Anne-Marie Will Beat You at Everything, Then Write a Song About It

Friends was one of those tracks from 2018 I kept returning to even when I told myself I was done with it—a pop song so precisely constructed it functions almost as an argument, a perfectly polite and completely devastating rejection letter set to a high-gloss beat. Anne-Marie co-wrote it with Marshmello, and somewhere inside all that production craft is a songwriter who genuinely has something to say.

What I find interesting about her is the absurdity of her biography, delivered without any apparent irony. By age two she apparently already knew she wanted to be the best at everything, a commitment she formalized by enrolling in performing arts school, landing two West End roles, and then—deciding that wasn’t enough—taking up karate, which she pursued seriously enough to win two international championship titles by seventeen. She has described this drive in her own words with complete straight-facedness: I love being the best at everything I do, always. I’m very self-critical, a real perfectionist. If I’m good at something I know I can be the best at it, so I keep going—Beyoncé, Sia, Rihanna, watch out. The laugh she appends to this, reportedly very loud, suggests she might be joking. I don’t think she’s entirely joking.

The Ellesse capsule collection she put out around this period—burgundy, cream, and navy running through wide-leg trousers, crop hoodies, and padded bombers, floral details throughout because Rose is her middle name—worked because it looked like her instead of a brand’s idea of her. Clothes as self-portrait rather than endorsement deal. But the clothes were never really the point. The point is a person who decided at age two that limits were optional and has spent every year since proving herself right.