Chlöe Is Finding Her Power Chlöe Bailey, music, interview

In this moment, Chloe Bailey’s multitalented stardom can’t be denied. The 24-year-old’s singing abilities are as certain as her acting skills, which have landed her role after role following her youthful debut as Young Lilly in The Fighting Temptations. Yes, Chlöe grew right before our eyes both musically and on screens big and small. After gaining recognition with her sister as the singing duo Chloe x Halle on YouTube, a record deal with Beyonce’s Parkwood Entertainment followed suit. Then came their debut project, 2016’s Sugar Symphony, followed by the spotlight-earning The Two Of Us in 2017. The trifecta was secured in 2018 with their official debut album The Kids Are Alright, a career-solidifying body of work that documented a coming-of-age story laced with moments of brute honesty and impressive displays of strength. It was a breakthrough that earned the Bailey sisters two Grammy nominations. Even with this decade-long list of achievements and accolades, there are certain aspects of present-day Chlöe that even her earliest supporters did not see coming.

MAKEUP: Michelle Dacillo @Michelle_Dacillo

PHOTOGRAPHY BY: Gunner Stahl

EDITION 16 AUGUST 2022

AUGUST 10, 2022

BY: Wongo Okon

By the time Chloe x Halle prepared to release their second album, 2020’s Ungodly Hour, there wasn’t much doubt about whether the duo could find success again. The question was more so, what would they bring to the table this time around? Through the album’s 13 songs, listeners slowly watched Chloe x Halle operate at a fine level of maturity. Their natural innocence toward the world was gone and replaced with recognition, as well as some cuts and bruises, of the dangers in life and love. Ungodly Hour portrayed artistic and contextual growth while unlocking a brighter spotlight and a new level of attention for the Bailey sisters. Furthermore, confirming the duo’s improvements, Ungodly Hour and songs from it were selected in three categories at the 2021 Grammys: Best Progressive R&B Album, Best Traditional R&B Performance, and Best R&B Song. In the immediate aftermath of the duo’s sophomore album, Halle found herself overseas filming for her role as Princess Ariel in the upcoming live-action remake of The Little Mermaid. Chlöe remained stateside, but in her own unique way, she used this time to project a new version of herself – new to the public that is at least – to screens all over the world. This story of Chloe x Halle is one that the public knows well. However, the story of Chlöe the soloist is still one that’s being put together. It’s been a little over a year since Chlöe teased her debut solo single on what was her 23rd birthday. “This is 23… HAVE MERCY,” she wrote on Twitter with both the peach and hands raised emojis. This officially launched the campaign for her debut single, “Have Mercy,” a song that arrived just two months later. Chlöe’s step into her solo artistry was one we all expected for some months by the time she entered her Jordan year. By then, she’d serenaded the world with covers of Drake (“Marvin’s Room”), Nina Simone (“Feeling Good”), Rihanna (“Love On The Brain”), and Cardi B (“Be Careful”). The series of soaring tributes began in the spring of 2021 and continued for well over a year, and as Chlöe tells it, they were strategic as much as they were for fun. “I wanted people to see me get back to my roots,” she says by phone from Atlanta. “For all of the incredible supporters, I wanted to still feed them while I was working on my solo music behind the scenes, I didn’t want to go complete ghost.” Additionally, these covers also marked a blast to her past. “That was how sis and I started on YouTube,” she notes. “I thought it would be nice to go back to how people originally met me and how people saw me from the beginning.” The formula worked for Chloe x Halle, and with an artistic and personal growth that’s quite hard to ignore, there’s no reason why elements of that past formula shouldn’t work in Chlöe’s favor years later. As the saying goes, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

