my name is belly oh yeah before Billy Eilish would be a role model for people
all over the world people are like you're a moult role model like how can
you how can you say that if you're somebody who's people are looking up to
you Billy like how could you possibly say something like I'm like do you know
why they're looking up to me because I say shit like that before Billy Amish
would win five Grammys as well as numerous other awards and accolades
alongside her brother who is a big part of the Billy Eilish brand our friendship
and like sibling ship or whatever is is kind of exactly the same as our
professional relationship we don't really turn on like a business switch I
feel a great sense of satisfaction when Billy feels close enough to me to go I
don't like that at all before Billy Eilish would have over 31 million
subscribers on YouTube with over 6.3 billion views 7.2 million followers on
Instagram and 4.5 million on Twitter one of my favorite parts about making music
is it people take it in the way that they take it and I have no control over
that Billy Eilish has taken the music
industry by storm at just 18 years old the LA native who still lives in her
childhood home has won numerous awards including five Grammys two American
Music Awards and plenty of others she's also been on world tours made Forbes 30
under 30 list and isn't showing signs of slowing down anytime soon most recently
being praised for her latest track which is the theme song for the new James Bond
film it appears Billy is here to stay and truthfully I don't mind with her
lack of enthusiasm for fame and focus on the craft of the music itself I will say
it's incredibly refreshing to find a true artist who isn't pumping out music
just to stay popular and for that reason alone I have no doubt Billy is going to
have an extremely successful career although one could argue she's already
done more in her short career than others have in decades
it's absolutely horrendous just like horrifying what's going on guys welcome
back to before they're famous I'm your host for this once you're at
Braunstein and today we'll be documenting the life and career of Billy
Eilish we've done other videos on Billy in the past but as we learn more we got
to keep these videos updated let us know your favorite billy song down below and
feel free to drop some suggestions on who we should cover next for now let's
get right into it
hey be sure to subscribe and hit that Bell boom my name is Billy and I'm going
to play a song that I made up with this the time Billy Eilish pirate Baron
O'Connell was born on December 18th 2001 in Los Angeles California she's the
daughter of Maggie Barrett and Patrick O'Connell both of whom have history in
the entertainment industry however Maggie also worked as a
screenwriter producer and teacher while her husband Patrick has also done his
fair share of work in construction the two of them are also amateur musicians
after meeting in New York the two decide to start their family in Los Angeles
where both Billy and her older brother Phineas would be born Phineas is 4 years
older than Billie and from a young age the two would seem to work well off of
each other growing up in a Highland Park billion Phineas would be homeschooled
which led to Maggie teaching the children the basics of songwriting and
Patrick teaching Billy how to play piano speak it on the first song she wrote
Billy recalls I quote when I was 4 I wrote a song about falling into a black
hole the name of that song is fingers crossed and it was apparently inspired
by her favorite show at the time the walking dead the song itself is still
available on her soundcloud page and at the time of this recording has been
played over 5.8 million times when it comes to musical influences Eilish has
cited a range of genres from Peggy Lee to Justin Bieber The Beatles Green Day
Avril Lavigne and of course Drake Ruby introduced you to Green Day took you to
Green Day yo u why do you know that that's so irrelevant like it's so
irrelevant but it seems there's two people in particular Eilish feels
incredibly strongly about when it comes to music Tyler the Creator and Amy
Winehouse who I personally feel at least the latter her music resembles at times
goblins greatest album ever Frank also the greatest I can't even I'm done carry
on I've done it with that being said I'll exclaims the motto from take cares
her favorite song of all time and also appreciates the sounds of childish
gambino Lana Del Rey as well as spooky black a rapper who now goes by the name
Corbin from st. Paul Minnesota aside from her love for music which was
evident from a young age Billie also grew fond of horses as well as dancing
and photography and just eight years old she would enroll in the Los Angeles
children's chorus and if you closely you could see a young Billy
front-row three in from the right smiling and eagerly awaiting her time to
shine Billy would also try her hand then
acting from a young age but it's clear she didn't want to follow in her parents
footsteps in an interview with BBC Billy recalled going to an audition and I came
back going I hate this I'm not doing this ever again when asked what exactly
happened Billy said some lame stuff dude still at nine years old Billy and her
two friends would enter into the 96 hour Film Festival where they had to write
shoot and edit a short film in just 96 hours other requirements included at the
film be a romance include a specific line and a crazy dog walker the film
itself is titled in love psych and is still currently up on YouTube
ah leave me although it was clear the family had a creative muscle they truly
enjoyed working Billy also found something about being with horses
incredibly calming professional horseback rider and a professional
gymnast her family couldn't afford for her to take riding lessons but Billy was
determined so she got a job working at a local stable to pay for lessons at just
10 years old she explained I wanted it so I worked for it and I got it I worked
at the barn for two summers I was a horse camp counselor I worked at
birthdays but I stopped because I am not rich and never will be and never was
that is expensive to ride a horse even anything that has to do with the horse
is expensive after a while nobody was taking me seriously because when you're
