LIVE : Chappell Roan — Hangout fest

By Nick Campos | NJC Creative

The Experience

I saw Chappell before she became the artist everyone knows today. She was still finding herself and developing the aesthetic that would unmistakably become hers, but even then, there was no denying the strength of her music or the presence she carried on stage. You can say a lot about Chappell. You can talk about her personality, her flaws, her dedication, her controversies, or everything that makes her unique.

But you can't deny her.

Even at that point in her career, the crowd was huge. She had a strong stage presence and knew how to command the space she had been given. Looking back now, there was something fascinating about watching an artist who hadn't completely grown into what she would eventually become while seeing that the foundation was already there. The confidence was there. The writing was there. The audience was clearly there. And underneath the fun, colorful world surrounding her music was writing that could be painfully vulnerable.

From My Experience

Chappell's music captured something I knew all too well: what it felt like to be a teenager who grew up too fast. There's a strange contradiction that comes with being insecure. You can crave being loved and yearn to be heard while simultaneously accepting that it'll never be you. There's a weird middle ground that you can decipher as either acceptance or simply giving up. You seek sexual validation and physical approval because, for a moment, being desired makes you feel valuable. Your body becomes a tool. A mirror.

But eventually, that validation wears off, and you're left wondering if it was worth it. You start pondering whether they ever cared about you or simply wanted access to your body. That takes a toll. Casual hits all the wrong spots, and for all the right reasons. There's something painfully familiar about giving intimacy to someone while pretending you don't need anything more from them. You tell yourself that you're okay. You even begin accepting that you'll never fully be chosen. You convince yourself that casual is something worth while because the alternative is accepting that it will never work and has to end. Because admitting you want to be loved is like a bullet.

Admitting you want to be loved is more vulnerable than intimacy itself.

And Chappell doesn't only write about the parts of desire we're comfortable admitting out loud. Picture You spoke deeply to me because it explores the private moments when you're completely alone with your thoughts and your body. The moments when your body calls for something it might have never known before. A feeling, a desire, a pleasure that feels like nothing could satisfy it besides that one person. It's strange. There's something beautiful about dedicating those private moments to someone, whether they know it or not. It's those secret moments that can make you feel even more drawn toward them. Nobody sees it. Nobody applauds it. The other person may never know it happened. But for those moments, they're the only person who exists in your mind.

That's why I find Chappell's writing so beautiful. Beneath the confidence, sexuality, humor, and theatricality is someone constantly writing about the need to be wanted, chosen, remembered, and loved. And those aren't always the same thing.

Being desired doesn't mean being loved. Being intimate doesn't mean being close. And being wanted doesn't mean being chosen.

When you're young and insecure, attention can feel like affection. Someone wanting your body can feel like someone wanting you, your heart, your mind, everything that exists beyond what they can physically touch. Sometimes you don't learn the difference until you've already settled for less. Her music doesn't make those experiences prettier.

It makes them feel normal.

Looking around that massive crowd, I realized that songs describing incredibly private feelings had somehow become something thousands of strangers could scream together. There was something freeing about that. The feelings I once thought were embarrassing or uniquely mine clearly weren't mine alone. I saw Chappell before the enormous stages, before she became one of the names everyone was talking about, and before her world had fully transformed into what it is now. But the part that mattered was already there.

She knew how to take the things we whisper to ourselves and make thousands of people scream them out loud.