All hail Kayleigh Rose Amstutz, AKA Chappell Roan

I saw her live this past Monday in KC, and the entire audience was exactly like that, intensely singing every word, even for the new song that came out just a few days before. Plus they were dressed in some variation of pink cowboy gear (like, 90% of the crowd was in pink cowboy gear, we didn't get the memo). It sold out one venue, got moved to a larger venue, and sold it out. If that's happening across the country - which I imagine is the case - she's truly on the rise. And deservedly so...

Seems like she just keeps building momentum, just based on from friends and others discovering her in the past months + hearing her in coffee shops all the time.

Thinking how part of the fun of this phenomenon is that the album has been out a long time, so individual songs don't feel like singles but instead have equal presence out there.

She's good but I gotta say, I started listening to this, listened to it a lot for two weeks, then ran out of interest in it and haven't listened to it since. But it's good! Just... not with staying power for me.

Went to see Katie Pruitt last week and she did an acoustic cover of "Casual" that successfully lodged that tune in my head for three days straight.

similar to when this was happening with “espresso,” i think when a song/artist experiences a lot of growth in a short amount of time, spotify is set up to assume this will be of interest to most of their users and therefore it gets recommended liberally https://t.co/76GxtcpWo0 pic.twitter.com/qyRApPrukf

— jaime brooks ☭ (@elite_gz) June 7, 2024

lots of requests for chappell roan at the gay bar lately so i hear

people who use spotify live inside a little spotify created bubble that the rest of us exist outside of, and it distorts their understanding of the world around them. imo

i for one am shocked that spotify is recommending sabrina carpenter and chappell roan to listeners who enjoy pop music

xpost 100%. for an increasing number of people, there is basically no music outside Spotify, imo.

which sucks real bad.

"good luck, babe" is the first thing from her that isn't really annoying

I think people habitually underestimate the power of social media when discussing these phenomena. If you move in any kind of sub-50-yr-old queer-ish circles online it is basically impossible to avoid suffocation under an avalanche of Chappell Roan references. This seemed to start about a month ago.

It's difficult to untangle cause and effect here - did Spotify's algorithmic amplification effect precede or follow the above? Almost certainly they feed on each other. But in an era when traditional music journalism manages less than ever, I think a lot of the void that has left has been filled by people deciding what to check out because of the "conversations" they see happening around them online and a desire to be able to at least understand if not join in.

In this specific case an Australian parody IG page modelled on the Onion published a story a few days ago which both reflects the above and ironically adds to it: "Local Lesbian Has Her Subaru Keys Revoked After Revealing She Doesn't Know Who Chappell Roan Is".

*In an era when traditional music journalism matters less than ever

I would argue that social media and especially vertical content platforms (tiktok, reels) are driving what new acts and artists are breaking now. Spotify is definitely the tail of the dog at this point. Labels compete in digital marketing on those platforms, playlisting is kind of cheugy when you're talking about discovering new acts, lol

In this specific case an Australian parody IG page modelled on the Onion published a story a few days ago which both reflects the above and ironically adds to it: "Local Lesbian Has Her Subaru Keys Revoked After Revealing She Doesn't Know Who Chappell Roan Is".

Meanwhile, Hard Times (the punk-rock Onion) just did "Man To Be Honored at GLAAD Awards for Giving Bisexual Girlfriend a Ride to Chappell Roan Concert."

When Azealia's right...

I dunno, i feel like lots of female artists really wanna do this weird Lolita shit well into their 50/s and she sings like a WOMAN. That’s what i appreciate the most. The truth and reality in her neeeeeed to express. And how cathartic it is.

— Azealia Banks (@CHEAPYXOMIAMI) June 22, 2024

I saw buzz about the album somewhere or other late last year, listened to it and liked it a lot (still do). I was surprised at the time that there wasn't MORE buzz about her, because she seemed pretty buzzable. I think festival season was primed for her, she'd built up a good following and she rocked those shows. Her Bonnaroo set got moved up to the 2nd-biggest stage, probably on the basis of the Coachella buzz plus whatever LiveNation was gleaning from users on the festival app. As with anyone who blows up, I don't think it's any one thing pushing her, it's mostly that she made a good pop album that is in line with the tastes of the moment — smile, Dan Nigro! — and she's spent the last year building audiences on the road. Opening for Olivia Rodrigo no doubt helped.

But yeah, I did just see a Facebook friend in her 40s asking "who the hell is Chappell Roan and am I a bad lesbian for not knowing?"

