THE Kim Petras is one of our SOUND OF NOW cover stars and we are obsessed. Amazing collabs? Check. A ton of super sexy pop music alter egos? Check. The first openly trans woman to win a Grammy Award? CHECK. Listen to SlutPop queen Kim talk about her collab with Nicki Minaj, her friendship with Sam Smith and why pop should be stupid
Category
✨
PeopleTranscript
00:00 (crow cawing)
00:01 Baby me.
00:02 That song always makes me so happy.
00:04 What's up?
00:05 I'm Kim Petras and I'm doing the breakdown today
00:09 for Cosmopolitan.
00:10 Watching my own work,
00:12 I feel like I know a little bit too much about it
00:15 just because I was there
00:16 and I know all the little moments.
00:18 So I don't think I can ever really see my own work
00:21 fully objectively.
00:22 I'm really proud of some of my music videos,
00:26 some of my performances.
00:28 Some not so much, but I can always kind of appreciate
00:31 just how much I've learned
00:32 or how much I've grown since then.
00:34 So that's kind of a nice thing about watching it.
00:36 I'm nervous.
00:37 (laughs)
00:39 (upbeat music)
00:41 ♪ Tell me how do I get over you ♪
00:51 ♪ When your eyes are so specific view, yeah ♪
00:55 ♪ Falling deep into Curaçao blue ♪
00:59 ♪ And all your kisses taste like ♪
01:01 ♪ And all your kisses taste like ♪
01:03 ♪ Curaçao blue ♪
01:06 - Aw, wow.
01:09 That one to me is obviously a very strange time
01:13 because lockdown and all of that
01:15 was so isolating and weird,
01:17 but it meant so much to me
01:19 that my friends in this video all came through
01:23 and we just all kind of worked together
01:25 and made a beach video from home
01:27 and it was the sweetest thing.
01:28 It just makes me feel really grateful
01:30 for my great friends and fans and all of that
01:33 because that video project literally like saved my life
01:36 during that time, I feel like.
01:37 It was like all I could really focus on
01:39 and really took my mind off of things so much.
01:42 What a strange time.
01:44 I DM'd most people,
01:45 "Hey, I have like a beach summer song I'm releasing
01:49 and I'm making a beach at home music video
01:53 and I really appreciate it."
01:54 Or, you know, I was wondering if you would be in it
01:57 and they all came through.
01:58 COVID and quarantine impacted my music
02:00 in the way that we set up a studio in my closet.
02:04 I kind of got like a little house and invited friends over
02:08 to live with me essentially and write songs with me.
02:12 We just made all this music
02:14 and I was really, during lockdown, very inspired.
02:17 I wanted to move to Paris right before lockdown.
02:19 I was really gonna go for it
02:20 and then lockdown kind of stopped that plan
02:23 and I got stuck in LA.
02:24 I made an album that was influenced by French house music
02:27 and I feel like without lockdown,
02:28 I would have probably never done that.
02:30 I think it just opened me up to experiment with something
02:33 and put no pressure on it and be like,
02:34 "Well, it's lockdown."
02:35 I feel like I've learned a lot through it.
02:37 ♪ I've been trying to give it to you all night ♪
02:41 ♪ What's it gonna take to get you all alone ♪
02:44 ♪ Kimmy, yeah, Nicki, ready, yes, we back ♪
02:47 ♪ We throw jabs, bitch, you get dragged ♪
02:49 ♪ We be like gag, call it Kim Petty ♪
02:50 ♪ When I ride it, I ride it steady ♪
02:52 ♪ Brand new range, I just painted it pretty ♪
02:54 ♪ Ice it, transfer Queens to Beijing ♪
02:56 ♪ I'm not the one that do the imitating ♪
02:57 ♪ Puff puff pants 'cause you know we blazing ♪
02:59 ♪ When I put it on him, he say it's amazing ♪
03:01 ♪ All this cake, he don't wanna taste thing ♪
03:03 ♪ Ice and shots, get ready, they may sting ♪
03:04 Watching that, I can't not be so happy and smile.
03:08 Nicki Minaj is my favorite person.
03:11 I can't believe she was on a song of mine.
03:13 I can't believe she called me Kim Petty.
03:14 I can't believe we were next to each other.
03:17 That was such a dream come true.
03:19 Sometimes I really can't believe my life.
03:21 That was such a goal when I moved from Germany to America
03:25 and I listened to Nicki every single day
03:27 and it just gave me so much,
03:28 I'm gonna do it and I'm gonna prove to everyone
03:31 that I'm good like Nicki.
03:32 Barb for life.
03:34 "Better Off Alone" and I think in Europe
03:36 is just the end of the night song.
03:38 With my most recent albums,
03:41 I was really kind of going back to Europe
03:43 and what I grew up on and the artists that
03:46 maybe might be like a little too weird for the US.
03:49 Rave culture was like huge in Europe
03:52 and it looked like the funnest thing in the world
03:54 and I feel like like every 90s baby in Europe
03:57 during that time wanted to grow up and be a raver
03:59 or at least I did.
