Heart were pissed off when they recorded their single “Barracuda” in 1977. The record emerged from a period in which false narratives constantly swirled around the band. “The real thing don’t do the trick, no/You better make up something quick,” Heart bit back on the song. Fast forward nearly five decades and the record has found new resonance with another popular artist: Chappell Roan. Having recently found herself pushed to adamantly defend her character, the musician performed a raging cover of “Barracuda” during a concert in Iowa.
With bright red lights soaking the stage in a fiery hue, Roan belted out the record at full force. She dropped to the floor throughout the song and rocked out with her band during blistering instrumental breaks. “You lying so low in the weeds/I bet you gonna ambush me,” she sang. “You’d have me down, down, down, down on my knees/Now wouldn’t you, Barracuda?”
Roan resumed her ongoing Midwest Princess tour earlier this week after cancelling two appearances at the Maryland and New York City iterations of All Things Go last weekend. “Things have gotten overwhelming over the past few weeks and I am really feeling it,” she wrote in a social media statement at the time. “I feel pressures to prioritize a lot of things right now and I need a few days to prioritize my health. I want to be present when I perform and give the best shows possible.”
For months, Roan has been vocal about having a hard time adjusting to the sudden level of fame and attention that she reached this year. With each festival set she performed over the summer, the crowds got bigger and bigger — and the expectations of her audience grew with them. In August, she attempted to set boundaries between her private and professional personas and opened up to Rolling Stone about her experiences being stalked. There was bizarre pushback to Roan’s decision to draw that much needed line, but it was nothing compared to the public reactions to her opinion about the 2024 presidential election.
Last month, critical perceptions around Roan became explosive and volatile as social media users accused her of supporting Donald Trump just because she wouldn’t explicitly endorse Kamala Harris. This led to a series of TikTok posts from Roan who, in attempting to clarify her position, found herself being backed further into a corner by an audience that wasn’t all that interested in hearing her out in the first place. She clarified that she would be voting for Harris, but has no intention of approaching any angle of politics without criticism and accountability.
“Fuck Trump for fucking real,” Roan said, putting that particular false narrative to rest. “But fuck some of the shit that has gone down in the Democratic party that has failed people like me and you — and more so Palestine and more so every marginalized community in the world. No, I’m not gonna settle for the options that are in front of me. And you’re not gonna make me feel bad for that.”