Billie Eilish’s New Groove

Illustration: Iris Gottlieb

On Billie Eilish’s third album, Hit Me Hard and Soft, the singer graduates from her signature anti-pop persona into the mainstream sounds of her pop-star contemporaries.

Eilish, of course, has been famous for almost a decade now. Since she broke out on SoundCloud at age 16 with “Ocean Eyes,” she has become one of Gen Z’s most acclaimed artists, winning two Oscars and nine Grammys. But Eilish’s approach to music and her own stardom has felt contradictory to the industry she found herself in. Between her neo-goth clothing and her ballad-heavy catalogue, she fashioned herself as an alternative to the mainstream. Her first album, the melancholic When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?, addressed teenage depression and celebrated the anti-hero years before her contemporaries did; her even quieter second record, Happier Than Ever, confronted the anxieties and absurdities brought on by sudden fame in the wake of her debut’s success.

On Hit Me Hard and Soft, Eilish expands on these themes but positions the music away from her usual down-tempo introspection and more toward radio listeners. There’s “Lunch,” Eilish’s first explicitly queer song, backed by a bright guitar riff, and “L’amour de ma vie,” her five-and-a-half-minute beat-switching eulogy for a failed relationship. On the adult-contemporary-leaning “Birds of a Feather,” she contrasts soft, dreamy melodies with hauntingly dark lyrical content about rotting in a grave. Many of the tracks, often assisted by Weeknd-esque synth production from Eilish’s brother and producer, Finneas, could comfortably fit in the Top 40. 

This week’s episode of Switched on Pop explores Eilish’s new record track by track, unpacking this new creative arc.