Billie Eilish says she owes “95 per cent” of her music career to fellow Glastonbury headliner Sir Paul McCartney and The Beatles.
The ‘Lost Cause’ hitmaker will become the youngest artist to headline the legendary music festival’s Pyramid Stage tonight (24.06.22), while the ‘Yesterday’ hitmaker, who plays Saturday night (25.06.22), is the oldest solo headliner at the age of 80.
Billie admits it’s “bonkers” that she is headlining the same festival as her idol.
In a one-off print edition of NME magazine to celebrate her history-making set, she said: “It doesn’t matter how old you are, where you’re from, what you look like or who you are: you can do this s***.
“My name next to theirs and being on the same level as them … it’s bonkers. I remember Kendrick headlined a festival I went to when I was 14, and I couldn’t believe he was headlining this small festival because he was so huge. And now I’m headlining the same festival as him and Paul McCartney … are you kidding me? The Beatles were what raised me. My love for music I feel 95 per cent owes to the Beatles and Paul. It’s insane to think about.”
The ‘bad guy’ hitmaker was booked to play the John Peel Stage in 2019, but she ended up playing The Other Stage, the second biggest stage, following her meteoric rise to global superstardom.
And while her set went down a storm with festival-goers, the ‘Happier Than Ever’ singer was actually contending with a number of technical glitches.
Billie recalled: “It was a quite busy time in my life, but after the fact I realised how big a deal it was and was like, ‘Oh, s***!’”
She continued: “It was a real mixed show – so many things weren’t working, so many technical issues that were just driving me mad.
“It’s really hard. You’ll be on stage during a show and think, ‘This is the worst show I’ve ever done’, but the crowd could care less; they’re just happy to be there.”