Billie Eilish – The World’s A Little Blurry
I have two teenage daughters and I’m fundamentally aware of the fact that as much as I know about music, I really don’t know much about theirs. I know some songs and I hear a lot of what they listen to while driving around. Back in early 2017 they started playing a song called Ocean Eyes by Billie Eilish and have been diehard fans from her earliest online presence. There is a lot of music they like that doesn’t resonate much with me but I was very much aware of her from the beginning cause she was different from everything else in music. Her Don’t Smile At Me EP came out mid 2017 and I loved the stripped back approach. Lot’s of space for acoustic guitar and piano with lots of interesting effects courtesy of her brother/writer Finneas. But mostly I really noticed Eilish’s vocals. Apart from having an exceptionally good voice, she also is very quiet in how she sings. It is very intimate and personal and it is reflective of the type of material she sings of. It is like talking about open wounds and hurt and pain and struggle but from someone only 17 years old at the time. My daughters mentioned that she would be playing at The Phoenix Concert Theatre in Toronto on Halloween 2018 so I surprised them with tickets to the show at a 1300 person venue. Their first alone…without parents. They came back from the show a weeping mess of teen adulation and I love that they had a first concert experience on their own with someone that they truly loved and identified with. I know it is something they will remember forever cause 6 months later Eilish sold out The Molson Amphtheatre which holds 16000 people and scalpers were asking for $500 a seat moments after it went on sale and sold out. I got them tickets to that show as well.
When her first full length album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? was released on March 29 2019 I posted that day on Facebook after hearing the album once that I predicted it would be album of the year and Billie would win Artist/New Artist of the year at the Grammy Awards. It was that immediate and relevant and different that I just had a feeling it was all about to explode for her and indeed it did. In the end it won 6 Grammy Awards including Album of the Year, Best Pop Vocal Album, and Best Engineered Album. The single “Bad Guy” won Record of the Year and Song of the Year and her brother Finneas won the award for Producer of the Year. That is an astounding feat and I’m not a big fan of the Grammy’s but this time…it was spot on and fully deserved. From the beginning I’ve been saying she reminds me of this generation’s Kate Bush. Innovative, in control of her career, family oriented, honest in lyrical content as much as it is uncomfortably open and unfiltered. I truly think Billie Eilish is a remarkable talent along with her brother Finneas O’Connell. I would even go as far as to say we are watching a generation defining artist emerge.
I’ve seen a lot of music documentaries in my time. Some are fair, some are terrible and some are really good. Yesterday Apple TV Plus aired the Billie Eilish documentary titled The World’s A Little Blurry which traces her rise over the course of the past 4 years. It is an astoundingly great documentary. It is a fly on the wall inside look at her personal life and career to date. It is raw and honest and sad and joyous and over 2h 25min really captures the challenges of a young girl struggling with her personal demons, her fame, her family, her boyfriend and her career. I’m willing to bet that the movie will be nominated for some kind of award at the whatever movie award shows give awards for this kind of movie. The Golden Globes and The Academy Awards I’m guessing. Yeah it is that good. It may be tough to find to watch right now but I strongly recommend fans of music to check it out cause it is remarkably good and her and her brother are truly gifted musicians.
