Billie Eilish cried after first new album show
Getty ImagesBillie Eilish says she cried after performing tracks from her new album live for the first time.
The singer's third studio album, Hit Me Hard and Soft, was released on Friday to rave reviews.
She told Radio 1’s New Music Show with Jack Saunders it took almost two years of writing as she struggled to settle on a sound.
"We started working on this album officially in October 2022 and had many months of ideas that weren’t very solidified and weren’t very exciting to us," she says.
"We liked them but we were like... I don’t think we can do this any more."
And she says it was Skinny, the first track on the album, that kick-started her new era.
"That awoke something in us," she says.
She first penned the track two years ago with her brother and collaborator Finneas and says it helped inspire their Oscar-winning song from the Barbie movie, What Was I Made For?
That song, and its success, "opened all these doors to millions of things in terms of inspiration," Billie says.
Getty ImagesBy early May 2023, she had completed The Greatest, the sixth track on the album.
"As soon as we wrote that song the whole album came falling out," she says.
The Greatest is a "heavy" song, Billie says, and a challenging one to sing.
She tells Radio 1 she's both excited and nervous to perform it live - and did it for the first time at an album listening party in LA last week.
"The count-in happened and I was sitting there on the edge of the stage in front of this tiny crowd and I was like 'woah I’ve never done this one before' and it’s really one of my hardest," she says.
"I love that song so much. That song is really, really special to me.
"I literally performed it the other day and cried after."
Critics have praised how raw Billie is on her latest release, as she opens up about growing up, her sexuality and body image.
Early in Skinny, she sings how "21 lasted a lifetime".
"It’s so funny isn’t it, we’re always the oldest we’ve ever been," she tells Radio 1.
"I had a realisation in December when I reconnected with some old friends who I never thought I’d see again and I was like 'wait, life is so long actually'.
"We change so much and so much happens.
"I’m older and I see things in a different way."
Hit Me Hard and Soft is on track to be her third UK number one album, according to the Official Charts Company.
"This album is my favourite thing I’ve ever made," Billie says. "I couldn’t be more proud of it."
Billie kicks off an 81-date world tour later this year, taking in North America and Australia before arriving in Europe next April.
She's booked 12 UK dates, including two shows in Glasgow, six in London and four in Manchester.
