Delilah Bon: “The problem isn’t young girls wanting to be a princess… It’s the idea that you need a prince”

Once upon a time it was Rapunzel who let down her hair to be rescued by a charming prince, but brat punk Delilah Bon is flipping the script: grow out a resplendent bush of pubes instead, but forget the knight in shining armour, do it for yourself.

This is what she tells us on the aptly-titled track, Bush. Mixing her lifelong love of fantasy with her colourfully vulgar lyricism, it stems Delilah’s forthcoming PRINCELESS PRINCESS EP landing right off the back of her first ever U.S. tour. Making for the perfect outlet to introduce a slightly softer version of herself, while still bringing her snappy wit, the collection of four tracks tells a twisted fairytale that tears apart the traditional narratives.

The feminist fairy godmother herself welcomed K! into the magical kingdom of Delilahland to tell us all about touring Trump’s America, the marriage of anger and womanhood, and why sometimes it’s more than okay to kiss some cute frogs if the princes in your life suck. Without further ado, gather round the lute…

The PRINCELESS PRINCESS EP has a warped fairytale running through it. You might be the only artist that could sing a song about bush and make it whimsical. What does this theme mean to you?
“One half of me is into escapism, and the other half of me is very much, ‘This is how I feel, and I’m not going to sugarcoat it.’ In this EP I’ve blended the two. I’ve allowed myself to sing about dragons like I’m this fairy princess, but then it’s blended in the reality of being a woman and dealing with misogyny. The princess part of it I absolutely love, because I don’t think the problem is young girls wanting to be a princess, it’s this idea that you need a prince; you need saving and your story doesn’t start until you meet him. What if the princess’ story was written without the prince being the centre? Or what if the prince was a dick? What if we get with the prince and we don’t even like him? It’s having fun with the traditional roles that women are put under.”

As usual, you’ve written and produced all of the songs on the EP. How do you think your production and songwriting skills have grown?
“I’m still experimenting all the time, but I can lay down a beat and I’m not having to Google everything. I give less of a shit when it comes to how I’m perceived, which is funny because personally I’m worried about how people perceive me but when it comes to my music, the more honest and ‘out-there’ it is, the better. It’s quite refreshing to write a song about a bush. I know young me would be so excited by this music, she’d listen to it and be laughing. It’s letting go of trying to impress this imaginary person that I always used to have in my mind when I was younger. It’s complete freedom. People should be quite scared because I’ve got no-one telling me no!”

You’ve just come back from the States – touring America is a dream for most artists in the UK, though it feels like a hostile place right now. What were the most special moments from the tour that made any worries worthwhile?
“Every single night when I performed Not The President. I wanted to take my guitar [to play it], but I couldn’t because it had so many stickers that I couldn’t get off. If I was going to get stopped at the border and have anything checked, these stickers would’ve been a real issue (laughs). I played it with guitar on track, which meant that I could go into the crowd and hold hands with people instead. I would get goosebumps all the time.
“I feel like every show had a different moment, but I got a girl up onstage for my song Cannibal Summer. She was so sassy and incredible. She messaged me afterwards and told me that she’d had the worst year. She said, ‘Being trans in America right now, I’ve felt so hopeless. When you pulled me onstage, I knew what I was holding on for because that night reminded me of who I am.’ It’s moments like that, you can’t put into words how magical they are. It’s more than just a show and it’s more than music.”

You brought along Becky Baldwin from your band Hands off Gretel. What was it like to reconnect with her and share a stage together again?
“I needed a bass player I knew would be able to learn the songs quickly. Becky was perfect. It’s so nice for me to be able to give her a crowd that’s like the crowd we needed with Hands Off Gretel. Becky is very rock, her style is very metal. As we did more shows, she was saying that she was finding it quite difficult to shake her ass and play bass at the same time, she was learning all these different moves! It’s a whole different side to Becky that people haven’t seen.”

You’ve got a UK headline run coming up in November. When you toured here last time, you struggled with your mental and physical health, and re-scheduled some shows. What are you doing differently this time to care for yourself on the road?
“On tour my mental health is always up and down, because I have to deal with a lot of difference to my routine. I’m very much a loner. [On the last UK tour], that’s when Trump was elected. I said my DMs were open, and [there was] a flood of hundreds of messages. I was sitting in the back room [at my shows] and I should have been getting dressed and doing my make-up but instead I was replying to people. Everyone around me was like, ‘You don’t have to do that,’ but sometimes I do take on that role; a lot of people do come to me with issues they want to talk about. I think I need to let the phone not be in my hand too much.”

Delilah originated as an alter-ego, but now it feels like she embodies a bit of your personality as Lauren. How do you feel the two sides of yourself have come together?
“When I first made Delilah I needed this character to pull me out of a depressive place that I was in. I changed my hair, I dressed up to be this person who’s the confident, extroverted me. A big breakthrough for bringing Lauren into Delilah was Not The President. With Delilah it was all attitude; I would try to give attitude all the time, and I feel that can only take you so far before it becomes a bit samey. Now I want to show anger, but then I want to show softness, vulnerability and humour.”

For any little girls out there who are dreaming of being a princess, what do you have to say to them?
“You don’t need a prince – you need a dragon. You need to get on that dragon’s back and fly around the universe and find yourself, love yourself, and only accept a prince if that prince is incredible and worthy of you!”

PRINCELESS PRINCESS is due out on September 26. Delilah Bon tours the UK in November.

Read this next:

• Delilah Bon: “Before, I felt like I was screaming on my own. Now people are screaming with me”
• Good For Her: Are we finally realising the power of female rage?
• Delilah Bon: “People’s responses to my music has given me fuel. I’ve not even started yet!”