04:00 I just kind of revisited that with my recent two albums.
04:04 I think just to me it was kind of a return
04:08 to that 90s, 2000s like raver fantasy I've always had
04:12 and then Nicki liked it which is crazy.
04:15 A lot of the stuff I write I'm like
04:16 what if I write something for Nicki?
04:18 Favorite look from that music video?
04:20 I love the nurse at the end.
04:22 I wish we could have gotten a little more time.
04:24 My friend Seth made that one.
04:26 I was very like inspired by like an iconic
04:28 Louis Vuitton Marc Jacobs show
04:30 but I also like love a gimp suit
04:33 like it's kind of become a staple of mine.
04:35 Going full dominatrix with Nicki was kind of cool.
04:37 My face is always...
04:58 What a moment.
05:00 That's really kind of the music video and song
05:03 that's really changed my life a lot
05:04 and it means a lot to me because just Sam
05:07 like the friendship we have
05:08 I don't think I have that with many other artists.
05:12 I respect Sam so much as a writer and as a person
05:16 and as like a soul and energy
05:18 and I'm just really proud of that one.
05:20 After all the challenges it really felt kind of like
05:23 like bootcamp a little bit.
05:25 I think for both of us we were just
05:28 I think both like didn't really think the song
05:31 would be as big as it was
05:33 but you know and people got mad about us pretty quick
05:37 I think just because of kind of who we are
05:39 and what we stand for.
05:40 We kind of faced a lot of criticism right away with the song
05:43 because it kind of just separated people so much
05:46 and we kind of also I think just saw like an opportunity
05:50 to really push that conversation
05:52 and I guess that's what we both like kind of always wanted.
05:55 You know I think it's best for people to discuss art
06:00 and rather than to straight out do it.
06:02 You know I like when music or art can do that
06:05 really separate people and really start a conversation.
06:08 Having a song go viral and be really big
06:11 and see it like at the mall and stuff
06:13 was something I've never really experienced.
06:16 My like nephew knows that song you know
06:18 in school in Germany.
06:24 Stairs were so scary.
06:25 Oh my god thank you so much.
06:30 Crazy Sam I love you so much
06:35 and this song has been such an incredible incredible journey for me
06:38 and Sam has been a supporter of mine for so long.
06:42 Sam graciously wanted me to accept this award
06:46 because I'm the first transgender woman to win this award.
06:50 Yeah we won a Grammy.
06:52 You were just so nuts.
06:54 I was so nervous and just overwhelmed I think
06:58 and I kind of had decided like five minutes before
07:01 that I was gonna throw up my little speech.
07:03 Sam really had a conversation with me
07:05 was like if we by any chance like we win or anything
07:09 I want you to do the speech which was so much pressure
07:11 and I was like no please don't do that.
07:13 Like I did it and I feel like that was one of the scariest moments of my life
07:18 but also one of the coolest moments of my life.
07:19 Just being in a room full of people who kind of value and love music as much as I do
07:26 felt incredible and I can't believe that this happened.
07:29 Shaking my balls.
07:36 Baby me.
07:49 That song always makes me so happy.
07:51 The whole video was really me and like one of my best friends in life
07:56 kind of being obsessed with this like prince or king
07:59 who was afraid that his bones were glass.
08:01 Maybe it was a princess I don't know
08:03 but we like went into like a weird European fairy tale
08:07 and got really obsessed with it.
08:08 So we were like she's in her castle and she's wearing a fragile shirt
08:11 and it's very inspired by like Jean Paul Gaultier
08:14 like in like the font of it.
08:16 We'll make it orange so it kind of seems like prison-y.
08:19 There's a lot of my friends randomly casted as extras in this video.
08:24 What always like sticks out to me in this video is my little mantis friend.
08:28 Like we were like okay so I'm a princess who's afraid of her bones breaking
08:32 if she falls in love like I need like a weird sidekick that like you know
08:36 and then kind of my pet being a mantis is just really perfect.
08:40 Sometimes you just like do things that you regret later
08:44 but this one I really feel like good choices were made.
08:48 I still close my show with it and people are still obsessed with it
08:53 so that makes me so happy and performing in tiny clubs
08:58 and then now being on a big tour and performing it still feels really cool.
09:04 [Music]
09:30 It's one of my favorite things I've ever done I think.
09:32 It's really stupid too but I feel like a song about tits needs to be stupid.
09:37 I did like the Macy's Thanksgiving parade and all these kids would scream
09:41 "pre-save coconuts" because like for some reason like
09:44 the whole thing just spiraled out of control.
09:46 It was post-COVID so I just had massive tits at that point
09:50 and I missed them I really do.
09:52 We'll see them again one day.
09:54 Hansel and Gretel, Humpty and Dumpty.
09:56 Those are my pick.
09:59 Humpty and Dumpty would have been cute or just the twin.
10:02 Hot.
10:04 Thank you so much for having me Cosmo.
10:05 This was so fun.
10:07 Love you!
10:08 [Music]