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"\"Hilary Duff? Are you freaking serious? Hilary Duff was there last night? This is what dreams are made of! Was she vibing it? Was she bobbing her head?\" asks 17-year-old Ella Yelich-O'Connor, better known by her music moniker, Lorde, after I reveal that the former Disney star stood next to me during the singer's private performance the previous night. It's Grammy weekend in Los Angeles, and we're sitting on a sun-drenched West Hollywood rooftop that's perfectly juxtaposed with Ella's black-clad, neo-nineties aesthetic. She seems blithely unaware of the fact that she is the music world's current It girl and that everyone, and I mean everyone, is clamoring for her. And that her album is soon to go platinum, and that in less than 48 hours, she's not only going to perform at the Grammys, where she's nominated for four awards, but she's also going to take home two as souvenirs. Miss Yelich-O'Connor is too preoccupied with the fact that Lizzie McGuire told me between songs that she's enamored with Ella's lioness mane. \"This is the most insane thing that's ever happened to me,\" Ella exclaims, pushing back her trademark locks (which she says she hasn't cut in seven years). \"That's my childhood right there. Hilary Duff is a fan\u2014that freaks me out!\"\n\nWhile the world is quick to label this wise-beyond-her-years songstress as a gothic, moody punk girl, it's clear she is also (if you can believe it) a well-adjusted, non-jaded everyday teen. \"There are a lot of expectations in this industry about looking a certain way and having a certain kind of appeal,\" she says. \"I am feminine, but I really love dressing in boys' clothes too. I guess that's why I get labeled as 'the grumpy girl,' because I don't play into that.\" Such self-awareness, humility, and, yes, even awkwardness are usually seen as a PR nightmare, but they've proven to be the very things that set Lorde apart from other breakout artists. \"Believe me, it's not lost on me. This time last year, I had never put new music out,\" she says with a smirk, as if she, of all people, is most surprised by her sudden household-name status.\n\nI first saw Lorde last summer at an intimate concert in a modest Manhattan basement club near New York University. It was Ella's first trip to America, really her first trip anywhere. The New Zealand native left her make-it-or-break-it jitters at the door and took to the stage with a nonchalant confidence\u2014and by midway through the opening song, she had fully bewitched the small crowd before her. The room chirped with support; we were already rooting for the unknown chanteuse as she sang the lyrics, \"Pretty soon I'll be getting on my first plane.\" Little did any of us know on that balmy night that she'd quickly be upgrading said plane to a rocket ship and shooting right to the top of the music industry.\n\nWhile most pop stars rely on provocative and well-calculated schoolgirl-uniformed antics or giant hot dog\u2013straddling ways to announce to the world that they've arrived, Ella put on a dark plum-colored lip and quietly sauntered up from the back of the class. She garnered critical acclaim and commercial success with her genre-bending debut album, Pure Heroine, which spawned legions of fans, ranging from the misfit teen to the frat boy to the indie snob. Everybody is welcome to hang out in Lorde's court.\n\nElla, the daughter of a renowned poet mother and a civil engineer father, grew up in an Auckland suburb as one of four kids. \"I was friends with all the boys and kind of bratty, nerdy, and quiet. I was probably really obnoxious to hang out with,\" the songstress says of her early teen years. She found an outlet in songwriting when she was just 12, and was discovered when record ecutives saw a video of her performing at a school talent show. But true adolescent boredom\u2014dreamily looking at the world from the outside and writing about it in a brave, evocative, and wry way\u2014is the root of Ella's musical success.\n\nWith her catchy global hit \"Royals\" (which she wrote a few years ago on a school holiday), she pokes fun at the excesses of fame and fortune that characterize the jet-set life. But now, with shiny accolades of her own, dibs on any straight-from-the-runway fashion, and a passport that's actually full of stamps, it's unclear whether Ella wanted life to imitate art all along. In any case, she's just trying to take it all in. \"Living in New Zealand, you don't get these experiences. I spent so much time in my room before,\" she admits. \"My life is so wild right now. For me to be able to do something I really enjoy and for that to get me out in the world\u2014to South America, to here, to London\u2014every day I kick myself, I'm so lucky.\"\n\n**To get the full scoop, pick up our May issue on newsstands April 29. And to have Teen Vogue delivered every month, subscribe here!**"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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