Television host Conan O’Brien’s podcast might be titled Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend, but pop superstar Billie Eilish is overwhelmingly grateful for the ones she already has. In a previously released clip to tease the “Bad Guy” singer’s appearance on the show, Eilish talked about how fame has shaped the way she views the internet and internet culture. Now, with the full episode being uploaded to streaming platforms, we now know about a few other things that have changed for the songwriter since finding breakout success. The importance of strong friendship is one of those things.
Eilish’s lived reality is the exact opposite of her Swarm character, and thanks to her friend Justin Bieber, she’s been able to manage it a lot smoother. Around the one-hour mark, Eilish expressed how grateful she was to have found friendship with Bieber. While recounting her initial meeting with Bieber, she told the host just how their friendship has blossomed since then.
“I am so grateful that he’s in my life, like truly it is something I don’t even know how to explain it,” she said. “I am so so thankful for him and like the way that he was to me when I needed it, and he needed it, and we’ve talked about it a lot. He could have just said, ‘Oh cool, you’re a fan, bye,’ and that’s it.”
Eilish added, “And he’s continued to be so. He just doesn’t give up on me, and I know that sounds stupid, but it’s really true, he really makes me feel so loved and seen, and he’s always reaching out to me in the sweetest ways in the most like just comforting ways of just like ‘you’re not alone in this, I was there.’”
Bieber also found success early in his career, and Eilish shared that he was in desperate need of a friend that understood it all.
“He said something that was so heartbreaking, which was like, ‘I’m just really glad that honestly you have me to talk to about this because I actually understand, and there’s really, you know, almost nobody in the world can know what it was like except kind of you and me and a few others,’ and he was like, ‘I wish I had a me to talk to when I was starting out and doing all that and going through everything ’cause I didn’t, and I was alone.’”
Listen to the full episode below.