Luck, Babe!, TikTok algorithms and a slot supporting Olivia Rodrigo on tour.
This rollercoaster would be a lot for anyone to handle — but, for women, fame isn’t just overwhelming; it comes with a side order of abuse and harassment.
In a rare move for a woman in the public eye, Chappell directly addressed her followers, telling them enough is enough. ‘I've been in too many nonconsensual physical and social interactions and I just need to lay it out and remind you, women don't owe you shit,’ she wrote on Instagram last month. ‘I do not accept harassment of any kind because I chose this path, nor do I deserve it.’
While many fans praised Chappell for her to-the-point honesty, some on the internet demanded that she stopped whinging about being famous. In a later interview, she explained why she finally spoke up (even though she really didn’t need to); she says she has been stalked, kissed without her consent, and claims that someone leaked her dad’s phone number. Chappell has also said that numerous famous women — including Lorde and Charli XCX — had been in touch, offering support, with the former even sharing a list of ways to cope with fame.
And just like her popstar peers, Chappell is subject to fervent discussion online. But one thing does seem slightly different when it comes to the singer. Huge accounts covering celebrity culture — the likes of Pop Crave — are quick to post quotes from her, usually more controversial ones, without necessary context included in the original post. It feels like she’s deliberately being painted as someone who bitches and moans, when in reality she’s just a woman brave enough to speak her mind.
Recent examples which have been all over X include her saying she isn’t bothered about whether she wins a Grammy (this somehow caused an uproar), or that she doesn’t feel the need to take big brand collaborations, calling out H&M in particular (people saw this as a dig at Charli XCX, who has just done a collab with the high-street brand). But posting these quotes without context leaves huge room for misinterpretation.
In a more serious example, in a recent interview with the Guardian, she said she wasn’t endorsing a US presidential candidate. There’s been many wild speculations since, that she’s a secret Republican, that she’s anti-LGBT rights (she is a lesbian, supports trans rights and has local drag queens support her on each stop of her tour), or that she isn’t informed (she was invited to the White House to perform, and considered reading poetry from Palestinian women as a protest to the US’ involvement in Israel’s attacks on Gaza — in the end, she declined the invite, but has sold prints to raise money for Palestinian aid at her shows).
Chappell has just addressed the ‘clickbait’ on TikTok, clarifying that she is not voting for Trump. She told her followers there is ‘nuance’ to what she says in full interviews, and added that her ‘actions speak louder than an endorsement’. ‘If you literally know anything about me and for what I stand for, you know that this is not lip service,’ she continued. ‘This is not virtue signalling.’ For avoidance of doubt, she read the full quote included in the interview, where she highlighted the importance of trans rights, and asked people to use their ‘critical thinking skills’ when voting.
These online backlashes are frequent, intense and unkind, where things she says are often taken in bad faith. And it just adds to how awfully Chappell is being treated
We often look back — rightly — at the way society treated female popstars in sheer horror. It was less than 20 years ago that the world’s tabloid media was broadcasting Britney Spears’ very public breakdown, instead of treating her with kindness and dignity. Around the same time, in 2007, the late Amy Winehouse won the Brit Award for Album of the Year — and we all know how horrifically she was treated by the British media, as she struggled with addiction and an eating disorder before her tragic death.
Chappell herself has also been honest about her mental health, and how she’s recently been diagnosed with severe depression (she has previously spoken about living with bipolar). Yet she is still being treated in a similar way to Amy and Britney, it’s just in a different, more online, form.
We like to think we’re nicer to brilliant, talented women now. But — especially in the age of stan culture — it isn’t true. The vicious posts online, many prompted by rage bait, show we’re still not ready to treat female popstars as human beings. As one viral tweet summarised: ‘Chappell Roan is entering the industry with a sense of self worth that everybody applauds in other women as long as they endure mistreatment for a decade before developing it.’
Whether she’s directly addressing her fan base on TikTok, or telling a photographer to shut the fuck up (like she did at the VMAs, in response to a paparazzo who swore at her), Chappell is simply asking to be treated with respect, in real time. Considering how hostile the industry can be towards women who speak their mind, that’s something which is to be admired just as much as her sensational live performances.