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At the time of the release of his second album, Happier Than Ever, in the heart of the summer of 2021, Billie Eilish took everyone on the wrong foot by making the front page of the magazine Vogue with a totally unexpected look. Known for her green locks and loose clothes, the 19-year-old shows herself there as a Hollywood fatal blonde in a bustier hugging her curves. “She always tries to deconstruct things“, analyzes Benjamin Manaut, project manager at Polydor / Universal.
“I wondered if I hadn’t locked myself in a box, if society wasn’t whispering in my ear: ‘Be this image until the end of your days’. It is exactly the opposite of what I am looking for! I don’t wanna stay the same all my life“, explains the young singer in Madame Figaro, during one of the few interviews she gave. At the end of August 2021, she also confided in the microphone of France Inter:
Little Simz’s Message: Power to Women
The same approach animates Little Simz, rapper from London, who is releasing her new album “Sometimes I Might Be Introvert“- the initials form Simbi, her real first name. So far, she has appeared on stage in a rather sober urban style, far from”‘show off’ of American rappers who are in the foreground, decorum, le entertainment“, summarizes Stéphane Amiel, head of the festival Les Femmes S’en Mêlent, which has twice programmed the phenomenon Little Simz.
Surprise there too with the clip Woman, where the rapper appears in a mansion with sheath dress and extravagant diamonds. “She plays with her image, she says: ‘I can do it, as well as the others, but it is not me either’“, summarizes Stéphane Amiel. And the words deliver a message that does not vary: power to women!
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Creator cocoon
To compose their records, these two artists do nothing like the others either. With the pressure around her second album, Billie Eilish could have summoned an army of producers, beatmakers and other sound architects. But no, the American has composed and written with her brother Finneas, in a closed circuit, as for her first opus.
Billie Eilish stays true to her brother, it’s quite fascinating and even more surprising, she continues to be unique and singular.
Benjamin Manaut, Polydor / Universal project manager
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“The first album sold over 18 million copies worldwide, any producer would have agreed to work with her, but she stays true to her brother, it’s quite fascinating and even more surprising, she continues to be unique and singular“, comments Benjamin Manaut. Against the current of the current production, Billie Eilish offers an album at slowed down tempo, in the purity, which sticks wonderfully to the theme of a notoriety heavy to carry.
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And at the time of eclectic playlists acclaimed by young audiences, the Californian offers a record “which can be listened to in its entirety, with a beautiful homogeneity“, continues the project manager. On September 3, Billie Eilish presents a concert-film where she interprets the titles of Happier… in full and in order, accompanied by the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra (on Disney +).
I’m a boss in a fucking dress.
Little Simz, rapper
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Same principle of the creative cocoon at Little Simz. However, from the start of her recording career in 2015, the rapper, now aged 27, was dubbed by her peers. Stéphane Amiel remembers seeing Mos Def, a New York rap figure, “at the back of the room at his first concert in Paris“To Women Get Involved. That was six years ago, and since the praise of Kendrick Lamar or Jay-Z has been raining down. She has even just made her first American TV in the Jimmy Fallon show.
The big structures gave her golden bridges, which she refused, remaining on her own label Age 101. It was enough to listen, Little Simz announced the color in his song Boss in 2019: “I’m a boss in a fucking dress” (I’m a boss in a fucking dress).
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