Halle Bailey is feeling motivated by “deep, deep” romance to produce new music.
The singer-actress, 23, talked about her upcoming solo music and how falling in love for the first time was a part of where she drew her “creativity from” to compose the project in a cover story for Cosmopolitan that was released on Tuesday.
In the magazine’s September-October STYLE edition, the Little Mermaid actress confirmed that her debut solo album will “definitely” be released “before the end of this year.”
The Chloe x Halle star added that “love” has been “a really big” musical motivation for her. She has been dating rapper DDG (full name Darryl Dwayne Granberry Jr.) since early 2022.
The Angel singer admitted that appearing in films like the upcoming musical rendition of The Color Purple and the live-action remake of The Little Mermaid had influenced her songwriting, but she also made a point to discuss how her relationship had.
“All musical inspiration really just comes from life experiences,” the recording artist told the magazine. “Love has been a really big one for me too, because that’s something I’m experiencing for the first time, and it’s, like, ‘whoa’ in your brain. It’s just fireworks, a spark for creativity.”
She continued by highlighting the importance of their current union, which was made official on Instagram when DDG posted a birthday tribute to Bailey in March 2023.
The singer-songwriter added, “You know, you have puppy love experiences, you think that’s love. But this is my first deep, deep, real love.”
Meanwhile the singer chose to keep her life to herself, she did share, “I will tell you where I get my creativity from.”
“This has been a really beautiful transformative time for me. I have all this new material to write about,” the R&B star continued. “It’s like, What the heck did I just experience and go through? A whirlwind of amazingness. You never know what you’re capable of until you’re put through it. I was very creatively inspired, and then from there, I fell in love. And so, I really just played with those themes in my music.”
The Ungodly Hour singer said that her forthcoming album, which doesn’t yet have a name, combines jazz and pop elements with contemporary R&B tones. The lead track Angel, which was released in early August, gave fans a taste of the music.
She then elaborated about her target audience while creating music. “My music is definitely for the young girl who doesn’t know herself completely yet, who’s growing every day and learning about who she is and about her power,” Bailey shared. “It’s an emotional, vulnerable kind of music. It’s also a love letter to myself and my younger self and my future self.”