STADUIMS: THE MIDWEST PRINCESS
If her debut album, “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess,” came out in September of 2023, why are we only NOW discovering the creative genius, vocal prowess, and cultural impact of the one and only Chappell Roan?
Here’s a little backstory to catch you up to speed.
Chappell Roan, originally Kaleigh Rose Amstutz, was an average girl from Willard, Missouri before her entire life changed, seemingly overnight. You know what they say, it takes ten years to become an overnight success. Artists like Lizzo and the band Fun attest that they were doing music professionally long before they were signed to a label and played on the radio. It took a certain song to change their lives, and the facilitator of that change is more often than not the media, or more specifically, social media.
Chappell Roan was originally signed to Atlantic Records as a junior in high school. She recalls it being announced over the morning announcements somewhere between maybe “meatloaf for lunch” and “soccer practice is cancelled”. Ecstatic that her career was taking off and her dreams of being a star were coming true, she moved to Los Angeles and gave it her all. That is until she was dropped from her label, landing her back at square one.
She moved to Nashville and worked as a barista and a nanny just to make enough money to survive, while also refusing to give up on her dreams. A little bit of rejection wasn’t going to slow her down!
When Chappell connected with producer Dan Nigro, she had no idea her life would be changed forever. Together they made one of Chappell’s biggest songs, a gay anthem for a generation, “Pink Pony Club”. Here, Dan was introduced to the juggernaut of talent and star quality that Chappell carried inside, and he knew something there would change both their lives forever.
Chappell Roan’s debut album, “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess”, produced by Dan Nigro, was released in September of 2023 under Amusement Records, an imprint of Atlantic records, owned by– you guessed it– Dan Nigro. If you’ve never heard of Amusement Records, that makes sense because it’s Dan’s new project that he created FOR and after being INSPIRED by working with Chappell Roan. He believed so greatly in her talent that he put his own reputation on the line to create a label to sign her.
But his dedication to her success didn’t stop there. A producer for Olivia Rodrigo as well, Dan invited Chappell to open for Olivia Rodrigo on her “GUTS” tour, giving her the perfect opportunity to get on a stage and share the new album with the world.
While touring with Olivia obviously brought more attention to Chappell and her record, most people in the crowd were there for Olivia and may not have ever been acquainted with Chappell before. Although you may think touring with one of the current biggest popstars in the world would have been the ultimate power move to skyrocket her career, but you’d be wrong.
April 5, 2024, Chappell Roan drops her single, “Good Luck Babe”, and the internet. goes. crazy.
I swear there were days where I’d scroll through videos on TikTok, and I’d hear the song play over and over again because each video was soundtracked by it. There’s no argument that TikTok expedited the spread of the song to levels Chappell had never seen.
When she makes the bold choice to step away from the “GUTS” tour in order to play Coachella on April 12, merely a week after the monumental release of Good Luck Babe, she not only visits Coachella for the first time– and plays Coachella for the first time– but also plays her first ever music festival and absolutely demolishes it. To play Coachella as your first festival is unheard of, but to draw that large of a crowd, making such a memorable impression, as a new artist is unbelievable. From that moment on Chappell Roan would be seen as more than an opening act. After a long journey to get there, she had finally reached the stardom that only visited her in dreams back home in Missouri.
Since then, she has played music festivals such as Boston Calling, Gov Ball, Bonnaroo, and more shows on her very own solo tour for the album, “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess.” Chapell Roan transformed before our eyes from an underground artist struggling to make it in the music industry to a musical sensation and icon for the gay community, one we haven’t seen the likes of since the golden age of Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way”.
Chappell Roan has amassed a whopping, 2.8 million followers on Instagram, 2.2 million followers on TikTok, and 30,720,420 monthly listeners, constantly inching closer to surpassing her friend and fellow performer Olivia Rodrigo , who she once opened for, with 51,072,569 monthly listeners. From September of last year when the album came out, she went from 1 million monthly listeners to over 20 million, in less than a year. Insane!
This kind of unheard-of spike in listeners and fame can be traced back to the power of social media in helping artists reach their audience, and helping people find community to connect with the music they identify with. There are queer communities that exist all over the country and the world, but for those in more conservative spaces, it’s increasingly difficult to find representation and an artist they can see themselves in. Chappell’s story of perseverance and growth, from coming from a small town in rural Missouri to drawing stadium level crowds at her shows, is inspirational for millions of people out there.
They hear her songs on TikTok and add them to their playlists. They watch “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess Documentary” and they connect to her and her story even more.
They listen to her music, and it makes them FEEL something.
Before long Chappell Roan will be selling out stadiums and performing in arenas. It’s an incredible honor as a fan of hers to watch her succeed in such a prolific way. While the internet and social media can be a scary place to reveal your authentic self at times, it also has the power to share a voice with the world that brings that authenticity and vulnerability out of people to keep on dancing at the Pink Pony Club.