Benee and the Art of the Sad Banger

Switched on Pop

Vox Media Podcast Network

Music Interviews, Music History, Music, Music Commentary

4.6 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 26 August 2020

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

How does it feel to become a global pop star under lockdown? Benee’s “Supalonely” had been out for over 5 months when in March of 2020, it quickly became the second most popular song on TikTok. The song’s hook “I’ve been lonely… Supalonely” clearly reflected a global collective malaise about the pandemic—and people wanted to dance to it. She wrote this “sad banger” to help get over a breakup. And now the song changed her life. Not along before she’d dropped out of college to make music while working at a pizza place. Her first EP had found an audience in her home country, New Zealand. Now, with her TikTok success Benee has ascended the top 100 in 30 countries. All of this happened from the solitude of her childhood bedroom, where like so many people, she’s taking zoom calls all day. She tells Switched On Pop about using levity to overcome personal difficulty and what’s like to achieve global recognition from home. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for this show comes from the Genesis GB70 Performance SUV. Every Genesis is a reminder
0:07.6	to try something bold to keep growing, keep hustling. At Genesis, they've harnessed all
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0:28.6	like the 14.5-inch infotainment system, and fingerprint recognition plus the GB70 features
0:35.2	all-wheel drive, which is bound to add a little more acceleration to your next drive.
0:40.2	Your Genesis GB70 is waiting for you. What will you begin? Learn more at Genesis.com. Genesis,
0:48.8	keep beginning.
1:04.7	Welcome to Switched On Pop. I'm a songwriter, Charlie Harding. When I first heard the song
1:09.4	super-only, I was scrolling through TikTok trying to forget everything in the world.
1:19.2	And then I heard it again.
1:31.8	After hearing it many times, the song's hook resonated with me and seemed to be the rest of the
1:37.6	world as well, because we've all felt super-lone at times during the pandemic. And that shared
1:44.0	emotion has led to great success for Super-lone which has moved from TikTok to the Billboard
1:49.7	charts and has made a star out of the 20-year-old artist behind the song. I wanted to talk with her about
1:55.4	how it came to be, what it was like to find success in an industry that was locked down,
2:01.2	and how she's connecting with her global audience while touring is nearly impossible.
2:05.2	So I'm excited to introduce you to one of my favorite new artists.
2:17.5	You can hear her in her voice that Benny is really fun to chat with,
2:20.0	but her song super-lone was actually born out of heartbreak.
2:23.4	So I have been dating this guy and it's August. I decided I break up with him and I'm going to LA
2:33.1	for a month. I was at the airport and I'm leaving with just my manager. My mom is going to come
	...

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