not rich every one of the stables is like shoo and horses are like one of the
only things that I would say bring me peace because my life is very not it's
not very peaceful it's a lot of fun and it's a lot of excitement being a
creative kid with a true love for the Arts Billy would also spend a lot of her
youth dancing spending up to 11 hours a week at the local dance studio Billy
loved dancing although she wasn't a fan of ballet however she still had to learn
how to dance ballet and also has experience in tap jazz and other genres
at 13 she actually joined a dance company revolution Dance Center but
doesn't have the fondest memories of her time there I quote her saying I wasn't
as confident I couldn't speak and just be normal when I think about it or see
pictures of me then I was so not okay with who I was I was always worried
about my appearance that was the peak of my body dysmorphia I couldn't look in
the mirror at all this is in reference to the really tiny clothes Billy had to
wear a dress rehearsals although in the clip we're about to show you
Billy appears to be wearing the most valued clothing of all the girls and
what appears to be a black hoodie she's on the far left if you couldn't tell
however Billy owes a lot to the dance studio her and her brother practically
called home for all these years in fact Billy actually said it best
herself this dance studio really deserves all the credit for the
beginning of this journey who would eventually turn into Billy's first viral
hit was actually supposed to just be a song that was used at the dance studio
in 2015 Billy suffered a growth plate injury which would unfortunately lead to
her hanging up her dancing shoes however this would be a blessing in disguise as
Billy would spend more time working on music with her brother Phineas it's no
secret that the two are close with really commonly referring to Phineas as
her brother and best friend and this close-knit relationship has certainly
done wonders for both of their careers with Phineas producing and writing all
of Billie's music with her however it wasn't always that way speaking with
variety Billie explained the first songs that we worked on we didn't write
together he wrote the song called she's broken and I wrote one called fingers
crossed and we recorded them and put them out on soundcloud just for fun but
I want to be long before the two would team up for the song ocean eyes which
would change their lives forever originally written for Phineas his band
at the time Billy's older brother felt it would sound best in her voice and
just so happened a few days prior to Phineas approaching Billy with a song
Fred Diaz Billy's old dance teacher asked her and Phineas to make a song for
him to teach a choreographed dance to it's almost as if the stars align
perfectly after Phineas taught Billie the song they put it together and
uploaded it on their soundcloud for their dance teacher to download in a
20-17 interview with Teen Vogue Billie explained we put it on SoundCloud with a
free download link next to it so my dance teacher could access it we had no
intentions for it really but basically overnight a ton of people
started hearing it and sharing it Hildy dilly a music discovery website found it
and posted it and it just got bigger and bigger it was really sexy
then Daniel Caston who is now my manager reached out to my brother and was like
dude this is going to get huge and I think you're going to need help along
the way I want to help you guys we were like that swag indeed on November 18th
2015 Oshin eyes would be uploaded to
SoundCloud and at the time of this recording it's been played over 40
million times the virality of ocean eyes would lead to Eilish signing with Apple
music owned platoon and when she signed an artist development deal which would
be negotiated by her brother this would be to polish Eilish before she got her
big record deal and eventually led to her getting a publicist as well as a
stylist who worked together in building the brand of Billie in August of 2016
Billie signed with a management company darkroom an imprint of Interscope
Records and released a video of herself dancing to the song ocean eyes which was
also re-released through Interscope I was 13 when ocean eyes came out the way
I talked was different my style was different
was different as we know Billy has gone on to release a good amount of music and
is setting herself up for a very successful future in August 2017 she
released her debut EP don't smile at me but was released in singles from it
every Friday in July the EP included tracks such as ocean eyes bellyache
copycat and I don't want to be you anymore the EP wouldn't debut too high
in the Billboard 200 charts initially coming in at 185 but in July of 2018 it
reached 38 and to no surprise it would surpass the top twenty mark peaking at
fourteen in July of 2019 let's not forget guys this EP debuted back in 2017
and speaking of 2017 this is the year Eilish would team up with Spotify to
push her new music before Apple music really pushed her into stardom in
September of 2017 building was named Apple music up next artists leading her
to get an interview with Zane Lowe on beats 1 radio a live session EP and a
short documentary after releasing the live EP up next session Billy Eilish she
would go on to collaborate with the likes of Vince staples Khalid and slowly
but surely become one of the music industry's biggest names after dropping
her debut album when we fall asleep where do we go in 2019 which would debut
at top of the Billboard 200 charts and secure three of her five Grammys Eilish
has continued to dominate the industry most recently dropping the theme song
for the new James Bond film no time to die
of course Billy has also been on a few world tours has already secured the top
spot on the Billboard charts with her smash hit bad guy recently snagged her
first number-one in the UK with no time to die and in 2019 at just 17 years old
was named to Forbes 30 under 30 list but this is before they're famous and I
think it's quite clear after ocean eyes went viral while the rest is history
that does it for this one guys as always I look forward to hearing your thoughts
below and feel free to let us know who you'd like us to cover in the comments
down below I've been your host cure at Braunstein and we'll see you guys in the
next one