There is a downside to being fast-tracked into the position of this season’s newest pop sensation, and it became more and more obvious the longer Chappell Roan’s self-proclaimed ‘biggest ever show’ went on.
A freshly risen pop star promoting their debut album should, by law, be performing a 40-minute hit-and-run set in a sweaty club, showcasing the absolute cream of their catalogue. Bang, bang, bang. Over and out. But the fast-track these days moves at positively breakneck speed. Barely a year after her first hit, Roan found herself playing to an audience of some 100,000 fans, convening over two nights on an ugly plot of land adjacent to an airport as part of the Edinburgh Summer Sessions series, whose fervour demanded the full event experience.
As such, Chappell Roan was duty-bound to perform pretty much every song she has ever released. All 14 tracks from her only album to date, plus the three subsequent singles, as well as a cover version – although in the case of the latter, kudos is due: who doesn’t want to hear a belting rendition of Heart’s ‘Barracuda’ in the shadow of an air-traffic control tower on a rainy late summer night? In the end, the visual spectacle was suitably grandiose, and her vocals were highly impressive, but it was scarcely a surprise that the material ranged from fabulous to filler.
A 27-year-old gay Missourian who has put a pop spin on the drag-queen aesthetic, Chappell Roan – the performing alter ego of Kayleigh Rose Amstutz – has enjoyed an eccentric trajectory towards raging mainstream success. Her signature song, ‘Pink Pony Club’, was first released in 2020 and roundly ignored. Her sole album, The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess, came out in 2023 to more or less indifference. It was only when an irresistible new single, ‘Good Luck, Babe!’, was released last year that the tangible commercial gains finally arrived – at which point her back catalogue was dragged from obscurity into the charts, and she was left with little choice but to fulfil consumer demand by singing, well, all of it.
The singing part is where Roan scores big. Beyond all the glitter and glam, close your eyes and it is her voice which sticks. A quasi-operatic instrument, sliding up and down the scales, it contains echoes of the young Kate Bush in its higher register, but can also be powerfully soulful in a more straightforwardly Adele-like manner, as well as confessionally conversational à la Lana Del Rey. On record it flutters, snaps and soars and on stage it proved no less compelling.
And the music? There is nothing terribly original going on with Roan’s particular brand of retro-pop, but she borrows from the right places. ‘Super Graphic Ultra Modern Girl’ was a decent take on ‘Vogue’-era Madonna. ‘Hot To Go!’ surfed the same sensual electro pulse as Sugababes’ ‘Push The Button’. With its phased layers of dream-like vocals and gauzy guitar, her most recent single, ‘The Subway’, pays transparent homage to the Cocteau Twins. Whatever the medium, a knack for writing simple yet catchy melodies goes a long way to explaining her success.
The overall tone of the night was one of melodramatic, even euphoric, sadness. A knowingly trashy take on camp, glam and queer tropes was shot through with real emotion and de rigueur sexual frankness. Amid the mélange of frothy 1980s pop styles were a surprising number of fairly conventional ballads, and even a stomping fiddle-driven number, ‘The Giver’, which proved to be one of the least persuasive of the many recent examples of pop stars dipping their rhinestone boots into the country genre.
The show was certainly full-blooded, and the live band solid and versatile. The gothic fairytale stage set, smart choreography, multiple costume switches and pyrotechnics met all the expectations of a big outdoor music experience, while also papering over the cracks of the less engaging material.
Roan possesses all the attributes of a genuine stadium-sized headliner. She just needs a few more great songs, and perhaps more quickly than she thinks. She recently stated that it will be another five years before a follow-up to The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess is released. In which case, she should enjoy these kinds of landmark occasions while they are available. The pop graveyard is littered with erstwhile sensations who will attest to the fact that, for those who dither when their moment comes, the fast-track has a reverse gear, too.
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