She's insanely charismatic and her songs are brilliant. Feels like the most deserving Huge Popstar Blowup in a long time.

Her NPR Tiny Desk was my first exposure to her, it’s an incredible performance and I immediately understood why she was a star. Listening to the album after was slightly disappointing - I mean the songs are great, but something about the production didn’t quite click for me. “Good luck, babe!” is excellent though

My wife is a very casual music fan in general, but recently she's been getting kind of obsessed with individual artists, and Chappell Roan is the latest.

(Before that, it was Taylor.)

She talked about this when she was on Fallon, but it's pretty funny that some fan inside Google made it do this in the "Did you mean" line.

https://i.imgur.com/gts393u.png

"some random twink that works at Google" as she put it lol

I haven't paid attention to any pop for the last 20 years, but recently became a taylor swift fan. Then I randomly heard good luck babe and thought it was phenomenal, the album ain't half bad either.

"Good Luck Babe" doesn't have the same kind of charisma as the best tracks on the album in my view

"Good Luck Babe" is quite the earworm, caught me more than "Red Wine Supernova" (which was also good). I should check out the album

maybe 200 20-somethings at the gay bar singing "good luck babe" at the top of their lungs last saturday night.

I'm genuinely surprised y'all embrace her! She's fine. I'm figuring out what about her voice bothers me.

Current 20-somethings were pre-teens when Katy Perry's singles were omnipresent. I feel like Roan's big numbers play into that nostalgia while making the lyrics young-and-single-adult. The album deepens from there with "Coffee" and other non-anthems.

oh my god lol. how can i even describe it. i feel like you either hear it or you don't. there's a sour confidence that offsets the purest of feeling. there's a yelpiness and then grade-a organic midwestern honey. her tone when she's at her most direct, yearning and heartfelt just melts my armor away. carly rae jepsen would kill for this kind of voice. that probably does a disservice to crj. i just mean that crj, her thing, it could have been huge if she had this kind of voice.

there's also an incredibly refreshing honesty in the drive of her heart through the lyrics. (is she writing these songs or does she have help, i genuinely don't know?). like, she isn't dumb, but she knows what she wants and it's l o v e. worldliness is a part of that but it isn't all of it. uncompromising. the feeling when all these kids are singing along to it warms my heart. it's a wholesome moment. you either feel it or you're soulless (j/k ;)).

xp as far as i can tell, at least from the 3 big songs, there's something less cookie cutter about her "american girl" persona than perry. she's like "american girl" post billie eilish or something. the american girl persona just feels more natural somehow. i hope she doesn't succumb to being another katy perry, that would suck.

oh, she's more convincing than Perry.

Thanks, map. I'll give the album another try. I do hear the worldliness.

tbh i didn't really get what the fuss was all about until i heard all of those kids singing it.

i feel like there's also a kind of "fartiness" to the production on the songs, like a brown plastic sound (sorry for the gross metaphor), it seems to communicate that she doesn't want to be seen that she takes herself too seriously. i noticed the same style in the sabrina carpenter songs.

I don't know if this holds water, but thinking again of 20-somethings growing up on Kidz Bop versions of pop songs, with their chintzier production, and playing a bit into that nostalgia (unbridled kid-like singalongs, but also as Azaelia said, songs about being a woman, not a girl).

Oh, well if there's a fartiness to this, I guess I'll go check it out.

Chappell Roan is expected to chart five singles on this week’s Billboard Hot 100 (dated July 6th, 2024), all at new peaks:

#11. (+5) Good Luck, Babe!
#38. (+17) Hot To Go!
#46. (+8) Red Wine Supernova
#66. (+24) Pink Pony Club
#83. (NEW) Casual pic.twitter.com/70qmjvBafv

— Talk of the Charts (@talkofthecharts) June 30, 2024

The production is the only weak point to me, tho its datedness makes it feel kind of relatably affordable or something… the Midwest adopting like an old idea of mainstreamed indie, idk. But she’s a huge talent / persona / force of nature, her star& vision makes the production feel like it’s struggling keep up with her like she just wills these aspiring 2008 Robyn sounds into good-enough canvasses …. Imho

(is she writing these songs or does she have help, i genuinely don't know?)