“Ungodly Hour was the start of Halle and I figuring out our individuality through our group and through our music,” Chlöe reflects, a little over two years since that album was released. “That was truly a special time for us.” When we speak, Chlöe has just come off the set of Praise This, an upcoming choir comedy film that stars Tristan Wilds, Anjelika Washington, Quavo, and comedian Druski. Following the conclusion of her Jazlyn character from Grown-ish, a role she assumed for four of the show’s five seasons, her upcoming part in Praise This is just one of many acting opportunities she’s secured in upcoming films. “It’s been super exciting being able to throw myself into another role or character,” she says. “Any unhealed pieces of me I get to heal through them.” She adds, “it's like another way of storytelling, like how I do with music.” Chlöe’s exploration of a solo career does not signal the end of Chloe x Halle. As a matter of fact, the two have continued to perform together as recently as Pharrell’s Something In The Water Festival in the spring of 2022. But as new recordings continued to pile up and take space on Chlöe’s hard drive, a venture into the solo world seemed like the most reasonable thing to do. “I was just accumulating all these songs because I was creating every single day,” she recalls. “And I was like, you know what, I should do something with these, instead of just having them sit on my computer… that's when I really explored the idea of branching out.” The past two years haven’t been the easiest for Chlöe. Her stardom presents its own pros and cons. Granted, stars often experience increased scrutiny, but unfortunately, it’s worse for Black women, young or old. Society always seems quick to criticize and dramatize their flaws while forgetting its own imperfections. Add in the fact that she and her sister are the musical progeny of Beyoncé, and you can see that life is more complicated than it usually is for a 24-year-old. With barely a quarter-century of life experience under her belt, one would hope that the world would be a bit more gracious to the young singer and allow her to find herself and figure out the world at the same time. While that’s seemingly too much to ask from some people, Chlöe isn’t complaining too much. “It's a weird place to be in because as a human being it does hurt sometimes hearing certain things,” she admits. “But at the same time, this is my job. So, it's really up to me to create those boundaries in my mental state and be like, 'Okay, this is what is important to me,’ prioritizing that, and tuning out the rest of the noise.” Chlöe confesses to “hard” moments, “struggles,” and times of breaking “down crying and in tears,” but it doesn’t outweigh the glory of living out the dreams her younger self longed so much for. “I still pinch myself at the same time because I get to do what I've always dreamed up since I was a little girl,” she says. “So, it's like anything that you love, none of that comes easy. Anything that's worth it doesn't come easy. So, I feel like it's just kind of a part of it, I just have to learn how to have tough skin.”

This mindset is the perfect display of the continued growth that Chlöe has shown in this post-Ungodly Hour era. Just look back to the beginning of last year to see how much things have changed. In February 2021, Chlöe took to Instagram Live to address the wave of criticism that she received for being proud of her body and showing it off through performances and social media challenges (see her “Buss It” challenge entry). “It’s really hard for me to think of myself as a sexual being or an attractive being quite frankly,” she said as she fought back tears. “When I see all the uproar about my posts and stuff, I’m a bit confused. Like, I really don’t understand because I’ve never seen myself in that way.” In 2022, she talks about flaunting her body and being herself with immoveable confidence. While finding this power has led to Chlöe doing more of what she wants to do, regardless of what others might have to say about it, it’s also led to her pulling herself away from what harms her. Unsurprisingly, social media comes to mind. For someone who has had to denounce rumors that she was dating Future (“I’ve never spoken to him a day in my life”) and speculation connected to her “involvement” in the Illuminati (“I didn’t sell my soul”), it’s expected that Chlöe’s relationship with and consumption of social media has changed. “I've noticed that I've been spending most of my time on TikTok,” she says with a laugh. “I feel like that's the place where I can kind of just get lost in funny videos.” As for the social media platforms that are more tethered to the elder Gen-Z community, like Twitter, for example, Chlöe has drawn her lines in the sand.

The next few years promise to be exciting for Chlöe, starting with her upcoming self-titled debut album. Specific details about the project, like when it will be released and possible guest features on it, remain under wraps. However, one thing is for sure: the project will see the light of day. Back in March, Chlöe revealed that her debut was complete and that it had been submitted to her label, confirming that she would not find herself in a state of constant perfecting and re-perfecting as we’ve seen with some of her contemporaries. “I am just so eager for the fans to hear the songs and the music, and I hope they love it when it finally comes out into the world,” she says happily. Despite the rather skim details about Chlöe, we do know that the album will document the aforementioned rise of power that Chlöe has experienced internally. “In the beginning, you can tell that [the person] who is singing is like a bird with broken wings,” she noted in a past interview with Allure. “As time went on, you can hear me finding my strength and confidence. I didn’t want to lose that story as I pieced the [songs] together.”

