Nessa Barrett

Nessa Barrett is a singer/songwriter with a flair for heartfelt, unguarded alternative pop and a social media star with millions of followers on multiple platforms. Her yearning 2020 single “Pain” introduced her vulnerable style, which she expanded on with that year’s “if u love me” and 2021′s charting collaboration with Jxdn, “La Di Die.” All of this led up to the release of her debut EP, 2021′s Pretty Poison, followed in 2022 by her first full-length, young forever. Follow-up singles like “Bang Bang!” and “American Jesus” kept up her visibility in 2023.
Barrett started posting lifestyle, dance, music, and comedy videos, including lip-syncs, as a high school student in 2019. By early 2020, she had gone viral, signed with a management agency, and quickly became a top performer. She decided that music was her main ambition, relocated from her family’s home in New Jersey to Los Angeles, and made her Warner debut with the yearning ballad “Pain” in July 2020. Barrett followed it three months later with “if u love me,” which also garnered millions of streams. Her third single, “La Di Die” featuring singer/rapper Jxdn, debuted in the Top 50 in Ireland in early 2021 and became an alternative and Top 40 radio hit in the U.S. Buoyed by the Hot 100 single “I Hope Ur Miserable Until Ur Dead,” Barrett hit number four on Billboard’s Heatseekers chart with her debut EP, Pretty Poison, which arrived in September 2021. The non-album single “Dying on the Inside” landed on the Billboard rock chart in early 2022, as did “Die First,” the lead single from Barrett’s full-length debut, that October’s young forever. It explored topics like loss, bullying, and mental health challenges and made it to number 80 on the Billboard 200. During the front half of 2023, Barrett continued issuing non-album singles like the revved-up “Bang Bang!” and the torchy “American Jesus” which made the Hot Rock & Alternative Song chart. ~ Heather Phares & Marcy Donelson