The Tragic, Real-Life Story Of Poppy

Who is Poppy? It seems like no one has the same answer. The Guardian hailed the singer as a "disturbing internet meme" vying to become a "pop sensation." NPR labeled her "part bubblegum pop star, part performance artist" and possibly "part robot." New York magazine claimed she might just be the modern Andy Warhol, but still wondered, "Is she a robot, a troll, a high-concept art project, a postmodern cultural critique, a cult leader, a clever satirist? Do I get the joke? Is there a joke?"

Only one thing is clear: the YouTuber-turned-singer makes a sport out of mystery and reinvention, whether she's hiding her YouTube subscriber count (despite racking up nearly half a billion views), co-opting just enough "satanic and Illuminati symbolism" to launch a thousand internet conspiracy theories, or starting her own (now-defunct) religion.

Just as fans think they've nailed down exactly who Poppy is, she becomes something else entirely. This time around, after cutting ties with long-term creative partner Titanic Sinclair and releasing her third studio album, I Disagree— a shocking, metal-soaked full-length that somehow pays homage to both the Beach Boys and Marilyn Manson — that something might just be human. This is the tragic story of the real-life woman behind the YouTube persona, who's just starting to take off her platinum wig.

Biography

Does Poppy even exist outside of the internet?

According to New York magazine, "Poppy prefers that you not imagine her as a person who existed before her digital public life," which started in 2014 when the very first Poppy-branded video hit YouTube. After all, Poppy's close friend — a vaguely depressed basil plant — probably won't be the one uttering her darkest secrets. But hiding an entire past life from the internet is a Herculean task. Her team went through extraordinary lengths trying to erase all evidence of the star's life outside of the singer-slash-possible android, but in recent years, she's started to lift the veil.

A quick Google search reveals that the star's actual name is Moriah Pereira, and — shocker — she's no android. Before Pereira became Poppy, she was a brunette who launched her career by doing YouTube covers of popular songs like leagues of other YouTubers before her. In a 2019 NME profile, the star publicly broke her character for the very first time and admitted that she was raised in Nashville, which she describes as having a "small town feeling," and spent a lot of time alone in her bedroom before moving to Los Angeles to pursue her career. Today, she owns a Sphynx cat named Pi to keep her company (at least when he's not being the "demon man of [her] home").

Poppy was bullied in public school

Poppy's childhood wasn't all that different from her character, who's known for sitting alone in a stark white room musing about the internet. In her 2019 NME profile, the singer admitted that she "would intentionally isolate [herself] from a lot of things" when she was younger. This included public school, where she was bullied for "being skinny and quiet."

"I didn't have a positive experience [at public school]," she told NME. "I barely said any words, so that kind of opened me up, in a way, to be the target of everyone's teasing." Poppy ultimately withdrew from public school and enrolled in home school, but she wasn't taught by her parents in any sort of social environment. The singer primarily studied alone in her bedroom using the internet to help her learn everything she needed to know. "The internet was my teacher," Poppy explained in the one single statement that sums up her entire career trajectory. In case you had any doubts about the artist's true genius, she also finished her studies early.