Q&A: Meg Smith on Being the Patron Saint of Pop and Why “Girls Just Wanna Be Famous”
INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
☆ BY JOY VILLANUEVA ☆
Photo By Danica Robertson
MEG SMITH IS BACK WITH HER LATEST SINGLE—“Girls Just Wanna Be Famous,”—a shiny, heavily addictive track that plays with the thrill of chasing the spotlight. The release follows her debut album, The Gospel According to Meg Smith, which landed last fall and introduced the world to her unique universe.
Known for her signature pink roots and theatrical flair, Smith merges intense, confessional lyrics with pop glam in a way that feels refreshing. With viral TikTok videos including her singing in angel wings and having her music featured on the Netflix television series “Ginny & Georgia,” it serves as a truth that Smith’s work captures all of girlhood and heartbreak with grace.
We had the chance to interview Smith about the inspiration behind “Girls Just Wanna Be Famous,” her unique visuals, and what it means to be the self-proclaimed “patron saint of pop music.” Read below!
Photo By Danica Robertson
LUNA: I first saw you on TikTok and was immediately intrigued by the videos you post—singing your songs and running around New York City in your angel wings. How do you come up with these visuals, and what do they mean for how you connect with your fans and your music?
SMITH: Oh my God, what a good question. I feel like, for every artist, social media is the bane of our existence. It’s amazing, fun, and a great tool. People find me through Instagram and TikTok, which is incredible. But at the same time, there’s so much pressure to constantly stand out, and also to copy trends and mimic what’s working.
This is the first time I’ve really gone all in on more professional-looking content. I didn’t know if it was going to work, but I realized I was running out of ideas for what I could do just sitting in my room. And I love making music videos—as stressful as they can be—and doing silly things on stage, but that doesn’t always translate to the videos I make at home.
A lot of what I’ve been doing now has to do with my neighbor, Patrick, who lives below me in my apartment in New York. He makes the videos with me. Most of the time, it’s us in the moment, like, “Okay, that looks cool—should we try it?” Some of it is planned, but a lot of it isn’t. It’s just us walking around the city and figuring it out as we go.
LUNA: Your album The Gospel According to Meg Smith blends religious imagery with pop culture in a playful yet profound way. You’ve mentioned that the concept emerged organically from your earlier single “jesus christ in a mini skirt.” Can you walk us through how this thematic evolution shaped the album's sound and visuals?
SMITH: Yeah, I think for me, it’s happening in a similar way with the project I’m working on now. It always starts with a lot of writing and experimenting. I try not to put too many restrictions on it—I don’t go into a project with a very specific idea of what it’s going to look like, because it’s always going to change.
With The Gospel According to Meg Smith, it started when I wrote “jesus christ in a mini skirt,” and that song really resonated. I just kept releasing music without knowing if there was going to be a full project or what it would end up being.
Eventually, I looked at all the songs I’d written and realized, Oh, I actually reference God a lot—not in a super serious way, but it was definitely a theme. There’s “jesus christ in a mini skirt,” and then I had the idea to write a song called “blasphemy!” and we also had one called “poltergeist.”
It all just kind of showed up without me trying too hard, which made it really easy in the best way. From there, I started playing with visuals. My sister is a costume designer, so we explored how we could reference religious imagery through my clothing. I dressed as an angel for the first time and loved how the photos looked on stage—I thought, I should do this all the time.
None of it was super planned out, but it ended up working in a really fun way. I wish I could say I went into it thinking it was going to be a full concept album, but it really wasn’t. I just tend to rely on these metaphors in my music, and the project came together without me overthinking it.
LUNA: Your lyrics often feel like they’re coming straight from the inside of a diary. Is there a line from one of your songs that scared you a little to share?
SMITH: All the time. Constantly. With “jesus christ in a mini skirt” and the lyric “I want to kill your dad,” I remember thinking, People are going to think I’m insane. Like, They’re going to think I’m completely nuts. That was definitely one of those moments.
