A hot night out eventually reaches the point where dignity becomes optional and carbs become urgent. I’ve been the girl standing in a bodega at 4 a.m. with my heels in one hand and somebody’s hickey blooming on my neck while I waited for melted cheese to save my life. The man responsible for that “I’ve been slutty” mark had already disappeared, which was fine because the sandwich was proving considerably more dependable. That particular combination of hot and fucking ridiculous is all over NOVUL’s Grilled Cheese. She treats sex appeal like something you can wear while doing dumb shit with your friends, preferably after last call. Nobody needs to look mysterious with melted cheese running down their chin like they just gave a blowjob to a nacho dispenser. Sometimes the hotter move is knowing you look incredible anyway.
Producer NASHUP – the solo moniker of Hot Chelle Rae’s Nash Overstreet – wraps the whole stupidly hot mess in sexy dance-pop that sounds built for sweaty bodies and one more drink before somebody gives an Uber driver a smoke show. The electro-pop pulse keeps pushing forward while NOVUL treats glamour like something you can drag through a 4 a.m. bodega and still wear home. She has built a visual world around Grilled Cheese where looking expensive and acting ridiculous belong in the same outfit. That confidence is what keeps the joke sexy. Nobody here is embarrassed, and thank fuck for that.
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NOVUL walks into the bodega like she owns the fucking place, which makes “LA / At bodegas / 21 flavors / Bite my grill cheese / je suis une star / Salut, je m’appelle… et toi ?” feel less like an introduction and more like somebody announcing the afterparty has followed her inside. The French translates to “I’m a star / Hi, my name is… and you?” which is an incredible attitude to bring into a convenience store. NOVUL is already famous in her own head and everybody else can catch the fuck up. The chopped-up images feel like memories from a night that stayed out several hours past coherent storytelling. I know that camera roll. Half the photos are blurry and one of them definitely needs to die before brunch.
The night gets filthier once the hickeys become part of the outfit and NOVUL starts wearing last night’s evidence like jewelry: “Hickeys on my neck / Im so iconic / Whiskey on my breath I know they want it.” This woman is wearing the evidence and calling it accessories. Preach, bitch. A hickey is usually treated like something you cover before work, but she is basically giving hers press credentials. Then “I’m collecting LA models / With the bottles / And my heels on full throttle” makes the night sound wonderfully excessive. She is not standing against the wall hoping somebody cute notices her. She is collecting them.
Pretty privilege finally picks up the tab when NOVUL goes “Everybody at the bar gets / Everybody at the bar gets / Everybody at the bar gets / Hot girls don’t buy / drinks” and she sounds fully aware somebody nearby is already reaching for a credit card. I have watched this economy function in real time. Sometimes you spend twenty minutes doing your makeup and the universe reimburses you in vodka sodas. NOVUL turns that little nightlife transaction into a hook and never bothers pretending the arrangement is noble. She looks hot. Somebody wants her attention. The tab sorts itself out.
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Any remaining adult supervision disappears when NOVUL admits “We be doing dumb shit / gotta taste and i liked it / I’m too shiny to be crying / Purple pills got me flyinggggg,” which sounds about right for a night already running on free drinks and questionable impulse control. “I’m too shiny to be crying” deserves permanent residence in the Laurelanne group chat because that is emotional triage I can fucking understand. Tears can wait when the highlighter is behaving. She follows it with “Get your card out / And ready for payment / All of my girls / gettin naked an famous,” which takes the girls-night fantasy somewhere much less polite. Clothing is apparently becoming optional while somebody else picks up the bill. God bless Los Angeles.
NOVUL is Sammantha Novlan, a French-Canadian girl from Saskatchewan who somehow ended up making filthy little electro-pop fantasies in Los Angeles, which feels like one hell of a geographic glow-up. She has been performing since childhood and trained as a dancer early, so the fact that her pop career now looks like somebody gave a hot girl a camera crew and told her to cause problems tracks beautifully. She has already taken that energy onto stages with AQUA and Pride crowds, while songs like Hot Girls Don’t Buy Drinks make her relationship with nightlife pretty fucking clear. Even the French in Grilled Cheese comes from somewhere real. She gets to say “je suis une star” because apparently being bilingual makes hot-girl nonsense sound even more expensive.
My own 4 a.m. grilled cheese tasted incredible although the bodega lighting did absolutely nothing for the hickey. I remember standing there barefoot and still feeling hot as hell because some nights your dignity and your sex appeal simply stop being related. NOVUL understands that distinction. Grilled Cheese lets the club girl survive sunrise without suddenly becoming tasteful or reflective. She can have whiskey on her breath and cheese in her mouth while somebody else reaches for the credit card. Frankly, that sounds like breakfast.
