Everyone at Billie Eilish’s 20th Birthday Party Was Her Employee

Every once in a while, I hear an anecdote from a celebrity about fame that sounds so hellish and bleak that it makes me extra grateful for my simpleton life as a blogger who spends the bulk of her time tending her tomato plants (they’re coming in fabulously this year, thank you very much).

On Monday, Billie Eilish discussed the loneliness of skyrocketing to fame on Lily Allen and Miquita Oliver’s podcast “Miss Me?” In one particularly bummer moment, the 22-year-old said, “I lost all of my friends when I got famous, like, literally all except one.” At one point during her 20th birthday party, she looked around the room and realized, “it was only people that I employ…and all 15 years or more older than me.” Woof. (Also shout out to all of those 35 year-olds at a 20 year-old’s birthday party. Very cool.)

Billie was only 14 when her hit “Ocean Eyes” started gaining traction, and her debut EP came out when she was just 16. That is so young! Making friends is hard enough at that age!

Billie explained that listening to Lily’s song “Smile”—specifically the lyrics “I was so lost back then/ But with a little help from my friends/ I found the light in the tunnel at the end”—made her cry “because I didn’t feel that way, because I didn’t have any friends.” A dagger! To my heart!

But! But! There’s a happy ending! I’m not just sharing the saddest story imaginable to start your day off in an awful mood. Billie concluded:

“I worked really hard on friendship and making friends and making new friends and rekindling old friendships… About exactly a year ago, I reconnected with a bunch of old friends, and now I have so many friends; I have a crew now! I could literally cry about it. It’s been the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me.”

It makes me genuinely happy to hear that Billie realized early on how hard the biz (and life in general!) can be without a good crew and actively sought to remedy it.

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