There’s something about Billie Eilish that pulls me in and makes me want to make things. Can anyone else relate?
I was watching the Billie Eilish episode of Carpool Karaoke with James Corden, and I was immediately transported back to my own teenage years, just messing around making music and other forms of art. No careful planning, no real censorship, no concern over possible ripple effects. (For better or for worse!)
As a career-minded adult, the responsible thing to do was of course to reign those things in – especially because our lives are more public and interconnected than ever. But listening to Billie talk about her songwriting experiences reminded me of how much I miss the boldness of creation with reckless abandon.
For background, I wouldn’t describe myself as a “super-fan” or anything (I do own one of her albums though, which carried me through a tough tax season a few years ago). I have pretty eclectic taste in music, I’m not up-to-date on pop culture and all the latest, and I don’t think too hard about the behind-the-scenes industry stuff.
I do, however, enjoy occasionally watching musicians singing to their own songs while driving around with James Corden. There’s something so relatable about that (confessions of an avid car-singer)!
As far as my unsophisticated musical taste can tell, Billie has a unique sound rooted in experimentation and authentic self-expression. To my mind, she’s sort-of become symbolic of the power of exactly that.
I just did it because it was fun
Billie recorded Ocean Eyes when she was only thirteen (!!!). As they talked about it, she reflected on how incredible it was that something she did “for no reason besides the fact that it was just for fun,” unlocked this incredible career.
Not to imply that if we all just do the things we like, just for fun, that we’ll suddenly be transported into stardom. But it is validation of the importance of play, don’t you think?
Just creating things for fun is an authentic expression of ourselves. The more fun creative things we do, the more we connect with that unique part of us, to the point where we can’t help but integrate it into our daily lives and everything else that we do.
You don’t know where it’ll lead – and it doesn’t have to lead anywhere. It will probably lead to your enjoyment – and that’s a win because we need to enjoy our own company and creativity. It’s also possible that it could open unforeseen doors. Maybe it does lead to some other notion of societally-accepted resounding success. Or it somehow injects itself into your career and grows it into something unique to you. Maybe you meet incredible people and go on to enrich each others’ lives.
Either way, you can’t lose.
Messing around is creating
Apparently, Billie’s parents had a rule when she was a kid: they couldn’t make her go to bed if she was making music.
James asked whether there were instances of, “well you’re not making music now, you’re just messing around,” and the jig would be up.
Her answer: “Making music is messing around.” I love this response.
And isn’t that true for most creative acts? Sure, you can have a purpose and an intention, but just messing around is where you make new discoveries about yourself, your medium, and what it means to be creative. It’s the process of allowing, unfolding, discovering, testing, trying, failing, and trying again.
Have big dreams and love the process
The pair swing by her childhood home. “You wanna know something crazy that I just remembered?” She reclines on her bed surrounded by colourful happy flower pillows, wonderfully juxtaposed to her image at the time.
“Before we made any songs together, Finneas said this, and it was kind of as a joke – we were talking about, like, making music… And we were like, what if we made music together? And he goes, ‘I’m gonna make you the biggest pop star in the world.’ And I was like, ha-ha. Like, we laughed!”
This energy of possibility that ripples through authentic creation from the heart gives me chills! I love the dream, but I also love that the dream wasn’t necessarily the purpose – having fun messing around with music was.
There’s something freeing about this. Often I hear people struggling wanting do something creative, but they don’t know what. Let yourself daydream! Have a big dream, then let the dream inform your play.
Then it’s just a matter of falling in love with the mess.