“The point I'm making is it'll be people that will judge or making an opinion about my music and A, you don't know this environment, or B, never took the time to even listen to what I'm really saying on the album,” he says. “That happens far too many times. You wish people would really listen, but I don't even blame them because there's so much music coming out.” Does he feel as though he’s gotten overlooked or lost in the furor? “Yes,” he agrees. “I don't think a lot of people don't know that me, Cole, and Pharrell opened for Jay-Z. We did a whole college tour... A lot of people don't know I opened for Jay before that, even in Europe… A lot of people don't know I opened for Rihanna in Europe. Because there was no Snapchat. I wasn't walking around with a cameraman for YouTube all day. It was a weird time… We got a little bit of the Mandela effect going on in this generation.” However, he says, “I might just try to do the best I can because there'll be a time when it will all connect and everybody is going to put everything together and then it'll all makes sense to some people that it might not make sense to. I would not be lying to say it wasn't frustrating, but ain't nothing to do about it but just keep pushing. It’ll be on Folarin II, where I wrote these subtle reminders all throughout the album.” When I ask him how this album will be different from the 2012 Folarin mixtape, which featured appearances from 2 Chainz, Chinx Drugz, French Montana, Nipsey Hussle, Rick Ross, and Scarface, among others, Wale compares the project to Jay-Z’s career-defining 2001 release, calling it a “Blueprint” record. “I feel like the process on this one was pretty much, as soon as I got into the mode, it just started feeling like, ‘You know what? Where I am, how I feel, how I know who I am, regardless of what anybody's talking about,’ it started just speaking to me more. I was like, ‘This is Folarin II.’ Folarin is when I started really coming into my own. I really was in that space. I was just singing with my chest. I think that's what's happening now.” “It's a space that I was in, this bubble,” he continues. “Some days I felt like telling the stories and some days I felt like talking about things going on back home. Some days I felt like talking about shit. The next day I felt like talking about shit. Then the next day I felt like talking about shit. Then the next day I want to do something else. It was just a moment in time, this bubble of where I'm at…. I made sure I spelled it out, it's more grandiose. I think all of them have a different thing, man. Folarin II is its own thing, but it's just the same intentions and the same feeling that I had when I made Folarin 1.”

That leaves us with “Surprise,” the outlier of the three singles. Where “Have Mercy” and “Treat Me” bounce hard and strut with earth-cracking steps, “Surprise” is sonically subtle while also being more risqué from a lyrical standpoint. Chlöe’s ability to find comfort in either realm is something she says is a favorite quality of hers, but also a duality that is a beautiful aspect in all people. “What I love about who we are as human beings and creatures, and more specifically women, is that we have so many different layers to ourselves,” she notes. “I like to think I'm a very kind person, you know, I love God, I am very sweet, and sometimes shy and sometimes very outspoken. But then when the door closes, when you're very comfortable and vulnerable with that specific person, different exciting parts of you come out.” For “Surprise,” that is undeniably true as Chlöe teases the intimate rewards of the reciprocation she begged for on “Treat Me." “I thought it was really fun to be able to truly be a young woman and be able to explain that in a sexy and subtle way, but also very bluntly.” It's safe to say that with her debut album right around the corner, Chlöe knows that this is a fresh start and chapter for her. The Chloe we’ve experienced as one-half of Chloe x Halle is completely different than Chlöe the solo artist, and while that presents some warranted uncertainty on the upcoming project, Chlöe is choosing to look at the glass as half-full. “I think just the body of work,” she says when asked what she thinks will be the most surprising aspect of Chlöe. “I'm a brand new artist and I haven't had a body of work out [yet], so it'll be the first thing people hear from me, really. So I think that'll be surprising in itself.” This fresh start allows for new goals to be accomplished, different heights to be reached, and of course, the satisfying opportunity to prove her doubters wrong and reaffirm the faith of her supporters. Accomplishing the latter will mean so much for Chlöe, who began this entire process with a notable amount of self-doubt to overcome.

In addition to video games and sneakers, Wale’s other big preoccupation is with wrestling. The appeal is obvious; in the same way rappers create characters for themselves, overcoming financial and structural obstacles, wrestlers do the same thing with physical ones. They can both become larger-than-life, exaggerating characteristics, creating their own narrative, and redefining themselves in the public eye. However, this wasn’t always the case. At one point, Wale was really the only rapper making himself such a visible fan of the sport. Just like with sneakers and livestreaming — that’s right, Wale was livestreaming himself on the now-defunct UStream, years before Instagram and TikTok allowed similar functionality to connect artists with fans — he was just a little bit ahead of his time. “You know, now there is a little slight shift in wrestling,” he muses. “You got to look at guys like myself and Westside Gunn, Smoke DZA, Flatbush Zombies, we've been a part of that culture for a long time. And Black journalists too, Black writers are talking more about it and uplifting our Black wrestlers. And this is a special time in that culture. The conversations are happening. I work closely with Neil Lawi at the WWE, and I talked to Triple H last week on text. So there's definitely... It's an interesting time for wrestling. You got the R&C podcast, you got the WrassleRap [social media movement], you got Kaz[eem Famuyide] doing it so crazy... Media uplifting the culture, you got Westside Gunn on the crazy run right now, uplifting the culture. So we love where it's at right now. We love where it's going.” Again, it feels like Wale’s interests parallel his real-life trajectory as an entertainer. He’s always on the ball before anyone else — but he rarely remains there alone for long. It just takes others a while to catch on. On being one of the first highly visible artists bigging up Nigeria before the Afrobeats genre broke stateside, he says, “It's one of them things that I feel like I knew was inevitable and it's not going to stop anytime soon. So I'm proud of all my guys and girls. I'm just grateful that I can be somebody seen as part of that culture.” Isn’t he being too humble? “Nah. I've been valid. My thing is if you know, you know. So I'm not overly concerned with that. Everybody know what I do and what I've did. And if they don't, Google is free.” He takes the same attitude toward the world’s skeptical view of go-go, which still threads through his music like the ever-critical stitching holding together his favorite Nikes. “Go-go is a genre where you got to experience that shit live to all the way, get it for real,” he says. “After you experienced it live, you have a different appreciation for it. This is what I assumed because I think I was maybe 13 years old when I realized go-go was only local. I thought everybody back then knew what go-go was. When I was a kid, I thought everybody in the whole world knew who those people was. Now that I've learned so much about the actual music and instruments and mixing and culture from all over the world, I can understand why we never really made that leap after [Junkyard Band’s] “Sardines” and [E.U’s] “Doin’ Da Butt.”

