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Picture it: it’s 30 March 2018 and after three years of nervous anticipation, all of the Sapphics over at Queer Landia – the lesbians, bisexuals, pansexuals and all of the wonderfully queer women-loving-women see their Messiah, Lesbian Jesus arriving with the keys of their salvation in her hands in the form of a 13 tracked LP titled ❝Expectations.❞
Although one would expect the coming of a Messiah to be a most glamorous affair: rolling clouds, thunder, lightning and singing angels I think the arriving of this particular Messiah would probably be in a vintage car speeding down an abandoned road and instead of pure white robes, she’d probably be dressed in a colourful tropic shirt or something equally colourful and aesthetic.
This was the experience I had on Twitter on the day American-Japanese singer, songwriter and actress Hayley Kiyoko released Expectations. Her fans have affectionately dubbed her “Lesbian Jesus” and passionately claim that she’s come to deliver them all from heterosexual music. The energy online was almost palpable and people within the LGBT spectrum from all corners of the world convened to celebrate this momentous experience with each other and with Hayley herself.
Expectations ranked at an impressive #12 on the Billboard 200 Chart upon the week of its debut. It is a pop album with various categories of it: pop-dance, pop-rock etcetera and features Hayely’s distinct tropical vibe with her soft, whimsical tones. It was named after Hayley’s “biggest strengths and weaknesses”
I specially dedicated time to listen to this album so I can deliver this post with as much accuracy as is possible. I could go into great lengths about the importance this album has on contemporary society for members of the LGBT community, because it really is a no-brainier: an entire album with experiences especially linked to girl-on-girl relationships by a queer artist for a queer audience in such a hetero-dominated industry? Give the girl a medal! But for this particular post, I’d like to be selfish and discuss the impact this album had on me as an individual.
Expectations is everything I wish I’d had while I was growing into the person I've come to be.
Every time I listen to this album, I’m transported to another world, to time where I was barely shy of fourteen years old and I was infatuated with a girl for the first time.
It was a new and exciting venture. At the time, I was terribly a romantic-at-heart so the idea of love entranced me. I was more enamoured with the experience of being in love for the first time too much to be freaked out with the fact that it was with a girl and that she was a close friend.
Hayley’s tropical musical undertones throughout the entire album make me feel younger, lighter, unburdened, wide-eyed and curious to the world ahead of me. The album sounds like what I imagine the soundtrack to a story about young love would sound like and I absolutely adore it.
There are a few songs in particular that tie into my experience almost to a niche: Sleepover, Wanna Be Missed and Mercy/Gatekeeper.
Sleepover brings an almost melancholic nostalgia to me because I think of what it felt like to have deep feelings for this one girl and not being able to express on these feelings or have them reciprocated because the girl was painfully and irredeemably heterosexual and a close friend.
I’m sure many a man knows what it is like to be in love with one’s friend and not have their feelings returned but I can bet every single woman-loving-woman on this planet has their own detailed novel of what their experience of falling for a straight best friend was. It is so common that one has to ask the question, “are you even gay if you haven’t fallen for your straight best friend?”
All jokes aside, its a particularly torturous feeling especially because when it comes to girls, we tend to have very intense bonds to our best friends, heterosexual or not. To have the girl of your dreams constantly tell you that she loves you more than anything in the world and that you’re practically her soulmate and she hugs and cuddles you at every opportunity is a slow-burning suicide.
You especially want to set yourself on fire when she drops the famous ‘I hope we’ll be friends forever and ever.’
So when Hayley sings : ❝ even when you’re next to me, its not the way i’m picturing/ you will never understand even when you hold my hand ❞ thirteen year-old me jumps up and screams “YES OH MY GOD, YES!”
Wanna Be Missed gives me light-hearted emotions and it reminds me of all the days and nights I spent imagining what it would be like to have my first girlfriend.
I had such rose-coloured ideas of relationships at the time and the notion of an all-consuming love where we both couldn’t get enough of each other set my heart on fire. I dreamed of having someone I could share all of the secrets of my soul to.
❝ i wanna be missed, like every night, i wanna be kissed like it's the last time / say you can’t eat, can't sleep, can’t breathe without me./ i wanna be held fragile like glass ❞
Sometimes I wish I’d never grown up, I wish I could still believe in the magic of first love and I guess that when I listen to this song, for those three minutes and fifteen seconds, I’m taken back to my idyllic and naive notions of love and I feel young, unburdened and unspoiled.
Mercy/Gatekeeper is my absolute favourite in this entire album and it is the song that evokes the strongest of emotions within me. It transports me to the time of my first heart break – although not at the uncomfortable, heart-cramping way most love-angst songs do. Rather, it reminds me of what it was like to want to crave escape.
I was so obsessed with running to places untrodden, driving away to hilltops that were far removed from civilisation and the girl who was giving me chest pains. I wanted to fly high into the sky and touch the clouds and forget about everything.
Most importantly, I wanted the pain to stop. I wanted my heart to have mercy on me and to end my torture over loving someone who could never love me the same.
I’m also starkly reminded of what it was like to call one of my other friends, upset and heavy-hearted over this situation and for her to tell me it’d be okay and me knowing deep down in my soul that she had no idea because she couldn’t relate.
The lonely and sad mood of this entire song actually soothes me because I love sad, deep music. It always feels like the embrace of a lonely, kindred spirit.
❝ i call you crying because ‘cause it’s too much pain. i can tell you don’t get it cause you tell me everything will be okay/ all i want to do is cry that's all i want to do/ all i want to do is cry and bang my head until i start to fly/ bang-bang i start to fly/ just give me mercy, cause i keep on hurtin-hurtin ❞
I am so comforted by this album and it feels so good to have all of my experiences validated. It’s also absolutely amazing to not have to replace any gender pronouns because for the first time ever, the artist singing about girls and I want to cry glitter because it’s a relief and a blessing.
There are things in this album that are discussed that I’ve not experienced but I have the rest of my life to go through these angsty sagas that I am sure await me, because really, am I really gay if I’ve never messed around with a girl who doesn’t know what she wants because she’s unsure of her sexuality? (What I Need) Or one who leaves me curios as to if she’s really happy with him after she’s been with me? (Curious) Or feeling that she’s settled for a man who’ll never love her the way I did? (He'll Never Love You)
Expectations is availble for purchase/streaming on all of the major streaming sites