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\n\tFor one, does the name Beyonc\u00e9 ring a bell? Beatty was part of the creative team that helped the superstar win album of the year at the Grammys in 2025, co-writing a handful of tracks on Cowboy Carter, including fan-favorite \u201cBodyguard.\u201d But enough about that. Beatty is here as part of a series of underplays across the world for his own music, which caught Beyonc\u00e9\u2019s ear to begin with. The tiny gigs are in support of his fourth album Sweet Fortune, which came out in June.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\n\tWalking down 101\u2019s narrow staircase, Beatty is in a small basement. His set is delayed (technical issues), but he\u2019s relaxed. With a baby face defying the fact he\u2019s turning 31 next month, Beatty dons a worn jean jacket and blue jeans, perhaps an allusion to the country twang that can be heard on Sweet Fortune. (\u201cVirtuoso,\u201d co-written with pop hitmaker Amy Allen, with its guitar pickin\u2019 and steady beat, would be perfect for a line dance.) But while the album may convey a subtle Southern energy (its series of music videos were filmed in the heartland, including \u201cWhite Lightning\u201d which improbably featured an actual lightning storm), Sweet Fortune actually took root not far from where we\u2019re sitting. \u201cI just felt like I needed something to really take me out of my comfort zone,\u201d he says, closing his eyes while he answers each question to hyperfocus on the words coming out of his mouth. \u201cA change of location is an easy way to do that. I have friends in New York and my favorite spots, but I never created here. I wanted to see what it was like.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tWhile the recording was done back in L.A., Beatty wrote the bulk of Sweet Fortune in the dead of a Northeast winter; at the time he says he was listening to a lot of Chet Baker. \u201cIt\u2019s that clich\u00e9 thing of, \u2018I\u2019m listening to jazz in New York!\u2019 I think it opened me up sonically.\u201d He looks at the album as \u201cCalifornia dressed up in New York clothes. I\u2019m a California boy through-and-through, and I just feel that it bleeds into my songwriting. The album is really about distance, so making it in a place far away from my comfort, my home, allowed me to speak on that more directly.\u201d Then again, there\u2019s another theme on Sweet Fortune that perhaps is much more important. \u201cI always know that no matter what, I have to sing about what\u2019s really happening in my life. And even though I\u2019m really protective of the things that I keep precious, singing about a relationship I\u2019m in \u2014 and not from a place of heartbreak \u2014 was a new thing for me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tFrom the minute he says he can remember anything, music was always a guiding light for Beatty during a childhood growing up outside Fresno, the California town far removed from both San Francisco to the north and Los Angeles to the south. \u201cI always knew it was a magnet for me and that I was gonna find myself somewhere in it,\u201d he says. That passion evolved into Beatty posting YouTube covers and eventually launching a pop career as a teen artist, his songs on Disney Radio. (Ryan Seacrest debuted his first official single.)<\/p>\n
\n\tAs he\u2019s been open about before, it\u2019s a period he doesn\u2019t fondly look back on. \u201cI think, \u2018Did I even have any say in the matter?\u2019 Not that anyone was forcing me. I was a kid, discovering who I was, and I didn\u2019t know who I was. I knew at one point early on as that was happening that there\u2019s something deeper that I yearned for that I could not achieve based on everything around me and what I was doing.\u201d He points to \u201cyears of shame\u201d and a grit he utilized to push through. When Beatty cut ties with his first label, he couldn\u2019t release music for a period of time. \u201cThe years that I\u2019d spent not making music, from when I was 17 to 21, were really hard,\u201d he says. \u201cThat was a dark era of my life just because of how lost I felt. I was alone and scared and tethered to nothing. I think it also allowed me to find my voice, but it took a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tBeatty wasn\u2019t just unhappy churning out bubblegum pop: he was also grappling with his sexuality. Launching a career as a young performer added a separate layer of turmoil. By 2016, when he came out in an Instagram post, Beatty said he could \u201cfinally breathe,\u201d adding, \u201cIt\u2019s taken 20 years of suffocating in the closet for me to become comfortable enough to say it.\u201d Today, he\u2019s living in acceptance of his journey. Not only did it let him zero in on his craft rather than chasing the poison apple of fame, but the same year he came out he released his acclaimed debut album, Boy in Jeans, which earned him street cred and deftly shed his pop past. (The fact he was also collaborating with BROCKHAMPTON at the time didn\u2019t hurt either.) \u201cI had to make one thing in order to make the next album, and the next one and now Sweet Fortune. It\u2019s like, everything for a reason. It\u2019s clich\u00e9, but it\u2019s true.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tBeatty says singing about gay experiences is so second nature to him that he almost forgets it\u2019s a part of who he is. \u201cIt\u2019s not that I don\u2019t think about it, but I get messages all the time where people are like, \u2018Where I\u2019m from, I can\u2019t be myself, and hearing your music or living with your art allows me to feel these things.\u2019 That means a lot to me. Those are the moments where I get reminded of like, \u2018Oh, this matters to people.\u2019\u201d I mention to Beatty that it seems like there are less opportunities for gay artists than pre-pandemic days, especially considering the current political climate. \u201cYeah, it\u2019s interesting how things can slowly change; one day you look around and you\u2019re like, \u2018Things feel different.\u2019 But I agree with you. It\u2019s hard for me to answer that right now because I feel like it\u2019s something in hindsight I\u2019ll be able to notice, but you\u2019re not wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tThe first song Beatty wrote for Sweet Fortune was its title track, a duet with close friend and collaborator Clairo, who also serves as cowriter. (She later surprised the crowd and joined Beatty during his 101 set.) \u201cSweet Fortune\u201d is also the first song he wrote about his boyfriend. \u201cI think it gave me the permission of, \u2018Oh, I can sing about this person, and I can sing about my experience with this feeling in a way that feels challenging but safe and protected but exposed.\u2019 It snowballed after that,\u201d he says. \u201cIt was hard because with heartbreak, you can dress it up in a song in so many ways. But being in a current relationship, I found it more challenging for a lot of different reasons.\u201d Still, Beatty\u2019s optimism beams through, especially on lead single \u201cSecret Language,\u201d which comes complete with Beatles-esque horns which triumphantly announce themselves as the track crescendos. \u201cYou seduce what I always suppress,\u201d he sings.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\n\tNow, Beatty is dealing with a different kind of anxiety: presenting these songs for his boyfriend. \u201cIt\u2019s awkward at first,\u201d he says with a laugh. \u201cIt\u2019s not like I prefaced it with like, \u2018I wrote this thing about you or about us.\u2019 They\u2019re actually not meant to be taken literally like a diary. Sometimes it\u2019s just about a feeling that exists between us.\u201d At the same time, he\u2019s honest about the process. \u201cI take my music really seriously, so to have fun making it is rare for me. I know that sounds dramatic, but it can be really painful, and it can be really hard for so many reasons.\u201d Now, however, whether it\u2019s writing for Beyonc\u00e9 or his treatise on happiness Sweet Fortune, Beatty is learning to take his wins.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWhat I\u2019m really trying to practice is holding onto those diamonds that arrive in the palm of your hand after so much hard work.\u201d With that, there\u2019s a knock on the door. It\u2019s showtime.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s the kind of day in Manhattan where subway stations turn into saunas, the air thick with humidity…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":854432,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[49,48,75,23827,341,33829],"class_list":["post-854431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-genre-pop","tag-music","tag-pride"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854431","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=854431"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854431\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/854432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=854431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=854431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=854431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}