There’s a certain kind of honesty you can’t fake, and Holly Humberstone has built an entire career on it. The kind that spills out somewhere between a late-night spiral and a voice note you almost don’t send. After watching Holly Humberstone perform a short, intimate concert, including a few old and new songs, we got to sit down and speak with the rising pop singer.
In this conversation, she traces the line from a quiet, fun, free Midlands childhood to the dense, hectic masses of London, unpacking sisterhood, insecurity, and the strange art of turning your inner chaos into something beautifully listenable. It’s real, a little messy, and exactly what pop music needs right now.
So tell me a little bit about yourself and where you grew up. What is something that connects you to home?
Home is something that’s constantly changing for me, and I’m constantly trying to redefine what home means.
I grew up in the East Midlands of the UK, and there’s not a whole lot going on. I grew up in, like, 20 minutes outside of a town in a tiny village, and we lived in this house, and it was just me and my 3 sisters. It was like a really fun, creative household to grow up in. I’ve been really, really lucky. My parents are super nurturing of all of us doing something creative and something that we love. So yeah, that’s how I started doing music. I just gravitated towards my mom’s piano, and it was my safe space to write, to figure out the world around me. And I still love writing songs for that reason.
And now you live in a big city?
I do. I moved to London in maybe 2019, and yeah, I live with my sisters and my best friend, and it’s very lovely.
What’s that transition like from a very small town to a very big city?
It was a shocking transition. When I first moved down to London, I was in a tiny little flat share, and I wrote a lot of songs about being in a little flat and suddenly being thrust into a big overstimulating city.
But London is amazing for that reason because everybody is just packed in so tightly. There’s not a whole lot of space. And I just love being around people. People are what inspire me, and inspire my stories, and inspire me to be creative. So it’s kind of the best place for me to be. I think I’d be very bored living in the countryside.
You grew up near Nottingham, and you referenced the city in some of your songs as well. What impact did Nottingham or the smaller town where you grew up have on your music? How have those two cities really shaped your sound?
Being disconnected from any type of music scene helped me in a weird way because I never thought too hard about what I was creating or how I would write. I’d go off instinct rather than expectation or what my peers were doing. But Nottingham is definitely a very inspiring place for me. I played my first ever shows at this tiny little cafe called the Jam Cafe, and it’s a very kind of humble place, I love it for that reason. People in the Midlands and the north of the UK are real and fun. I love Nottingham.
Let’s talk about your music video “To Love Somebody”. It features themes of Victorian theater, the Brothers Grimm, and Nosferatu. And these themes, I would say, slightly juxtapose the pop feel of the song. What is the intention behind combining these two vibes? Why did you choose to go with this theme for the music video?
Everything that I write about is real experience and raw, kind of candid, just things that I’m going through. And my way of processing the world around me, or understanding the people in my life that I really love.
And I’ve had so much fun with the creative, doing the videos has been just like such a change for me. I knew that I could write the music, but I never thought how important and fun being in charge of my creative world could be. I did a lot of it with my big sister. She’s very talented and knows me better than anybody. I grew up doing a lot of dance. Ballet was maybe my first love. My kind of segue into music, and where I learned musicality, came from just dancing as a really young child.
I remember as a treat at Christmas, my mom would take me to watch a ballet occasionally, and it would be just such a special experience going into the theater. The curtains open, and this fake world is revealed. You get sucked into this papier-mache prop-painted backdrop universe for like 2 hours, and then you come out, and you’re like, ‘Oh my gosh, I was just sucked into a different realm.’ And I find that so inspiring. That’s kind of where all of the creativity stemmed from.
For me, writing this album has been such an escape from my real world. Just somewhere that I can go to romanticize my life. And I think that’s why the song is pop-sounding and a bit more outward. That’s why that juxtaposition of that versus this alternate universe comes together. Just because, I mean, my music is so candid and real and human, but I think that it still feels like an escape to me, and I still want it to feel like that for other people.
You mentioned writing as being sort of like therapy. You and your lyrics reflect lived experiences and those of your loved ones. Is there a song that you particularly found difficult to write? What is it like to really process those feelings in writing?
A lot of the time, I have just like a confused brain fog mess in my brain, and going into the studio feels like my comfort space where I can candidly say how I really feel about things going on. Writing a song about something is my only way of breaking an emotion that I’m feeling down into a simpler format and writing it into a song. I write a lot about other people and the people that are closest to me, like my sisters, a romantic partner, or my best friends. I have a lot of love in my life and a lot of amazing people to be inspired by.
There are definitely a few songs on the album where I’ve turned the magnifying glass on myself. Those are the hardest songs to write because I have to talk about myself and my insecurities and my real feelings. There’s a song called “Beauty Pageant” where I just talk about my experience of being a woman and just existing online seeking validation from external sources. I guess just the unrealistic expectations that we all kind of hold ourselves to in this world that isn’t really shaped for us. Those are the most empowering songs to get to release because it’s important to be real with people. So it’s cool to be able to share that I also feel like this. You’re not on your own if you’re having these weird, confusing feelings.
How does that feel, also after releasing it, when you kind of turn that mirror on yourself, and then you kind of have to face those hard realities? How does that feel when you release it and then you hear it back?