And with this new project, I think I’m pushing it even more. It’s funny, because I’ve found that the lyrics I’m most embarrassed to say out loud in a songwriting session usually end up being the ones I’m most proud of when the song comes out.
Even a song like “Joni”—that one felt like a diary entry. There’s something really scary about being that vulnerable, especially with a song like that, where I worried, Are people going to think I hate women? Just because I didn’t like this one girl? I kept asking myself, Are people going to understand what I’m actually trying to say here?
LUNA: You’ve mentioned Chappell Roan as a huge inspiration—another artist with a super glam, high-drama pop persona. How has her work influenced the world you’re building with your own?
SMITH: I think there’s an element to Chappell Roan that made me feel like I was allowed to do things I had always wanted to do. For a really long time, I used to straighten my hair when I performed. I didn’t really like wearing my hair naturally curly on stage. I’ve been following Chappell forever, and I remember seeing her perform with her natural curls. I thought, Oh, that looks really cool, and it made me realize—I can do that too. That’s what Chappell has done for a lot of artists. You feel this sense of freedom, knowing that your silly ideas can actually resonate.
I grew up on a lot of Taylor Swift and other emotional singer-songwriters with guitars, which I still love—and that’s how I started. But now, it’s fun to feel free to look at the other artists I love and take little pieces of what they’re doing.
I love Electric Light Orchestra, ABBA, Queen, Supertramp—all these ‘70s artists I’ve always adored—but for a long time, I didn’t feel like I could really pull from them because I didn’t think it would “work,” if that makes sense. Now, I feel like I have more freedom to play, and that’s the whole point of being an artist.
LUNA: Your music being featured on “Ginny & Georgia” introduced it to a whole new audience. What was it like to hear your song on screen for the first time, and did it change how you see your work?
SMITH: It was really weird—one of those things that just happened totally randomly. I think it came about because I’m friends with someone who knows some of the actors on the show. He was playing my music, and someone heard it by chance. I remember coming home from my day job, turning on Netflix, and hearing my song—it was such a strange moment. It’s a very weird feeling to have something that exciting happen, and then still have to get up and go to work the next morning. It’s really cool, but also kind of surreal.
I always try to make music without thinking too much about how it’s going to be received—just making things that I genuinely like. But I’ve always wanted my music to feel cinematic, like it could be in a movie. That’s one of the reasons I love making music videos—it feels like getting to make little movies of my own.
LUNA: Titles like “jesus christ in a mini skirt” and “Rom Com Pop” are so bold and specific. How do you approach naming your songs—does the title usually come first or last?
SMITH: I start a lot with the title and then work backwards.
With the way playlisting works now, and how competitive it feels to get your song noticed, I knew I wanted the titles to stand out. So a lot of times in sessions, when we’re naming a song, I’ll ask, “If you were scrolling through new music friday and only looking at titles, which one would make you want to press play?” That’s how it was with “jesus christ in a mini skirt”—I was like, I’d probably click on that just to find out what it is.
Even “Girls Just Want To Be Famous” started with just the title. I came into the session with that and a loose concept, and we built the song around it. Same with “emotional affair” and “blasphemy!”—a lot of my songs start with the title, and then I fill in the blanks from there.
LUNA: The pink roots have become a signature for you. What made you choose that look, and what does it symbolize for you now?
SMITH: The pink roots actually came from an Instagram comment. Someone was like, “You should dye your roots pink,” and I was like, “Wait, can I do that? I didn’t even know that was a thing.”
Honestly, a lot of the past year has been me making these little physical changes to look more like a pop star. First I bleached my hair. Then I bleached my eyebrows. Then I did the pink roots. Then I started dressing up as an angel. I think part of it is that I like the idea of always looking like a pop star—like at all times. And also, I’ve always loved the idea of having physical traits that are kind of iconic. My dream is to be a Halloween costume someday—the more I can make myself look like a Halloween costume, the better.
Photo By Danica Robertson
LUNA: You’ve called yourself the “patron saint of pop music”—which is iconic, by the way. What does that title mean to you, and how do you live it out in your music or performances?
