Imagine a stadium pulsing with the energy of tens of thousands of sports fans when a song hits, and the place erupts.

That’s the sort of song Rebecca Lucy Taylor, better known as Self Esteem, has always dreamt of writing.

“Those moments where music is used to heighten the tension,” she says.

Earlier this summer, that vision landed. A song from her new album, A Complicated Woman, scored the BBC’s opening montage for England’s Euro 2025 run. Plus, the Lionesses went on to secure the Women’s Championship title.

The song, “Focus Is Power,” builds to a soaring and defiant refrain: “I deserve to be here.” It’s a fateful selection for Taylor, amid her recent surge in success and the pressure that follows it.

A Complicated Woman comes on the heels of a breakout year for the English musician. Her 2021 album, Prioritise Pleasure, drew rave reviews and earned a 2022 Mercury Prize nomination.

“Suddenly, everyone’s listening. I was selling tickets, and I was sort of this big deal in the U.K.,” she says. “If you want to capitalize on that — and I’m being really binary and reductive — but, you have to broaden your sound.”

“Focus Is Power” is only the entry point. A Complicated Woman is irreverent and frank, built by an artist who spent years in a band where she didn’t often have full control. (Taylor split from her band, Slow Club, in 2017.)

“Self Esteem has always been like taking my bra off at the end of a long day,” she says. “I just don’t overthink it. I just do it.”

In this session, Taylor talks about making A Complicated Woman and what it feels like to take control of her career after nearly 15 years of hustle.

On working with a pop vocal producer

“I was in a band for so long with somebody else, and I just couldn’t get my way. Self Esteem has been like taking my bra off at the end of a long day. I just don’t overthink it, I just do it — the vocal delivery or the vibe.

“Actually, on this record, I tried to work with a vocal producer just out of interest, because what do all the big pop stars have when they make albums? There’s, like, specific tuning people and there’s delivery people. So I wanted to see what that was like. What happens when you have one? So I tried it, and I immediately hated it. I never did it again. …

“This goes back to pushing through for mainstream success or not because I see why a vocal coach helping you deliver in a certain way might scientifically connect with more brains. I get it. But I just can’t do it.”

On “The Curse” and sobriety

“I had the lyric — ‘If I’m sober or drunk, it’s still me in the middle of the problem’ — because I have done that. For 20 years now, I’ve gone sober. I’ve done AA. I’ve committed to it. I’ve found it more difficult. It’s hard to explain, but it created more problems than being able to moderate and just be able to do what everyone else is doing around me. Then, of course, there’s the risk it can go too far.

“Me and all my friends are the same. I have a few friends that are really successfully sober and it works for them. That’s great. I feel like we hear those stories, and we hear the stories of, like, ‘Cheers to the weekend. Let’s get effed up.’ But what most of us are practicing is trying to successfully sit in the middle.

“It’s just my truth. The more honest I am about myself, the freer I feel. … I think a lot of people have really connected to it.”

On calling the album A Complicated Woman

“I had just written down in my phone, ‘I’m such a complicated woman.’ It almost amuses me to say that because I’m not. I’m the most basic woman experiencing life like every woman with the hand I’ve been dealt, which is a pretty privileged one.

“I’m reacting perfectly reasonably to the system, but it still registers as complicated to other people. I don’t make sense. … It’s just such a useful word, but it can be weaponized. It can be used to gloss over things, instead of interrogate them. It’s a great word.

“I’ve spent so long in my life trying to be like everybody else, or this picture-perfect ending. It was like I was coming out as someone who can’t do that.”

This episode of World Cafe was produced and edited by Kimberly Junod. The web story was created by Miguel Perez. Our engineer is Chris Williams. Our programming and booking coordinator is Chelsea Johnson and our line producer is Will Loftus.