I mean, it’s a crazy experience. I honestly feel like when I’m writing and when I’m in the process of creating the songs, I am never thinking about the release day. It doesn’t cross my mind.
The scariest part of it all is when it comes to releasing music. And yeah, it’s super vulnerable and obviously quite exposing and sometimes embarrassing, and I overshare a lot in my music, so it is kind of scary. But also, again, it’s a privilege to be able to do this as a job and to be able to share so much of myself with strangers who are like-minded. And I’m writing about universal feelings, so I’m sure that everybody can relate to a song in the album in some way. It’s cool. I feel like people are really craving just a bit of humanity and human connection. So I think it’s important to be unfiltered and real in art.
In what ways does music help you find back to yourself and ground you in your true identity?
Music is at the core of everything that I do. I hate silence. I hate being left alone with my thoughts. And I feel comforted by playing an album that I used to love as a kid. When I feel lost and confused, going back to those original references that I used to really, really love as a child, like stealing CDs from my parents’ music collection and taking them into my room and playing them. It’s kind of like smell. It can just bring back stuff that you’ve forgotten, and it can remind you of who you are. Yeah, they’ve defined me. As a person.
You just said music is kind of at the core of everything for you, but in general, if you had to choose something, let’s say food, sound, or cultural influences, or even guilty pleasures, something that’s very true to Holly, what would you say that would be? Like, what is something that is uniquely you?
That’s a really good question. It’s also a hard question because I’m not really too sure. I don’t know if this is like a cop-out answer, but the people in my life, I think, are what make me feel human. I think it’s so easy to get wrapped up in your own world when you’re alone with your thoughts, or when I’m on the road or something like that. It’s so important for me to come back and to just be with the people who understand me, who accept me, and who I don’t have to try with, and who just remind me what I care about in life and what’s actually important to me. So, yeah, I think the people in my life. I’m really lucky. I have an amazing, cool group of friends and just an insane sisterhood that I just couldn’t really exist without. Um, so yeah, I’m very grateful.
So what was the first song you ever wrote and properly recorded as well?
I started writing songs when I was really small, and I don’t ever remember sitting at the piano and being like, I’m going to start writing songs, this is going to be my thing. It was something that I naturally did. And a lot of my early songs were so, so shit, but that’s fine. I think it’s something you have to work at over the course of your life, and even now, constantly working at being better.
But I think the first song that I wrote, recorded, and released was “Deep End”, which was my first release. It just felt really natural. It’s a song about my sisters and people really close to me, and worrying about other people, and just working through being a young adult. It’s important to talk about mental health, and everybody has their own internal struggle that is unique to them.
Where does your passion for music and songwriting stem from? Are there strong influences of music in your family? I know you mentioned the piano as well.
My parents worked for the NHS, so they are very much not in the music industry, and I don’t think they know much about music, but both of them really, really loved music, and we had music playing like 24/7 at home or in the car on the way to school. They were basically just huge music fans, obsessed with music.
My mom is actually really musical herself; she plays the piano and the cello. I think she wouldn’t like to admit that she’s really good, but she’s amazing. And my dad is big into poetry; he used to read a lot to us as children. So, yeah, I’ve just been blessed with iconic parents, to be honest, who were just willing to let us be free and follow our passions and be creative. I have a lot of credit to give to my parents, really. They’re amazing.
Over the years, your style has shifted in different directions. Do you feel like your aesthetic now is more closely tied to your identity? Do you really feel like yourself?
I do. I really do. Part of that has to do with just the amount of time that I’ve been allowed to just exist in London at home as a human being and not an artist, getting to just think about how I want to present this next chapter of the story. I’ve been growing up a lot in this past year and a half, whilst I’ve been writing and coming up with the creative concept behind the album.
I was going back and forth from my childhood home because my parents moved out last May just to sort out like 25 years’ worth of stuff, and we’re all hoarders in my family, and basically just kept everything from when we moved in there when I was like 3. I remember rifling through my wardrobe and rediscovering all of these old items. My old jewelry box. Winding her up and hearing the little tune that it plays when the ballerina spins around, everything just came flooding back. My old school books, my old ballet shoes. As I said, I used to love to dance as a kid, and that used to be so core to my identity. That’s when I started working in the music industry, such an overwhelming, overstimulating, kind of amazing, but kind of mad place to exist. It’s easy to get wrapped up in it, and I lost sight of who that little girl was who had a dream of being a musician one day. I’ve brought all of my old items back down. My bedroom is now pink like my childhood bedroom was, and I have all the same decorations as I had as a kid.
I feel so much closer to who I am at my core now. The music and the style just completely reflect all that. I think if I had a vision, my vision when I was 11 would match up to how I’m presenting myself now, and what the music sounds like. If I were to show my 11-year-old self what I’m up to, I think she’d be absolutely buzzing, which is really nice. It’s been so cathartic, and I really stand behind everything that I’ve made because it feels so authentic and really, really me.
Do you still dance?
You know what? I had a crazy dancing dream last night. I need to get back to dancing and do a regular class because it’s one of those things that I just haven’t done for years. I’ve done like a tiny, tiny bit in my music videos that are coming up, but the most minimal bit of dancing you’ve ever seen. Hopefully, I can get to a class and get back to it because I love dancing so much. It’s just very freeing and a place to just be with yourself. It’s self-care.
