Baby Queen announces debut EP, releases fourth single ‘Pretty Girl Lie’

Knock knock, get the door, it’s the sound of the future. Bella Latham, aka Baby Queen, has cemented her place as the coolest thing in pop™ with her first three singles, and safe to say new release ‘Pretty Girl Lie’ doesn’t do anything to shake those foundations. It may even be the most crucial building block that could possibly be placed upon them.

If you don’t care about me going on and on about the excellence of this track, let me quickly refer you to the tag line here: “Crispy fucking cheesy pop banger” is no word of a lie. Lyrically crisp and musically a total pop anthem, you’d struggle to not be having a wee boogie and singing along as you walk back from the shop when ‘Pretty Girl Lie’ comes on your headphones.

Frankly, it’s this innate catchy pop quality that makes ‘Pretty Girl Lie’ such a significant release. Some people have, somehow, struggled to get aboard the Baby Queen hype train in the wake of ‘Internet Religion’, ‘Buzzkill’, and ‘Medicine’. Too indie, too aggressive sounding, too depressing. Ugh. With its even more overt pop sensibilities, ‘Pretty Girl Lie’ is the track to win over those of little taste.

Lyrically, Baby Queen is still up and attacking the worst parts of social media, focusing on how apps like FaceTune distort our perception of our bodies:

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I wanted to tell you what this song is about before it comes out tomorrow. Fuck you @facetune 💔 I love you and you’re beautiful. Pretty Girl Lie 🥺

A post shared by BABY QUEEN (@queenofthebabies) on Sep 21, 2020 at 12:24pm PDT

While the chorus is incredibly catchy – “Now the pretty girl smile is perfectly white/and the pretty girl style is super contrived”, my lyrical highlight comes from the bridge/middle eight section. Vocally it is the rawest part of the song, with the polish rubbed away to reveal the reality underneath. Sounds just a lot like the whole theme of the song, right? As always, Bella is near painfully honest here, as she confronts rather than acknowledges how influencers and celebrities treat the images they post online. “But I don’t wanna modify reality when I’m online / In case they end up just like me / Too insecure to be happy” closes the section, with genuine struggle intermingled with a slightest sense of victory. The chain is broken, and with that comes release. It’s a story of personal growth, and we love to see it.

Musically, this is Baby Queen’s most mainstream feeling offering to date. It’s full of bouncy and rising synths over super basic beats, perfect for sucking listeners in and then becoming a total earworm. Guitars are still present, in a manner more reminiscent of what little 1975 I know than the indie influences in ‘Internet Religion’. Really, I don’t have a lot to say here. It’s just simple and catchy.

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Idk how this happened to me by the way. The debut EP is up for pre-order, the Pretty Girl Lie music video is out and the Baby Kingdom merch just dropped online. 🥺🥺🥺 I don’t do this enough online, so I really want to thank my brother @kinged and my incredible teams at @polydorrecords and @juicemgmt for the work they’ve put into building our Kingdom 🥺 I’m the luckiest Baby Queen in the world. Thank you @spotifyuk @applemusic @soundcloud and @bbcradio1 for your support. I also want to thank you guys for listening to my music. You see what I see and you’re tired of the same fucking words being said by people who don’t really care about who they’re saying them to. I really feel that right now is a time for pop music to mean something. I really fucking love you and I promise I’m going to work harder than anybody has ever worked before to make you proud of who you are and what you’ve been through 💖 Baby Kingdom for fucking ever 👑👑👑👑👑👑👑👑👑👑👑👑👑 links in bio, love BQ

A post shared by Baby Queen (@queenofthebabies) on Sep 23, 2020 at 1:23am PDT

My overall perspective is as simple as outlined earlier – this song slaps. It’s the sort of song I imagine everyone will be putting their TikTok videos to for its catchiness, not taking the time to listen to how it is the antithesis of what they’re doing, and I think that’s beautiful. Not that I know how TikTok works.

Baby Queen has also announced her debut EP, featuring her four singles so far alongside two new tracks. Release is set for November 6^th, and you can bet I’ll be here talking about it when it drops then, so set your calendars.

Pre-order the Medicine EP on vinyl or cassette, both pink, here.