GRIFF is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

LIGHTING: STEF FERRA @STEFANFILMPHOTO

Photographer: PETER DONAGHY @DONSLENS

A glimpse into this strength and confidence is present through the album’s current singles: the Murda Beatz-produced “Have Mercy,” the provocative “Treat Me,” and the sultry, slow-burning “Surprise.” These records aren’t as gentle or as soul-focused as what we’ve heard from Chloe x Halle. Instead, in Chlöe’s world, she prefers to be feisty and in your face. She’ll flaunt her assets and shake what God gave her – regardless of who’s watching. But as empowering as these singles are, there are also vulnerable aspects that serve as the foundation for her to build strength. “A lot of people don't know [that] me and my friend Theron [Thomas] wrote that song [after]... I was feeling a little low and down because everyone had something to say about me and my body,” she says of “Have Mercy.” “Being able to take the power back and instead of men commenting, ‘Oh, that woman has a fat ass,’ I got to flip the narrative and be like, ‘Yes, I have a fat ass, I love myself, and I exude confidence.’” This trend continues with “Treat Me,” a provocative request for reciprocation that carries a lot more bounce than one might have bargained for (just take a look at the song’s accompanying music video). Just like with “Have Mercy,” released eight months prior, “Treat Me” sees Chlöe use the opportunity to shake herself into top form after a low moment. “I was dealing with somebody, and I was looking for all these things inside of them that I've never even given myself,” she admits about that record. “So I'm like, ‘How can I expect something from someone when I'm not giving it to myself?’... and it's nice to be able to expound on that within a relationship.” When speaking about “Treat Me,” Chlöe also beams at the opportunity to let us in on a productional aspect of the record. “I think one of my favorite pieces of the song is the outro,” she says. “In the other hooks, I had a vocoder on my lead vocal, but for the outro, I took every note that was in the vocoder and I sang it and then I added some more harmonies on top and no one really knows it was just my pure voice on the outro. They think the vocoder is still on there.”

GRIFF is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

“It’s like having the comments section right in your face and you’ll see so many negative things,” she says of Twitter. “I have to give myself a break sometimes. There are moments we become super obsessed with, like, what people think of you and what they're saying.” While the overflow of negative comments can often be overwhelming as an artist, something Chlöe comfortably admits, she also holds a bit of excitement towards eventually proving her cynics wrong and validating the predictions of her supporters, both new and old. “I am so happy people care about what I'm doing,” she says. “Ninety percent of things out there about me are complete lies and rumors, but I love proving people wrong…One day, I hope people can really get to see who I truly am as a human being as opposed to this facade of a person that they think I am.” Chlöe hasn’t had to combat her haters alone. Halle has fulfilled the role of younger sister to a T as she’s been ready on multiple occasions to go to bat for her big sis.. Those moments have earned comparisons to Beyoncé and Solange’s dynamic, but near or far, Chlöe remains grateful for her relationship with Halle. “We are both powerful and strong, not only together, but also individually,” she declares. “I really love the synergy that we have and, you know, I am just so happy to always have her support — just like she always has mine.”

