In her debut single, Charlotte Lawrence sings:
“I don’t think you know this, but you’re so predictable
Textin’ her behind my back and actin’ like I don’t
But I already know
Yeah, I already know this”
The track is pure pop, pulsating with vibrant synths and intricate layers of sound that are incredibly catchy. Her storytelling is painfully refreshing, full of love, heartbreak and teenage angst as she tells the tale of an ex-lover’s infidelity to a tune that makes you want to dance. And while the recently turned eighteen-year-old model and Instagram personality is just beginning to embrace her artistry, her music fanbase is already growing — and will only continue to grow this year.
Born and raised in Los Angeles as the daughter to Hollywood parents (TV actress Christa Miller and director and producer Bill Lawrence of “Scrubs”), Lawrence may be best known for her Instagram popularity or modeling career, gal-palling it up with best friend and fellow model Kaia Gerber; but Lawrence has already been making waves for herself as a musician in the past year. Since the debut of her song “Sleep Talking” last year, she’s racked up tens of millions of streams on Spotify along with her dizzying dark pop anthem “Just the Same.” And these songs are telling of her rising teen pop status, and why she is such a standout — she captures the teenage experience in a way that resonates with her listeners.
Lawrence made her Los Angeles debut at the Moroccan Lounge last Tuesday night as one of four special shows — Brooklyn, Chicago and later San Francisco — just in time before her debut EP Young dropped last Friday. She quickly sold-out the intimate venue and, as her Los Angeles date was packed with friends, family and legions of diehard high school fans, she fully embraced her emerging pop status.
She opened with a sultry and airy track with pulsing drumbeats and mysterious instrumentals as she sang, “Boy you never do enough for me.” She looked intently into the crowd, grabbing hands and dancing into the crowd as fans squealed whenever she approached them. The song was intoxicating, detailing the way her mind can spiral in love. It was the perfect lead-in for her song “Keep Me Up,” a song she has described details her personal experience with anxiety.
Lawrence is a natural performer, and her music is disarmingly honest and mature for her age. She commands the stage with a sense of ease as her songs document her experiences with love and the anxiety that can come with it — and that’s where her power shines as an artist. She’s telling stories that aren’t often documented in pop music, talking about her own personal experiences with relationships and mental illness (in her upbeat hit “Just the Same,” she sings: “You’re playing with my head, playing with my heart, playing with my body” and perfectly drops “I f–king hate you, but I love you just the same”).
In her Young EP, Lawrence has created an extremely dynamic and expressive work of art. Her songs are the type that can get easily stuck in your head, make you dance when you hear them live but also make your heart hurt a little when you realize just how incredibly raw and emotional they are. In songs like “Young and Reckless,” with its upbeat moody pop vibes and smooth vocals, her youthful energy and carefree attitude is captured perfectly; yet, the song is enchantingly euphoric and dramatic, with its catchy pop keys as she sings: “We’re just young and reckless / If we wreck this, it’s fine.”
For her special Los Angeles debut, Lawrence brought special guest Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks onstage, describing that Maines had brought her onstage for her first show at the Hollywood Bowl when she was just six-years-old. It felt appropriate for Lawrence to bring her back for her own Los Angeles debut. They sang a sweet, stripped-down acoustic duet of “Landslide,” which fans and her own parents were thrilled to see.
As the night went on, Lawrence shared special moments as she took to the piano to sing an emotionally-charged and intimate “Everybody Loves You,” where she details her experiences of feeling distraught over someone who is loved by everyone but is not who everyone thinks they are. She sings quietly and gently: “Why does everybody love you? / They don’t know enough about you / Do they know that I regret you? / Do they know I shouldn’t have to?” She also shared intimate moments with fans as she took phones from the audience and recorded herself on their phones, grabbing hands and dancing while looking into cameras.
As a debut EP is the first introduction we have to a new artist, Lawrence proves herself as a promising talent in the pop world with Young. Her music feels like it was made for both blasting out on the radio during carefree drives and tuning the rest of the world out, yet her storytelling radiates with an incredible sense of self-awareness, youth and the beautiful mess of adolescence.
Although Lawrence may be widely known for her modeling and Hollywood persona, her real passion lies in music and where she strives to be known — and she seems a natural. She isn’t afraid to be vulnerable; she’s confident with herself as an entertainer, performer and singer; and her music documents the real and raw stories in her life which resonate with her listeners. “I want to brand myself as a musician and have people love me for being a musician, not for being an Instagram girl or a model,” she told WWD.
This fall, Lawrence will be touring as support for Lauv where she is sure to breakthrough to new and young audiences. Her Young EP is available now and worth your listen, not only so you can say you knew her before she starts headlining her own tours, but because it is a genuinely good collection of catchy and infectious pop with deeply personal lyrics that can make your heart break and come back together again.
Follow Charlotte Lawrence on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
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