How going to the gym and DJ'ing shaped Billie Eilish's surprising third album (2024)

She's a record-breaking, award-hoovering, pop culture phenomenon. But somewhere along the way, Billie Eilish fell out of love with music.

At just 22, the Los Angeles superstar has already experienced more than most musicians do their entire career — subject to intense levels of adoration and scrutiny while growing up in the public eye.

At 17, her 2019 album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?, crafted in her brother's childhood bedroom,made history atop triple j's Hottest 100 and at the Grammys.

That meteoric rise was captured in 2021 documentary The World's A Little Blurry,which showed (sometimes uncomfortably) how the sudden impact of global fame affected Eilish physically, mentally and emotionally.

Her second album, ironically titled Happier Than Ever, further cemented her cultural dominance, even as it raised compelling questions about achieving that kind of ubiquity.

Her complex relationship with music and celebrity was distilled into a revealing 'careful what you wish for' chorus.

"Things I once enjoyed / Just keep [me] employed now", she sang on album opener 'Growing Older'.

"I used to really not enjoy making music and I still have trouble with it," Eilish admits to Lucy Smith on triple j Mornings.

"I forgot that I started making music because I loved it. And then it became my job so quickly when I was so young that I kind of didn't get to enjoy it as much."

However, on the release day of Hit Me Hard and Soft, her hugely anticipated third album, Eilish says, "I think that I've come back to enjoying it and that's been really nice."

The 10-track release finds Eilish returning to the darker, theatrical tone of her debut album, but with a new-found confidence and studio mastery that looks toward fresh sonic horizons.

There are surprising settings we've never heard Eilish in before: a string quartet, 80s pop-rock, 'indie sleaze'-era electronica and late 90s club heaters.

As with everything Eilish records, Hit Me Hard and Soft was produced and co-written with her brother, Finneas O'Connell. However she had a greater role than usual in its cinematic, adventurous production.

"I was more involved in this album than anything we've made. And I think that came from pure enjoyment. Like, I wanted to," she says.

That includes continuing to comp her own vocals — the editing process of splicing together various vocal takes to assemble the perfect take.

"The greatest thing I've ever learned to do," Eilish declares. "I'm never not grateful that I do that … all my vocals, and my little synths."

"I engineer a lot of my own stuff … and then Finneas comes in and does the rest better than me."

Hitting the club and the gym

Among Hit Me Hard and Soft's biggest surprises are moments where Billie takes us to the club.

The big synths illuminating 'Bittersuite' for instance, or 'Chihiro', which is powered by bass-heavy funk, snapping beats and laser-lit synths.

"We really didn't even mean to do that, it just came naturally," Eilish says.

"There's like a lot of small moments on the album that we didn't really mean to do honestly."

Case in point: a segue that arrives with a sweaty, dancefloor sheen in the second half of the jazzy 'L'Amour De Ma Vie'.

"This little breakdown track called 'Over Now'," Eilish explains. "That was me and Finneas just messing around, making the kind of thing that we were like, 'No one's every going to hear this'."

"Finneas [and I] had this realisation: The coolest, bravest thing we could do is just put it out exactly how we made it. It's about 'Do we enjoy this and do we like this?'"

With its pitch-shifted vocals and throbbing up-tempo pulse, 'Over Now' evokes chart-friendly trance music from the late '90s and early 2000s. But rather than being targeted to the dancefloor, Eilish revealed the music was designed for her personal fitness playlist.

"I was at the gym all the time in this period. I was doing a lot of cardio," she says.

"There weren't a lot of songs that were right for running and jumping rope [to] that I liked enough that had the right BPM [beats per minute]," she explains.

"I found one that I loved so much and remember being like, 'Wow, I wish there was some sort of way I could put this in an AI program and make 800 songs that make me feel the way this song makes me feel'.

"It's just fun and dance-y and clubby'."

It also reconnected Eilish with an old, little-known hobby of hers: DJing.

At around 15, her brother gave her some DJ software.

"I got so good at it … I would remix everything [and] I was doing it literally all day, every single day," she says.

But then she lapsed (global stardom can be distracting) only to pick it up again recently thanks to Finneas' circle of talented DJ friends.

As part of their DJ mentorship, the siblings were also enjoying going to various parties and clubs.

