Lorde has tremendous poise for a 17-year-old—but she admits that holding it all together isn't always easy.
"I get paralyzingly nervous a lot of times, so I tried bravado," the "Royals" singer, pulling that from the "me found bravery in my bravado" line from Kanye West's "Dark Fantasy," says in the latest issue of Rolling Stone.
The New Zealand-born beauty, whose real name is Ella Yelich-O'Connor, also makes her RS cover debut in goth-dark lipstick and a nod at punk rock via a Cramps T-shirt.
"The way I dress and carry myself, a lot of people find it intimidating," Lorde says. "I think my whole career can be boiled down to the one word I always say in meetings: strength."
So the Pure Heroine artist is well aware of the way she comes off, at least—confident enough to blog fearlessly about Taylor Swift, Selena Gomez and other well-established pop stars about whom Lorde just happened to have an opinion.
While the rest of her interview is out Friday, RS promises a text exchange with Taylor (despite the seemingly inauspicious start, they now hang out like besties), the racially charged Twitter nastiness aimed at her boyfriend after they were photographed frolicking on the beach together and, of course, her rapid rise to international stardom.
Lorde will have to muster up all of that bravado by Jan. 26, when she's slated to perform at the 56th Annual Grammy Awards. She also happens to be in the running for four Grammys: Pure Heroine is up for Best Pop Vocal Album and "Royals" is nominated for Song of the Year, Record of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance.