Trigger Warnings: Mentions of Substance Abuse, Sexual Assault and Disordered Eating
Having written songs and produced songs for monumental artists like Beyoncé, Rhianna and John Legend, you might think that Raye would be more of a household name. Afterall, she has appeared in popular songs such as Jax Jones’ ‘You Don’t Know Me’ and D-Block’s ‘Prada’. Her 2022 single ‘Escapism’ trended on TikTok and has been notable as the hit of winter 2022.
Some TikToks have even referred to last winter as ‘Escapism Season’ due to its popularity. I remember visiting Paris with my best friend last Christmas, blasting the song on our phones, as we walked to the club, yelling out the lyrics “the man that I love sat me down last night and he told me that it’s over – dumb decision” into the dark, cold night. ‘Escapism’ meant a lot to many people, not only being a fun and catchy tune but referring to using sex, substances and partying as coping mechanisms.
It’s not a surprise that it engaged so many young listeners. However, while Raye’s discography is successful, most of her songs have not developed as much of a cult following as ‘Escapism’ did. It’s a shame because as a huge fan of her work, I believe that ‘The Thrill is Gone’ and ‘Oscar Winning Tears’ (as well as most of her songs) are some of the most important and lyrically mastered songs of our generation. Dipping her toes in jazz, R&B and soul, Raye’s powerful range sings songs of addiction, feminism, self-esteem, race and class. This is why I believe Raye is the powerhouse lyricist and singer of our generation…
- Fighting Against the ‘Ice Cream Man’
As many women of our generation, Raye has hinted towards being a victim of sexual harassment. She sings how a producer hit her up, wanting to collaborate and instead made sexual advances on her. This song is a formidable refusal of predatory men in the entertainment industry. The symbolism of the title refers to the coldness of men like this, coming at her with their “ice-cold hands”. Raye’s song ‘Ice Cream Man’ implores listeners to stand up their very own ice cream men. She shames men for their misogynistic behaviour, singing “How dare you do that to me, really?” The lyrics I find the most powerful are: “And I was 7. Was 21, was 17, and was 11. It took a while to understand what my consent means”. These lyrics portray the reality for so many women in the world, only developing an understanding of how unacceptable men’s actions towards them have been once they have already experienced such violations. She sings that while she had to “pay the price now” and that because of men’s exploitation of her she had been “broken for a moment, I’ve been through it”, she has grown into a “strong woman”. For me, this is an anthem for victims of SA, reminding us that while we don’t deserve to “frame myself for your sins”, there is life after experiencing violation from a “pathetic, dead excuse of a man”. The way she calls out the normalisation of sexual harassment in the entertainment industry is so important and not vocalised as often as it should be. Listening to her fight against the patriarchy’s objectification of women from an early age is both empowering and cathartic. I hope that this song can bring other listeners some healing too.
- Her Polemic on Race and Class in England
When speaking to the Independent, Raye stated “I’m a young woman of colour who is fed up with being controlled and manipulated”. Some of her masterful lyrics testify to this. ‘Hard Out Here’ is a key example of this. Raye has said that she looks at the white men under her lab, “the support they get, the love they get, the encouragement they get, which isn’t necessarily there for women at any label”. Afterall, her incredible first studio album ‘My 21st Century Blues’ was released in February 2023 – years after she had songwriting credits for singers like Beyonce, John Legend and Charli XCX and seven top 20 hits, including her 2016 breakout ‘You Don’t Know Me’. After years of work – and still no debut album – ‘Hard Out Here’ references the effort implemented for a young woman of colour to get her work released and truly appreciated. She sings “What do you know about hustling? As a young girl in the dungeons”. ‘Hard Out Here’ is an important song addressing the struggles women face to make it in the world, particularly women of colour. A quote from Raye that I love is: “It came from a messy time, but as humans, we just have to keep surviving!”. This is a sentiment addressed in many of Raye’s songs that so many listeners can relate to.
- Fearing Your Own Body from Girlhood to Womanhood
I have seldom heard a song so expertly address the fears women have since childhood about their physical appearance and how their affects their self-worth as Raye’s ‘Body Dysmorphia’. She sings how she uses “XL T-shirts, baggy jeans, so I don’t have to stress about it. Marijuana every day, so I cannot obsess about it”. This refers to the avoidance and escapism (get the reference?) when a woman suffers from self-esteem issues, often due to the stigma surrounding women speaking out against a society which elicits them to feel their body lacks desirability if it does not fit a specific and unrealistic mould. Another lyric “yes, lately I’ve been thinking ‘bout the ways to rearrange my face. I wanna cut pieces off looking in the mirror, want to take a pair of scissors. Sadly, dear, I wanna cut pieces off” emphasises the desperate measures people take to alter their appearance in an effort to boost their self-worth. The violent connotations of “cut pieces off” accentuates this idea of self-hatred and desperation. This climaxes to the outro in which a little girl’s voice is heard saying “I hope I’ll be pretty when I grow up or I think I’ll be sad”. This bleak outro demonstrates how beauty standards are ingrained in girls at a young age. The unsettling juxtaposition between such rigid beauty standards and the innocence and vulnerability of youth draws attention to the extremity of body dysmorphia and self-esteem issues.
- Substance Abuse
In BBC Music Correspondant Mark Savage’s interview with Raye, the singer states “for me, sadly, substance abuse was entangled with numbing the trauma that I had experienced. I got pretty deep in and it got really dangerous at one point”. While Raye is now sober, the descriptions of drug use are threaded into her ‘21st Century Blues’. While the obvious reference lays in her stripped-back blues ballad ‘Mary Jane.’ in which she states drugs “take these bitter thoughts in my brain and let them fall like summer rain”, other songs like ‘Escapism’ and ‘The Thrill is Gone’ indicate her drug use as a form of – you guessed it – escapism! In her excellent podcast with Song Exploder, she discusses the writing of ‘Escapism’. She describes how she remembers being in a car with people who “didn’t even know my name… just there, doing lines… and I’m like cool, where am I?” During her drug usage, she was surrounded by people equally reliant on drug use with only this usage drawing them together rather than valuable interpersonal relationships. This is illustrated in the lyrics “I don’t trust any of these bitches I’m with in the back of the taxi, sniffing cocaine”, portraying the isolation experienced during her usage of Class A drugs. This is further portrayed in the lyrics “Toke this joint how I’m blowing this steam, back to my ways like 2019”, suggesting that drug use is the only method she can use to cope with the heartbreak of being broken up with. On this episode, Raye states the song is about how she doesn’t “want to feel reality or feel honest feelings… specific times in my life where you’re just trying to run away from reality as fast as you can and you’ll take whatever is on the table, whatever is on offer, whatever you can get your hands on, wherever you can run”. This candid description as to why she relied on drugs causes ‘Escapism’ to be, yes, a catchy tune but more of a heart-jolting and stomach-turning reminder of those dark times in a person’s life. Raye’s “explicitly uncomfortably honest” lyrics are what – in my opinion – solidifies her songs as some of the most important of this generation.
Concluding Thoughts
Raye’s strident lyrics on the lives of women in 21st –Century society are ones that can be extrapolated to the majority of twenty-something-year-old women. While her songs have certainly garnered popularity on TikTok, I implore you to listen to her first studio album – back-to-back – and get lost in the wonderland of Raye’s fall and rise. She is, and will forever remain, one of the artists I hold most dearly to my heart.