Billie Eilish’s Happier Than Ever achieved growth in a time of chaos
The COVID-19 pandemic had monumental consequences on just about every industry on a global scale, be it medicine, infrastructure or entertainment.
The ways in which the world operated and the way humans interacted with each other fundamentally shifted, writes Music News Blitz’s Isaac James.
We as a race were faced with the question as to whether human connection could persist when a key component is removed; proximity.
Not many sectors flourished during the pandemic. Whilst we all have varied experiences of the time, some having felt liberated on their lonesome and others feeling isolated and melancholy, there was an undeniable shift in the arts as lockdown forced a state of reflection and introspection on a macro scale.
We were all forced to confront who we were when we were not surrounded by others, and such themes were persistent in the renaissance of music that COVID encouraged.
Potent shift
One artist who had a notably potent shift in image and songwriting traits was Billie Eilish, who used lockdown as an opportunity to experiment with both her music and her personhood.
The album title Happier Than Ever was a stark contrast to the depressive and self-loathing undertones of her previous album, When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? contrasting the latter’s dark and gothic visuals with a light and ethereal aesthetic to accompany the album.
The nature of self-hatred
When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? was a distinct and potent album, one that worked to differentiate a more mature Billie from her light-hearted and romanticised songs like Ocean Eyes, and amidst the surreal and horror-infused visuals, it certainly did that.
The album’s second and most popular track, Bad Guy, is an open testament to the worst qualities of Billie’s character at the time as she laments over an onslaught of bad behaviours, all driven by a heavy percussion that makes the song feel aggressive and overwhelming.
In lines like “bruises on both my knees for you”, Billie connotes sexual deviance, the bruises perhaps both odes to the frequency and self-harming nature of her behaviour.
She continuously describes herself as “cynical” and “that bad type”, words she almost wears as a badge of dishonour.
A similar motif can be heard in Bury A Friend where Billie questions why somebody would want to be friends with her and how she passively pushes people away with her actions, likening her friendship to acts of self harm, “step on the glass, staple your tongue”.
Both Bad Guy and Bury a Friend are underpinned by a near depressive state of mind, but the tempo and instrumentation of both songs are so forceful and well-driven that it's almost easy to overlook just how sombre the lyrics are.
There is an interesting point to be made here about how Billie, even before the pandemic, seemed to have been in a pre-established state of isolation, albeit self-inflicted.
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Discomfort in rejection
In Wish You Were Gay Billie sings about how she struggles with rejection, noting that she would find it easier for a man to simply not be sexually attracted to her than for her to confront the notion that someone just isn't attracted to her as a person.
The song details persistent attempts to grow close to a person and to continuously be met with rejection, “If three’s a crowd and two was us, one slipped away”.
The ordeal is tiring to Billie as she begs for him to “spare [her] pride” as her confidence is continuously challenged and washed away by a stream of disregard.
This lack of pride and true hatred for one's self was narrated by Billie in Idontwannabeyouanymore on her EP in 2017, though I appreciate the complexity of rehahashing this topic in the context of pursuing love, only to be met with loneliness.
The song neatly bridges the ideas of pushing others away noted in the former two songs discussed, “I can't tell you how much I wish I didn't want to stay”, insinuating that the entire ordeal would just be easier if she could walk away, yet she fails to bring herself to leave.
Finding the light
In stark contrast, and in the lead up to Happier Than Ever’s release, Billie Eilish released the single My Future, a track from the album and a taster of the general tone and narrative the album would explore.
The song begins with a slow set of chords on an electric piano which give a soothing reverb effect; for this first segment, her voice is only accompanied by the piano which generates a sense of intimacy and vulnerability before the song’s lyrics begin to expand on her willingness to meet her future self.
“I'm in love, But not with anybody else, Just wanna get to know myself” perfectly encapsulates the core message of the album and the change that COVID brought about to the landscape of music.
Unlike in Wish You Were Gay, Billie poses the question that, whilst she knows she's meant to feel alone without ‘someone’, “Aren’t I someone?”, questioning whether loneliness has to inherently be negative.
The nuance of love
Billie would also go on to explore a duality of love in this album in the songs Happier Than Ever and Halley’s Comet, which detail the positive and negative experiences she had with love.
Whilst the former would describe the dark period of her life where she was abused by her partner, noting the avoidant and hostile nature of a partner who “Made [her] miserable” and “sad”, Halley’s Comet is the beacon of light amidst the dark.
She begins the song as avoidant, still stuck in her distant ways describing how “I don't want it, And I don't want to want you”, yet yields, stating “But in my dreams I seem to be more honest, And I must admit you’ve been in quite a few”.
The song encapsulates the inescapable and inevitability of love; an all-powerful force that can “break a promise”, likely the promise Billie made herself to stay alone.
In comparison to the ways in which she described relationships and proximity to others in Bury A Friend, there is undeniable growth that juxtaposes both pieces of work.
Billie is able to be vulnerable and fall in love once again without fear of harming herself or others, and through Happier Than Ever is able to reclaim a sense of autonomy and personhood that a tainted husk of “love” otherwise stole from her.
She sees connection, the risk of pain and sadness it may bring, and chooses to love anyways; I find a true beauty to that.
Retrospective
Happier Than Ever as a body of work is a critique of company, acknowledging how it can be both beneficial and detrimental to one's self.
Billie actively showcases just how far she has come and the maturity she gained throughout the album, a journey of self discovery that otherwise wasn't possible without the COVID pandemic.
In further bodies of work Billie would focus on the struggles of fame and living with trauma, but none have come quite as close to self-actualising Billie and her many layers quite as effectively as this album.
Whilst deeply emotional and vulnerable songwriting was a trademark of Billie’s career, I feel as though Happier Than Ever was truly Billie’s north star when it comes to her work thus far.
Her heart on her sleeve, she entered a state of pure self-understanding and acknowledgement and enabled the world to follow along with her.
