Chappell Roan, pop’s next big thing: ‘I grew up thinking being gay was a sin’

‘If it’s not bold, if it’s not ruffling feathers, what’s the point?’ Chappell Roan. Photograph: Ryan Lee Clemens

From Missouri, US
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In a decidedly risk-averse, self-consciously tasteful pop landscape, Chappell Roan stands out. The 25-year-old singer-songwriter’s debut album, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, is one of the most over-the-top, gloriously tasteless debuts in recent memory. It sounds, at turns, like Patsy Cline, 80s Madonna and RuPaul at his nastiest. Here is Roan’s idea of a poignant hook, on the breakup ballad Casual: “Knee deep in the passenger seat / And you’re eating me out / Is it casual now?”