'You Get Too Big and They Cut You Down': YUNGBLUD on the Trials of the Internet

When he was thirteen, Doncaster’s YUNGBLUD became enamoured with The Cure’s frontman, Robert Smith. A few years before, when he was a kid, he’d steal his sister's blue-tinted reading glasses – which she used for her dyslexia – so he could pretend to be Ozzy Osbourne. 

At their peak, Osbourne and Smith were both unashamedly themselves (they still are). Instead of fitting in, they stuck out. Smith could often be seen onstage sporting smeared red lipstick and smudged black eyeliner, his hair like a bird's nest. Ozzy… well Ozzy was just Ozzy. YUNGBLUD feels the same.

Though his appearance and presence in the music industry have, at times, made him the target of some unfortunate people online (at one point he was accused of being an industry plant, appropriating the working class and queerbaiting) YUNGBLUD has always claimed to have stayed true to himself. It’s what his latest, self-titled album represents. 

“YUNGBLUD. It's fucked, it's flawed,” he tells VICE, “But you can’t define YUNGBLUD to one thing, it's literally about obliterating conformity and obliterating boxing yourself in.”

Rather than present the narrative of a sad rockstar finding his way, the album reclaims who YUNGBLUD sees himself to be: an act of defiance and a symbol of connection. Someone who is truly and genuinely himself.

They’re traits that his hero, Robert Smith, must have caught onto, with YUNGBLUD receiving a personal thumbs up to sample The Cure’s ‘Close To Me’ on his track ‘Tissues’. There was no bigger nod of approval.

Having just toured Australia, Japan and Paris, skirting home to the UK with “just enough time to wash his underpants,” YUNGBLUD has headed to the US. His new album also drops this week. In between all that, and with a heavy Doncaster accent and wolf-like grin, he sat down with VICE to chat androgynous legends, hate on the internet and middle finger tattoos.

VICE: So Robert Smith. ‘The Funeral’ off this album feels very “Cure-esque”. What makes you such a fan?

YUNGBLUD: Imagine someone simultaneously expressing your happiness and your sadness all at the same time. It was fucking mental. It taught me how to open the fucking door with a flower petal. Mentally he just completely changed my mindset. All the songs were so beautiful and so uplifting yet they was so gut wrenching at the same time. It was like sweet and salty popcorn. I was like, “What the fuck, bro?” He taught me androgyny. Taught me depth. He taught me understanding of the heart. He taught me that it was okay to be anxious. 

I think for someone like me, I'm confidently insecure. And that's why a lot of people don't believe me, “How can he be so sad if he’s so excited and happy. But I think I use that to kind of combat my insecurity, combat my anxiety, and that's a personification of songs like “The Funeral” on this record. 

Robert Smith was known for wearing lipstick onstage. Your song Strawberry Lipstick isn’t an ode to him, is it?

No. But, I mean, maybe, it could be. I owe it to him to wear lipstick on stage. You know? I owe it to Boy George, Robert Smith, Brian Molko. They made me wear makeup, it was sick.

VICE: I've noticed that you're attracted to these individuals that really don't give a fuck. They’re just completely themselves. In the music video for ‘The Funeral’, Ozzy Osbourne makes an appearance. What was it like working with him?

YUNGBLUD: A fucking dream come true. I think Ozzy is awesome. Ozzy’s not crazy, Ozzy’s free. I think that’s a similarity that we have. People just think I'm fucking fake or not real, when it's just because I'm energetic, or tell the truth. And I think people don't like the truth because it makes them have to face themselves. 

I think that's what me and Ozzy spoke about a lot. He said to me that people don't like the truth, it makes them have to face who they are, and never apologise. Be fucking wild man. 

Why’d you get them to hit you with a car as Sharon called you, “just some other fucking poser” [in the video, not real life]?

I just thought it was quite funny. They were like, “Is there a deeper meaning behind that?” and I was like “Nah”. At the time of the album it was getting bigger and everyone started to question whether it was authentic or not. And I just think the songs are about taking control of your narrative. So just like fuck it. This is hilarious.

VICE: I thought ‘I Cry 2’ was a really interesting song. Especially the line where you said “everyone online says I'm not really gay” and “I spend most of my days wondering what the fuck do they want from me?” Is that mostly in reference to trolls and hate online?