SMITH: Well, I can’t take credit for that—that came from my friend Nancy who’s a writer. I told her, “I really want to make myself into a patron saint,” and she was like, “Oh, you’re the patron saint of pop music.” And I was like, “That’s brilliant.”
As for how I take that into my life, I think a lot of it comes down to confidence. In my personal life, I’m actually pretty shy and more introverted. At a party, I’m not the party animal—I don’t really go out, I’m kind of a homebody. I have a small group of friends, and I’m definitely not the biggest personality in the room.
But when I’m on stage, I get to be this totally different person. I get to be confident and silly and … whatever the opposite of embarrassed is. I get to be unabashedly myself.
So calling myself the “patron saint of pop music” is so ridiculous, but also so fun. And I think that’s the energy I want people to take away from my music. It’s a little over-the-top, a little absurd—but it’s also a lot of fun.
LUNA: “Girls Just Wanna Be Famous” instantly feels like both a wink and a warning. What’s a personal moment or memory that sparked the idea for the song?
SMITH: The song is really about my mom. She was a professional dancer, and I grew up hearing so many stories about her dance career. Some were really silly and fun, and others were honestly kind of scary. My mom’s older, so she was dancing in the 1970s, and it was pretty brutal back then.
Two things stand out: first, dance was her way out of a tiny town she grew up in. It gave her a chance to see the world. But also—and I think she’d agree with me on this—I don’t think she ever felt like she reached the level of success she really wanted. She never made it big. She never got to star in a lead role or anything like that. Most of her work was as a backup dancer or in smaller, regional theater productions. So I think it was really special to have a mom who supported my artistic goals and believed in me—but at the same time, she didn’t really know how the music industry worked. She had no idea what this world was going to look like for me.
The song really started from thinking about her. I think it’s such a classic story: young women wanting to leave their small town and make it big. It’s Marilyn Monroe, it’s my mom—it’s every famous actress ever. And when I wrote “Girls Just Wanna Be Famous,” I was still working my day job. I was constantly questioning why I was doing this.
A year before, I was working 50 hours a week as a nanny—just alone with a baby all day. I’d call out “sick” to squeeze in songwriting sessions or film music videos on the weekends. It’s an expensive career, and I was putting all my money into it. And there’s so much rejection. You’re constantly being told no. That it’s not good enough. There were definitely moments where I was like, what the f*ck am I doing? And that’s kind of what made me laugh and say, okay, why am I doing this? Well … girls just want to be famous.
LUNA: You play with pop iconography and glamor in such clever, layered ways. What does the word “famous” mean to you right now—as an artist, and as a person?
SMITH: I think fame can mean a lot of different things. For me right now, it’s really about having a community around what I’m doing.
I don’t need to be the person who walks down the street and has paparazzi following me. But I do want to be able to play a small show and feel that connection with the people who show up—even if it’s just 10 people. Right now, it’s all about community for me.
LUNA: Your songs explore girlhood, performance, and heartbreak with so much style and care. What do you hope your listeners—especially young women—take away from this chapter of your music?
SMITH: I think the songs I love the most are the ones where I hear a lyric and I’m like, oh my God, someone else feels that. Those lyrics are the most exciting and important ones to write, for me as an artist and as a fan of other people’s music.
It means a lot when I say something like “I could be jesus christ in a mini skirt and he still wants her,” and people get that. And I’m like, okay, I’m not insane. It makes me feel less crazy.
I want other people to feel that too. It means so much when you see an artist you can see yourself in—someone who understands that part of you that doesn’t always feel seen. I want people to take that away from my music. That’s the goal, always. It means the world when people come up to me after shows and say my songs helped them get through a breakup or a friendship ending. Those are the moments that matter. The song that’s playing when you’re sobbing in the car after a breakup—those songs mean the most. If I can be part of someone’s soundtrack for those big moments, that’s everything to me.
LUNA: Is there anything else you’d like to share with Luna?
SMITH: I think my goal for this next project is just to have fun and be silly and get people to dance. So have fun, be silly, and dance!
