If you’re anything like me, you’ve heard bits and pieces of CupcakKe’s music over the years through Tik Tok audios and viral remixes. Or maybe you hadn’t heard of CupcakKe at all, in which case, I beg you to immediately listen to the Misery x CPR x Reese’s Puffs remix on YouTube, which overlays CupcakKe’s “CPR” with “Misery” by Maroon 5 and the audio from a 2009 Reese’s Puffs cereal commercial. These remixes are hilarious, oddly satisfying and cemented in internet history forever, speaking to the versatility of Cupcakke’s music.
CupcakKe was born Elizabeth Eden Harris in 1997, and grew up in Chicago, Illinois. Her childhood in Chicago was challenging. She was raised by a single mother and spent nearly four years in Chicago’s homeless shelters, but eventually found comfort in music and writing. In an interview in 2016, she stated, “‘Writing is … my friend. It’s family. I know it’s just words, but it’s something close to me. That’s how I look at it.’”
She first started writing and performing poetry at her local church, and later shifted to writing rap verses after being encouraged to do so by a fellow member of her church. Her music is most known for its unabashed female sexuality, though she expressed in the same interview that her music encompasses a wide range of themes, from sex to her struggle with depression to autobiographical accounts of being molested by her abusive father and growing up on Chicago’s South Side.
Before CupcakKe was announced as the LDOC artist, I mostly only knew her through the remixes of her hit songs that had gone viral on the internet. Like a good Wellesley student, I set out to study up on her music. With help from some friends who love CupcakKe and have seen her perform, I’ve created a list of Cupcakke songs to listen to before the LDOC concert:
- LGBT
- CPR
- Deepthroat
- Squidward Nose
- Grilling N****
- Spider-Man D***
- Crayons
CupcakKe will be performing in Munger Meadow next Wednesday, May 1 at 7:00 p.m., and I’m looking forward to a concert that is fun, energetic and unapologetically herself.