Being the biggest — again, another mantra of hers — comes with its ups and downs. Shortly after releasing a freestyle to the viral SpottemGotem single “Beatbox” earlier this year, Latto found herself embroiled in the sort of rap drama that it would seem the game might have outgrown now that there are so many new female rappers finding success at the same time. However, uneasy is the head that wears a crown, and by dubbing herself the biggest female rapper from Atlanta — currently inarguably true, at least judging by sales — she apparently rankled some of her fellow Georgians with the track. Renni Rucci, another Atlanta rapper, recoiled at Latto’s assertion of being “the biggest,” leading to a back-and-forth that still amuses her. “Look, on my mama,” she chuckles. “I did not think that that was going ruffle feathers like that. I swear to God. I do this. I'm a very confident woman. Some might call it cocky, I don't give a fuck. I'm seasoned and I know I'm good at what I do. So when I go in that booth, I pop my shit. So that's not me taking shots at nobody or me dissing anybody. It's a lot of bitches who put Big in front of they name that I'm cool with. So that wasn't no dis but at end of the day, we in hip-hop, baby, we still competition. It ain't even that deep. It's just me going in there popping my shit. It's not even for nobody to take it to heart. So I definitely didn't think it was going to do all that. I don't remember being offended though. I remember being like, 'Oh, shit. Okay. Yeah. You the biggest too, girl. Go ahead.’”

Stylist: Todd White @labelsndollas

Hair: Kahh Spence @kahhspence

“Am I good enough? Do I like the music and the art that I'm making? Do people even want to hear me in this way?” These are questions she admits swirled in her head in the beginning, but nowadays, she seems quicker to conquer these moments of self-doubt thanks to some help from her godmother. “Even now, I'm still getting out of it,” she admits. “Of trying to prove myself to people that I'm worthy enough when I should just believe that I am worthy enough.” Our conversation takes place just a couple of days before Beyoncé – who signed Chlöe to Parkwood and also serves as her mentor – released her long-awaited seventh album Renaissance. This meant that for the first time since signing to Parkwood, Chlöe was crafting a solo body of work at the same time Beyoncé was, offering a unique opportunity to see Queen Bey put together the album, which has been met with critical acclaim in the days following its release. “Ever since I was a young girl, I've always been inspired by her,” Chlöe says of her mentor. “To be able to hear the music and get to see her thought process in choosing certain songs, and just knowing how fearless she is, it's been incredibly inspiring to me.” For Chlöe, success is being able to live out “every single dream that I have." When asked what she thinks her teenage self would say to her today, she replies, "Keep going, keep holding my head up, and look what you're doing. This is what you've always dreamed up, and I know you're not exactly where you want to be, but you're on the right path… you should be proud of yourself.”

The past two years haven’t been the easiest for Chlöe. Her stardom presents its own pros and cons. Granted, stars often experience increased scrutiny, but unfortunately, it’s worse for Black women, young or old. Society always seems quick to criticize and dramatize their flaws while forgetting its own imperfections. Add in the fact that she and her sister are the musical progeny of Beyoncé, and you can see that life is more complicated than it usually is for a 24-year-old. With barely a quarter-century of life experience under her belt, one would hope that the world would be a bit more gracious to the young singer and allow her to find herself and figure out the world at the same time. While that’s seemingly too much to ask from some people, Chlöe isn’t complaining too much. “It's a weird place to be in because as a human being it does hurt sometimes hearing certain things,” she admits. “But at the same time, this is my job. So, it's really up to me to create those boundaries in my mental state and be like, 'Okay, this is what is important to me,’ prioritizing that, and tuning out the rest of the noise.” Chlöe confesses to “hard” moments, “struggles,” and times of breaking “down crying and in tears,” but it doesn’t outweigh the glory of living out the dreams her younger self longed so much for. “I still pinch myself at the same time because I get to do what I've always dreamed up since I was a little girl,” she says. “So, it's like anything that you love, none of that comes easy. Anything that's worth it doesn't come easy. So, I feel like it's just kind of a part of it, I just have to learn how to have tough skin.”

Chlöe hasn’t had to combat her haters alone. Halle has fulfilled the role of young sister to a tee as she’s been ready on multiple occasions to go to bat for her big sister. Those moments have earned comparisons to Beyoncé and Solange’s dynamic, but near or far, Chlöe remains grateful for her relationship with Halle. “We are both powerful and strong, not only together, but also individually,” she declares. “I really love the synergy that we have and, you know, I am just so happy to always have her support — just like she always has mine.”

Writer: Wongo Okon (@whereswongo) Photographer: Gunner Stahl (@gunnerstahl.us) Stylist: Jennifer Udechukwu (@jenniferudechukwu) Hair: Shanique Frett (@shaniquefretthair) MUA: Melissa Ocasio (@melibabyyy) Tailor: Viola Thomas (@wydneyvye) Designer: Daisy James (@djamesdesign) Assistant Designer: Carlos Sotelo Olivas (@barlosx)

Photographer: PETER DONAGHY @DONSLENS