YUNGBLUD: Yeah, it's everything. I feel so fucking honoured and lucky to come up around artists like Billy Eilish, lil Nas X, and Mac Miller. And I think when you tell the truth – like, those I spoke about are a generation that speak about things that I do – and the Internet can be so fucking cruel to artists like that. And it hurt me, with people like Mac Miller, it fucking killed them. 

The world is so angry right now. It's so fucking angry. And you've got to remember that the person – no matter famous or fucking not famous – is going through shit. And people find it so hard to express their emotions. We have to be kinder to each other. We have to be kinder in the world. 

I wrote about my friend who was going through a really hard time in his life and he couldn’t express his emotions. And I said, “It's alright mate, I cry too”. But I wanted to make a universal idea that we have to be kinder to each other because you don't know what someone next to you is going through and you don't know how easy or hard it is for them to express their emotions.

I don't know if you remember when the internet was fun but it's gotten a lot less fun in the last few years or so.

Yeah, it really has. You’re telling me, man. Like last year, it was almost my turn. It was like, “Alright who are we gonna take down next? YUNGBLUD.” 

But what for guys? Just some fucking stupid shit. So it’s like… whatever. But it's funny, the kids who are hating on you are just obsessed anyway. Love or hate, it’s an obsession.

It’s Tall Poppy Syndrome. That’s an Australian term.

Yeah, you get too big and they cut you down…And grow again.

VICE: This is your third album, but it's the first album that uses your name in the title. Is there more of a connection to this one?

YUNGBLUD: I know it's bizarre that I called my third YUNGBLUD. And I could call every fucking album YUNGBLUD from the first one to the last one, but I think the reason why I wanted to do it on this one is because I'm understanding what it means. Not in terms of definition, because I think if you ever define YUNGBLUD it's fucked, it's flawed, it's like the whole concept is fucking flawed. 

You can’t define YUNGBLUD to one thing. It's literally about obliterating conformity and obliterating boxing yourself in. But it's almost about understanding a feeling, because feelings don't lie, energy doesn't lie. You can lie about a feeling, you can lie about an experience. You can lie. But the feeling itself and the energy doesn't lie. And the feeling of YUNGBLUD is becoming clearer to me. And that's what I feel like this album represents. 

I was originally going to call it: “You only lose when you stop getting up” , but YUNGBLUD says that. Right now, in a world of anger, where the internet's fucking crazy, where there's war going on, where there's so much fucking dark shit that I wake up to every day, YUNGBLUD is this little, fucking community – that's not so little anymore – that represents love and expression and beauty and light. Togetherness. And I couldn't be more proud to be a part of it. So I wanted that name to be cemented in the history of an album.

VICE: You’ve got a black heart tattooed on your left hand on your middle finger. Why?

YUNGBLUD: So I’ve a broken heart on my right hand and a full one on my left middle finger and the reason why I did that is because all my life I didn't have an answer. I felt like I was being ridiculed just for fucking existing as I was, and I wanted to say, “Fuck you to the world”. 

I feel like I'm just being myself and I want to find people like me. And then I'm also left-handed. So by writing songs and writing YUNGBLUD my heart got filled up. And I got it on my middle fingers because I think YUNGBLUD is an act of defiance. It's a juxtaposition. It's kind of saying “fuck you” while finding “love”. 

That makes sense.

I think when everyone tries to box me in, when they call me a punk or a pop punk or something, it's not what I am. I'm not that, it’s lazy journalism. It's a lazy definition. I don’t think I’m defined by a genre, by a sound, by a look or an image. It's a feeling. It's a mindset. It's a movement. It's an idea.

I guess when it comes to that, some people need to categorise to make sense of the world, which can be sad at times.

It is sad sometimes. But as I say, like “fuck it”. I'll just spend the rest of my fucking life fighting against it. You just do it, even if I'm a dreamer.

YUNGBLUD: Oh dude, every time I come down, it’s a little bit of a homecoming for me. I just fucking adore it. We played first on TV there, we played our first arena there on the last tour. I just fucking never want to leave. I always want someone to kidnap me when I'm in Australia and you can keep me there forever.

VICE: I remember you saying you thought Australians were loose?

Yeah, literally that’s what I said. I was like “y'all don't turn your nose up at shit” All these mental artists come to Australia and you’re all like [puts on Australian accent] “Fuck it. Love it. fucking weird, but I'm down”.

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