Album was produced and mostly co-written by Dan Nigro, who performed same duties on Olivia Rodrigo's albums. (And has written with/produced assorted others.)

maybe robyn with the house/dance elements removed? i don’t really hear robyn otherwise, she would never be caught dead using the cheerleader gang vocals that pop up throughout “red wine supernova,” for example. it feels like teenage dream-era katy perry but with smarter lyrics and supreme vocal control

i agree that the production is the weak point, but i appreciate that she doesn’t go fully into camp or 80s nostalgia (“hot to go” and its clear toni basil inspo, notwithstanding). it’s a tricky balance because these songs are clearly massive and arena-ready, but until “good luck babe,” the production has kind of been…humble?

I guess I hear katy Perry on “red wine supernova” but her three biggest records (“good luck babe” “hot to go” “pink pony club”) all feel like late aughts indie efforts at 80s pastiche. Like bat for lashes era shit. “Pink pony club” is very fake Kate bush right, but also kind of “modern” in an mgmt era sense (Which is kind of what I mean about the production feeling more slight than the songwriting and performances).

The album itself has production that’s also kind of all over the place imo like you can id different pop referents but to me the albums spirit is just not something I locate in the production which feels kind of “servicey”

TS: "Pink Pony Club" vs. New Young Pony Club

What immediately came to mind for me was Marina and the Diamonds circa Electra Heart; there's also a theatre-kid quality to what she's doing that scanned more like... Born This Way Gaga than Katy Perry to me. But to be honest I only gave the album a couple of plays when it came out last September, took "Super Graphic..." and ran, so I'd have to revisit it to see if that opinion still holds.

By Robyn I’m thinking of “dancing on my own” era more than “honey” era

She sounds exactly what I would imagine Katy Perry to sound like if she was a member of Gen Z.

The singles are pretty irresistible!

"Casual" is killer. No wonder Katie Pruitt covers it.

katy perry if she could sing and had good songs

"Casual" is also a perfect song if you don't really need a new Taylor Swift song but you don't want to give up that kind of pop.

I thought of Katy Perry in part because I remember hanging out with some friends and their five-year-old daughter in 2010, and the kid sang the "Hot N Cold" chorus nonstop and loved Gaga's "Bad Romance" too; and now that kid is 19 and at Berkeley, and I imagine Roan hitting that balance between nostalgia for being five and being a young woman in college.

i like your kidz bop theory btw.. that's kinda what the production reminds me of most.

bat for lashes era shit

you have a weird sense for what Bat for Lashes sounds like

anyway I tried the album and liked it slightly more than my first attempt to listen to her which, it turns out, was HOT TO GO which I still think is terrible. But the new single is better than anything i heard on the album. I could really do without those horrible cheerleader bvox, it reminds me of the worst parts of Born to Die and Electrheart.

when i first heard her i admired her lyrical candor, how she included things in her songs other artists would be too embarrassed or self-conscious to, and in that respect she brought to mind early kesha for me

oh def

its why being precocious is in fact a risk

Last I checked the only people fantasising that this particular eleven year old was badly behaved were in this thread? CR said she didn’t even notice this girl.

this thread sure is a Rorschach test

was wondering why i thought i saw my parents arguing upthread

Front of t-shirt:
my strongly held belief is that its nice to be nice

Back of t-shirt:
yeah thats right i said it

ok, which one of you is the plant from the talent agency that Roan recently left that's getting paid to trash her rep?

just kidding, although I suspect the bot army crap might be related to that

this is less a comment about the discussion in this thread and more the general reaction to this story & her public persona overall recently but -- when did pop music fans discover a distaste for diva behavior? i think what's particularly interesting/contradictory to me is that this sort of constant chiding of chappell roan for being rude to people rides alongside a pretty robust culture of nostalgia for divas & diva behavior of the past. yet the behavior of the present is policed in a way that enforces norms/boundaries that would invalidate a lot of that nostalgia if it was applied equally. like, if there was a story from 1996 about madonna making a little girl cry in a brazilian hotel it would be considered iconic lore, so what's changed (this question is somewhat rhetorical)

internet

Probably same reason people would no longer celebrate rock stars doing tons of drugs and having sex with young groupie.

ok except there is a difference between rudeness and statutory rape. the fact that you would immediately zoom to that comparison actually feels illustrative here lol

I think in 2026 people are probably just increasingly sick of rich assholes, which is not a comment on how true this story is or not.

