we love you billie! We wish you to be happy, with your friends, and family!

happy birthday number 18

NME.COM: Billie Eilish’s debut is NME’s Album Of The Year 2019. Duh. The LA teenager started the year as a cult hero and finished it as the most-talked about musician in recent times, brandishing a brand-new sound and all the makings of a true once-in-a-generation star. Thomas Smith speaks to the 17-year-old about her triumphant year, coping with fame and how she’s going to follow this one up.

Two years ago this month, NME met Billie Eilish for the first time, backstage at Brooklyn’s 280-capacity venue Baby’s All Right. Calm, collected and staggeringly cool, the then-15 year-old put the heebie-jeebies into us – barely a teenager, she already had wisdom beyond her age, and it felt abundantly clear we were meeting with a future superstar. As her ‘Don’t Smile At Me’ EP was gaining steam, we asked if she was ready for the fame coming her way. “The attention doesn’t scare me,” she said. “Nothing really scares me, to be honest.”

If her 2019 is anything to go by, every other artist should have the fear running through them. She’s entering the next decade comfortably perched on pop music’s highest throne, just like she promised on ‘You Should See Me In A Crown’. Good luck wrestling it from her.

READ FULL INTERVIEW HERE {CLICK TO GO}.

The musical collaboration between Billie Eilish and Rosalía is still in the works, it just isn’t quite finished yet, according to Rosalía herself. During an interview with Billboard at the magazine’s Women In Music event on Thursday evening, the singer gave an update about the highly anticipated project.

“We’ve been in the studio, we’re friends,” Rosalía said. “Billie, please, let’s finish that song! I love Billie, she knows it. I wish that we had more time to be in the studio… We started something, we gotta finish it.” Though it doesn’t sound like there’s any firm plan to wrap it up ASAP, at least they’re keeping the project’s energy alive. Previously, Rosalía said of the song, “Billie and I had a session together, totally independent from her other projects. We wrote with her at the piano. We created a great idea for a song and had a great time.”

Both artists have been very busy, to say the least, so it’s understandable that they haven’t had a moment to reconnect. Back in March, Eilish began the buzz around the collab when she told Billboard, “We only had one session and it was, like, right before I left for tour. And then she’s been on tour; I’ve been on tour….We’ve been busy.” She added, “I actually love the song. It’s half in Spanish — for both of us — half in English. Yeah, it’s so beautiful. I hope something happens with it. I’m sure it will. We’re both in love with it. So, I think there’s a future for it.”

Billie Eilish and Alicia Keys are taking their mutual love to a whole other level.

On December 9, when Alicia was filling in for James Corden on The Late Late Show, the two singers performed a stripped-down rendition of Billie’s breakthrough hit “ocean eyes.”

“We need some dramatic lighting,” Alicia said before unveiling her piano and kicking off the song. The duet version featured Alicia on the piano (sorry, Finneas!) and mixed both singers’ honeyed vocals to perfection, making it the collab we never knew we needed.

Back in August, Alicia posted a piano cover of the song to her IGTV. “Billie Eilish giving me all the feels … Keep shining mama, writing that truth,” she wrote back then. “I’m a super, super fan of yours — I love how you write, I love your music,” Alicia told Billie on the show.

And it turns out, the love was very much reciprocal. “I have adored you my whole life,” Billie told Alicia before sharing a throwback clip of her 12-year-old self covering Alicia’s 2001 hit “Fallin’” — also at her piano. To further commemorate the occasion, Billie also posted a few of the snippets from their respective covers on her Instagram, writing, “CRAAAAZY full circle moment… love you so much @aliciakeys thank you for everything you are, can’t believe any of this happened. you in my heart forevaaaaa.”

“You got one for me and I got one for you. We’re going to do the next one soon,” Alicia told Billie after watching the adorable clip. And you can bet we’ll take her up on that one.