On Tuesday, Rolling Stone revealed none other than Chappell Roan as this month’s cover girl. Unsurprisingly, the breakout star—but noted opposite of an overnight success—spoke candidly on all things, from leaving President Joe Biden on read (“I’m not going to go to the White House because I am not going to be a monkey for Pride”) to learning to cope with international fame (“At first, I was in severe denial. They would literally show me some stats and the only thing I could do is say, ‘No, no, no. It’s not like that'”) to unlearning homophobia (“I was scared of flamboyantly gay people because I was taught that”).
Despite her breakneck ascent to pop stardom, Roan is refreshingly honest about how not great life has been since she’s selling out shows, repeatedly going viral, and basically, becoming one of the most sought-after singer-songwriters of the year. Thanks to her viral appeal to her fans, in which she asked them not to be weird, it’s well-documented that Roan’s boundaries have been violated. In the interview, she offered some distressing details as to how: She’s been kissed by an overzealous fan without her consent, her family’s been stalked, and she now has to travel with security.
Hearteningly, a number of her industry peers—predominantly the shes, theys, and gays—have lent their hands, hearts, and how-to-deal-with-harassment tips to her during this time. They include Charli XCX, Billie Eilish (who said Good Luck, Babe! is her favorite song of the year), Lady Gaga (though Roan said she’s too anxious to text or call her), Hayley Williams, Miley Cyrus (she offered a party invitation), MUNA (they hosted her for dinner), Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker (all three grabbed coffees and took walks), and finally, the third member of boygenius, Phoebe Bridgers (they commiserated over “abusive and violent” fandoms). Oh, and there was something about Katy Perry telling her not to read the comments, but really? Who the hell is accepting advice from Katy Perry right now?
Anyway. Mitski, too, reached out to Roan via email that read, in part: “I just wanted to humbly welcome you to the shittiest exclusive club in the world, the club where strangers think you belong to them and they find and harass your family members.”
“I’m not trying to name-drop,” Roan told RS. I’m trying to tell you there are girls who are good people, who are helping other girls out. I’m name-dropping them because people just need to know that people are good people.” Frankly, I wouldn’t blame her even if she was trying to name-drop. If Lady Gaga gave me her phone number I would be blocked already. In all seriousness, as a fan of most of the aforementioned, it’s all very affirming information.
Now, I could write something about all the women who maybe haven’t reached out to Roan but…instead, I’ll focus on what she said about men in the industry being generally unhelpful. While Roan mentioned that Orville Peck, Troye Sivan, Noah Kahan, and Elton John had been in touch, according to her, “not a lot of boys have been like, ‘Let me know if you ever want to talk about it.’”
Insert shock here!
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