Chappell Roan has hit the "people are getting upsetting and weird" tier of famous
This is why we can't have nice things/extremely satisfying summer jams
Photo: Erika Goldring/Getty Images
Today, from the “This is why we can’t have nice things or extremely satisfying summer jams” department: Rising music superstar Chappell Roan has given an interview where she suggests she might be backing away rapidly from that whole “rising music superstar” thing, telling the Comment Section podcast that it might be time to “pump the brakes” on making moves to grow her career, because “People have started to be freaks.”
Roan went in to specifics of said freakitude, saying, “[they] follow me and know where my parents live, and where my sister works. All this weird shit. This,” she added, “Is the time when a few years ago when I said that if [there were] stalker vibes or my family was in danger, I would quit. And we’re there. We’re there!”
Although Roan’s been performing publicly for a decade at this point, she only exploded earlier this year, after serving as a support act for Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts World Tour. That led to festival performances, hit singles, and, eventually, her (very good) 2023 debut album The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess going from critically lauded “sleeper hit” to “actual, no fucking around hit.” And that, predictably, has come with weirdos, of the kind who approach what would be classified as pretty banal information—i.e., “Where does Chappell Roan’s sister work?”—as though it were precious, parasocial treasure.
In fact, according to Roan, it’s affected how she’s been doing promotion, and where she plans to go next with her career: “I’m just kind of in this battle… I’ve pumped the brakes on, honestly, anything to make me more known. It’s kind of a forest fire right now. I’m not trying to go do a bunch of shit.” This, of course, isn’t the first time that a performer’s fame has suddenly massively outstripped their infrastructure for handling it/protecting people from it (and/or the weirdos it produces and attracts). But given that Roan’s ascent has been one of the delights of the last year in music, we’re holding out hope she’ll find a way to weather the storm without making her own life hell.
[via THR]