Artist trashes hotel room in 70s = bad ass
Artist trashes hotel room in 2020s = people dragging them for not being in therapy

the idea of looking at chappell roan as a rich person is funny to me. i don’t think that’s what is happening here

I don’t actually think most people liked diva behavior anyway, just certain types of fans

yeah madonna if she had made a kid cry in the 80's I think it would have been a big deal

i think maybe another unexplored aspect of this is this, especially considering Trump and his celebrity in all of this

I think in 2026 people are probably just increasingly sick of rich assholes,

so what's changed

well she's a drag queen, not a diva, i think is the answer to your question

yeah madonna if she had made a kid cry in the 80's I think it would have been a big deal

― a (waterface), Monday, March 30, 2026

I cried when "Into the Groove" wasn't officially released as a stand-alone single.

dude same

music can be such a revelation

The internet spent like 7 years talking about how mean Ellen Degeneres was. There seems to be less tolerance for queer female divas.

this thread sure is a Rorschach test

“The streets are extended gutters and the gutters are full of blood and when the drains finally scab over, all the vermin will drown. The accumulated filth of all their sex and murder will foam up about their waists and all the footballers will look up and shout 'CAN YOU TAKE A PICTURE WITH MY DAUGHTER PLEASE!'...and I'll look down and whisper 'No.”

I think overall we’re in a better place about what behaviors (or crimes) we tolerate, with a reasonable amount of credit to be given to internet discourse

on the other hand, a lot of it seems locked into this mentality that seems a little immature, where cultural figures get flagged for something small and there’s not a sense of scale. “musician being possibly rude to a child” getting the amount of attention that “musician runs over child with their suv” would hypothetically get seems a little off base

I think the younger people who weren’t locked into internet gossip mentality are better about it but I have definitely encountered millennials — although not strictly millennials — who have a mental catalogue of what’s good or bad based on data points. The most tiring category might be “local businesses that are bad because I read someone’s anecdote on reddit/facebook about a rude manager”

yeah madonna if she had made a kid cry in the 80's I think it would have been a big deal

― a (waterface), Monday, March 30, 2026 11:41 AM (fourteen minutes ago)

my point is not whether people would have been mad in the 80s, it's about behavior that is ultimately inconsequential and kind of funny being treated as controversial in the present while at the same time a robust online culture exists to archive, canonize, celebrate such moments of the past

bjork assaulting paparazzi in the 90s was a legitimate controversy at the time but is now viewed w/in the warm glow of nostalgia for meme-able moments of the past as being well inside the bounds of celebrated diva behavior. and yet, we are still apparently supposed to care about chappell roan being rude to photographers on the red carpet. why?

Oh shit - mh's agency-revenge theory (especially given how publicly it happened) definitely makes sense.

the idea of looking at chappell roan as a rich person is funny to me. i don’t think that’s what is happening here

I guess you missed the ancillary clusterfuck about her grandad being a rich insurance guy or whatever

xxpost I'm sure this is partly about the genre Roan is in. She shares a fan base with the Taylor Swift/Arianna Grande class that came out of Disney or Country and cares a lot about positive image. Bjork was an alt artist.

I think in the 90's my main association w/ the Mac would be "Bill Clinton campaign song".

Wrong thread.

the idea of looking at chappell roan as a rich person is funny to me. i don’t think that’s what is happening here

― slob wizard (J0rdan S.), Monday, March 30, 2026 11:40 AM bookmarkflaglink

And Jorginho, who kicked this all off, has like three times CR's net worth

fwiw when I tried to actually figure out what the story is here (which I failed at, but tbf I didn't try hard), a lot of it did come across as insane rich people stuff, though mostly from the kid's parents who posted some insanely entitled nonsense

otm. I mean maybe the kid told their parents "I want her to suffer, Don Corleone" but something tells me it was more a case of protective parents with a sphere of influence and notoriety hitting back at the person they think hurt their kid. Who may well be embarrassed at being the center of this story 5 years from now

Can't say for sure my parents wouldn't have taken out an op-ed and made a TV movie about my bully Drew who lived across the street if they had the means, but I'd have resented them for my entire adult life for it. Especially if they didn't get someone cool to play me.

we thinking someone like Kirk Cameron? he's available.

Footballer Jorginho Frello says he “regrets the impact” the security guard situation had on Chappell Roan:

“It was, ultimately, a misunderstanding in that respect, and I am glad to set the record straight. It's important to me that this is clarified fairly and accurately.” pic.twitter.com/xfnqejpDCz

— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) April 13, 2026

wow what a dickhead

Well he did play for Chelsea and Arsenal