"I've been starting to go out into the world for the first time since I was young and just biting the bullet and just going outside," she says.

"Just letting myself be, and trying not to be anxious and terrified the entire time like I have been for years."

Making music for herself

Given her immense popularity and Gen Z idol status, Hit Me Hard and Soft already feels like a guaranteed blockbuster, destined for glowing reviews, epic streaming figures, and screaming fans packing venues around the world.

All 12 East Coast shows on Eilish's upcoming Australian tour sold out almost immediately, despite cost-of-living pressures and fans only getting a few days' notice between its announcement and tickets going on sale.

The pressure of those weighty expectations initially hung heavy on Eilish's head when beginning her new record.

"I remember just being like, 'I don't know what people want me to make, and I don't know what I'm going to make [or] what people are going to think!' I just was very in my head about it," she says.

A conversation with a friend provided an epiphany. "I remember them being like, 'Billie, just make what you want to make. Don't worry about what they want you to make'," she says.

"I was like, 'Oh, yeah, right. That's so true!' That really made me think of it differently: the only person that needs to enjoy this is me. And that's all I need."

With the pressure off, that liberating sense of artistic freedom informed the work.

"It allows you to feel more free to just do what naturally comes to you instead of what you think is going to be received well, or be successful, or being number one or whatever."

It also informed Eilish's decision that there'd be no singles for Hit Me Hard and Soft, a 180 pivot from the multiple advance singles that preceded her first two albums.

"Not doing singles, I wanna give it to you all at once," she declared on Instagrampre-release.

It is a power move that not only underscores Eilish's superstardom — big enough she doesn't need to follow the industry standard of carefully-orchestrated album rollouts— but that pushes back on the way her young target demographic typically experience music, as individual songs or clipped-up hooks and 'moments' on TikTok.

Addressing the haters

Beyond levelling up her songwriting and sonic variety, Eilish's third album is a showcase for her most powerful instrument: her voice.

Hit Me Hard and Soft showcases her expressive singing techniques, such as the exhale/inhale that becomes rhythmic punctuation on 'Lunch', and impressive range.

She's capable of rising from delicate phrasing to soaring falsetto, or a commanding, full-throated presence, spanning it all on 'The Greatest'.

The record begins with the hushed vocals of 'Skinny', which feels like a loungey companion piece to 'What Was I Made For?' — the poignant, breathy ballad written for the Barbie soundtrack that won the 2023 Song of the Year Grammy Award and made Eilish and Finneas the youngest-ever two-time Oscar winners.

Asked if there's a particular vocal inflection or moment on the album she's most proud of, Eilish points to 'L'Amour De Ma Vie' as a favourite.

"It's the jazziest song on the album, and any time I get to sing in the realm of jazz, I am so happy," she says.

"I really feel like I was born to be a jazz singer and almost like [born in] the wrong generation in a way."

Eilish grew up with a dyed-in-the-wool love for classic, old-school crooners who never had the luxury of digital tweaks, relying on the raw prowess of their pipes to convey a feeling or capture listeners' attention.

"Frank Sinatra is my favourite in the world, and Johnny Mathis and Peggy Lee and Julie London and Etta James and Sarah Vaughan and Ella Fitzgerald," she says.

"It's so funny because I grew up with people talking about how soft and delicate voices are not as good as big, loud powerhouses. And that's just not true."

"All voices are beautiful. There's different kinds."

If one detected a defensive tone, it's because Eilish is used to facing criticism — 'Billie Eilish only whispers' allegations — of her understated singing throughout her career.

The 22-year-old is comfortable clapping back at critics, ranging from the way she dresses and queerbaiting claims, to clarifying her stance on "wasteful" vinyl variants against Swifties. Addressing criticisms of her singing is no exception.

"I really grew up thinking I was a bad singer because I didn't belt and because I didn't use my voice like that," she says.

"But when I think about it and I look back, all the singers that I adored had deeply precise, beautiful, delicate control over their voices. And that's what I always gravitated towards. And I think that 'L'amour [De Ma Vie]' is a really great vocal.

"When you listen to that compared to something from my first EP, Don't Smile at Me, it's a completely different person. It's amazing."

Hit Me Hard and Soft is out now.

Hear Lucy Smith ontriple j Morningsfrom 9am Monday to Fridays.