A stella combo of pop, trap and punk, Chloe Star is ready to take on the world with debut single, “Element.”
Confident, striking and empowering all at once, “Element” will soundtrack your next main character moment. With just the right amount of spook, a groovy and infatuating guitar line on top of Chloe’s luring vocal execution, “Element” wants to steal your heart while simultaneously convincing you to enter your own heartthrob era. Undoubtedly a strong opening statement, Chloe Star’s debut gives you just enough of a taste of what’s to come.
The young Native American songwriter has big goals for the upcoming year. She may be comfortably in her element now, but her story is undeniably an intriguing and twisting one. While working on an EP that will define and reveal the identity of “Chloe Star” as a musical project, Chloe wants to inspire and conspire you for your own self discovery. She carries influence across genres and eras, as well as childhood memories that might have been slightly traumatizing (and “slightly” is certainly an understatement). Though her musical career has only just started, Chloe certainly has a clear vision and she’s beyond ready to reveal her world.
“I feel like it introduces me as a person and as a creative,” in her own words, Chloe explains why she chose “Element” as her opening statement, “Once the listeners hear the song, they’re going to realize, Okay, that’s Chloe Star’s element. And her element is confidence, that bad-bitch, I don’t give a fuck what you think of me, I don’t care about your opinion/you can judge me all you want, that element. That element is something the listeners can hear and be able to, hopefully, tap into for themselves. I am all about empowering people and wanting everyone to feel comfortable in themselves and in their skin.”
Upon the release of “Element,” we caught up with Chloe on shooting the music video, her favorite lyrics and influences and all things music.
I guess we can start off by asking how was the music video shoot you just wrapped? Is it for “Element?”
Yes, it IS for “Element.” So I shot it yesterday, it was a 12 hours shoot day. It will be dropping with the song, so the turnaround is crazy. I’m so excited for this video. It was so much fun shooting, there’s a lot of artistic aspects to the video. I personally feel like, when you watch the video, you feel like you’re watching a movie, and you’re really experiencing the song; so when you hear the song, it’s all gonna make sense. It’s empowering and you feel the confidence, you get that bad-bitch, and I’m here to take over the world [vibe], like I’m “in my element.”
So glad to hear that!
Yeah, I cannot wait for you to see it.
What’s a favorite line from the song?
“Too much money in my pocket / Feel it burn a fucking hole.” When I hear that line, my mind just goes so many places. I visually see so many different things of what that can mean or resemble. When you think of money, you think of spending money on this and that, or just power. It’s like dressing up and it translating to how I’m gonna walk for the day. “Too much money in my pocket / Feel it burn a fucking hole,” to me, it’s so much deeper than that. It’s like, I’m gonna do whatever the fuck I want to do, and I’m gonna be confident in everything that I do while doing it. Yeah, that’s my line.
Let’s talk a little bit about genres and influences. What genre would you put “Element” into if there’s one or a few? What did you grow up listening to?
For “Element,” I would say it’s along the lines of pop and a little bit of hip hop. My overall project that I’ll be releasing by the end of the year is gonna have pop and some punk, definitely some hip hop vibes, which all three of those are my absolute favorite. Growing up I listened to so many different people. My dad used to listen to a lot of Guns N’ Roses. My mom listened to a lot of Mariah Carey. And my favorite band I discovered at the age of 16 is Third Eye Blind, which to this day is still my favorite band. Of course, Drake. And Billie Eilish – big inspiration. Post Malone, Amy Winehouse… It’s such a mix. Have you heard of Tash Sultana?
I actually haven’t.
Check her out! She’s so cool. Her live shows are so much fun. Her sound is crisp to the ear.
One question I was going to ask later: What is one song you’re particularly obsessed with currently?
Currently? Um, gosh. Okay. I’m that person that will listen to one song for a week straight and completely obsess over it. Right now, I don’t have one because I’ve been so onto “Element” for the past month, but my most recent one is Saint Levant’s “I Guess.” He’s an upcoming artist – I actually discovered him on TikTok. He’s on the up and up. His other song called “Very Few Friends” too, it’s so good.
I think everybody is curious about the whole story of the camp that you got sent to as a kid that went viral on TikTok. I just want to know, what happened?Â
So I had no idea that that was gonna pop off on TikTok. I was like, Oh, my God, but that experience was extremely life changing. To this day I never had an experience like that, nor do I think I ever will again. I was 16 years old, and I was struggling with depression and substance abuse. I was self harming, I was dealing with mental mental health issues, it got to the point where my mom had to do something. She took charge and one day these two men came to my house–I had no idea. They picked me up, put me in a car and fully, legally kidnapped me. I was sitting in the car kicking, screaming, and they’re not talking to me. I was just like, What the fuck is going on?
We got to LAX and I was in my pajamas. I got on a plane and I asked the flight attendee, Can you tell me where the fuck is this plane going? And they were like, We’re going to Georgia. Um, so yeah, I ended up in a three month wilderness program. I lived under a tarp, I had to dig a hole to use the bathroom, I had to make a fire out of a stick and a rock to eat hot food. I got stripped of everything I had and I was able to learn a lot of stuff. I still got eaten alive by bugs, I have a lot of tattoos and I was able to cover up a lot of the scars from the bug bites, but it was very intense for a 16 years old to go through that.
Music was actually the saving grace for all of that. One of the staff members had a guitar. You had to build yourself up to a level to be able to play his guitar. I was able to look forward to that. So yeah, music really got me through that. After that, I felt like music was my one crutch. Music is my purpose. It gives me purpose. I need to continue on this path in order to keep my mind, my body and my spirit alive.
Do you feel like music is therapeutic in a way that it heals you? Or it’s therapeutic in that it transforms you?
I think it does both. It definitely heals me, it gives me something to relate to and to know that I’m not alone. It does something to my body where it makes me feel like I’m high, especially [when I’m] writing, putting out all of my feelings and getting vulnerable–it’s all just such a big release. And you know, creative people struggle a lot with their emotions and their feelings. I don’t always know how to deal with my feelings. I feel trapped and when I do get in that place, I find myself listening to music and writing because I’m able to put all of my thoughts on a piece of paper. As a creative person, I’m constantly going through something. There’s constantly some sort of sadness, or some sort of depression, or anger, and unhappiness. Sometimes the happiness is so happy that the low is so low. Music gives me a balance.
To wrap things up, what are some things and goals you’d like to check off the list before the end of this year?
By the end of this year, my main goals are to hopefully inspire some people and leave a mark on them in some sort of way. Letting people know that they can relate. And bigger goals would be being on a tour by the end of the year. I want to collaborate with other artists, through music or through art in some other way. And definitely get my EP out before the end of this year, absolutely. Constantly writing, releasing, writing, releasing. Definitely connecting with people, creating a community of people that, hopefully, love the music and relate to the story, hopefully that translates to the listener.
