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Billie Eilish Pirate Baird O’Connell born December 18, 2001) is an American singer-songwriter and musician.

She first gained public attention in 2015 with her debut single “Ocean Eyes“, written and produced by her brother Finneas O’Connell, with whom she collaborates on music and live shows. In 2017, she released her debut extended play (EP), Don’t Smile at Me. Commercially successful, it reached the top 15 of record charts in numerous countries, including the US, UK, Canada, and Australia.

Eilish grew up listening to the Beatles, Justin Bieber, Green Day, the 1975, Arctic Monkeys, Linkin Park and Lana Del Rey. She has said that stumbling upon Aurora‘s “Runaway” on YouTube inspired her to pursue a music career. Hip hop is her favorite genre and biggest inspiration. She has recounted that Matty Healy was an early inspiration for her: “His show is the second show I ever went to in my life. He changed so much about who I am, how I write music.” She has also cited Tyler, the Creator, Childish Gambino, and Avril Lavigne as major musical and style influences.

Other influences include Adele, Earl Sweatshirt, James Blake, Amy Winehouse, the Spice Girls, Lorde, Marina, Britney Spears, Taylor Swift, Nicki Minaj, XXXTentacion, and Twenty One Pilots. She has also shown appreciation for Paramore after inviting Hayley Williams to join her set during Williams’s first Coachella set to perform an acoustic version of “Misery Business” and sing “Happier Than Ever”.Eilish also named Rihanna as an inspiration for her style choices after she called fashion her “defense mechanism” during an acceptance speech. She has also credited Damon Albarn for changing the way she views art and music creation.

Eilish has been compared in the media to Lavigne, Lorde and Del Rey, the last of whom she says she does not want to be compared to, saying, “That woman has made her brand so perfect for her whole career and she shouldn’t have to hear that.” Eilish said that Ariana Grande‘s 2019 album Thank U, Next inspired her to continue making music. Eilish has received numerous awards, including nine Grammy Awards, three American Music Awards, five MTV Europe Music Awards, six MTV Video Music Awards, two Academy Awards, nineteen Guinness World Records,[231][232] four Brit Awards, and three Billboard Music Awards.

She has appeared on several lists, such as Rolling Stone‘s 2023 revision of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time and Time‘s 2019 “Time 100 Next” list. She is the youngest person, second person ever, and first female artist to win the four main Grammy categories—Best New Artist, Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Album of the Year—in the same year.

In 2022, Eilish won the Academy Award for Best Original Song for “No Time to Die” from the James Bond film No Time to Die, becoming the first person born in the 21st century ever to win an Academy Award in any category, and she remains the only. With her win in the same category in 2024 for “What Was I Made For?” from Barbie (2023), she became the youngest person ever to win two Academy Awards in any category and the song became the tenth song in history to win both an Academy Award for Best Original Song and a Grammy Award for Song of the Year.

Much of the media attention surrounding Eilish has revolved around her fashion style, which consists primarily of baggy, oversized clothing. In 2017, she said she likes dressing out of her comfort zone to feel like she grabs the attention of everyone around her. She tries to be “really different from a lot of people” and dresses opposite to what others wear. Aiming to “look memorable”, Eilish said that she “proved to people that [she’s] more important than they think” and likes being “kind of intimidating, so people will listen up”.

In 2019, she said: “Over time it’s kind of become a thing, ‘Billie Eilish, the creepy, weird, scary girl.’ And I don’t like that. It’s lame. I just don’t want to stay one thing.”