Joanna “JoJo” Levesque found support in her fellow female singers during a rough patch in her life.
Levesque, 33, opens up about her personal and professional life in her new memoir, Over the Influence, out Tuesday, September 17. In an excerpt shared by People on Friday, September 13, she recalls Selena Gomez bringing her to a Galentine’s Day party hosted by Taylor Swift.
“Taylor had this arts and crafts section set up where we took pictures of ourselves and slapped them on this cute questionnaire where we described our best qualities (and our worst ones), the things we were looking for in a guy, and the reasons why we were currently single,” Levesque wrote. “I snuck outside to the In-N-Out truck on her lawn to grab a burger, fries and Diet Coke, but also went out there to text the guy I’d been obsessing over at the time.”
Levesque called Swift’s “girl’s night” the “best possible distraction from the complete unavailability of this f—boy,” and noted how her friendly interactions with Swift, now 34, and Gomez, now 32, were uncommon to female pop stars of the past.
“Earlier in my career, I’d been conditioned to keep girls like Selena and Taylor close but never let them really know what I was doing, going through or thinking. To be ‘strategic.’ But I wasn’t,” she explained. “I sometimes wished I could be, but I simply liked who I liked and didn’t like who I didn’t like. … I genuinely enjoyed these girls, and although two of them were among the most famous women in the world, we had the shared experience of starting out very young, and I was happy to be let into the fold, part of a group.”
In addition to staying up late eating “copious amounts of French fries” with the Galentine’s Day group, Levesque said Swift had shared some kind words about the predicaments she was facing in her career. (Levesque was unable to release new music for several years due to complications with a contract she signed with Blackground Records when she was 12 years old. She later launched her own imprint, Clover Music, with Warner Records in 2017.)
“Taylor was so sweet and complimentary, and she seemed excited that Selena had brought me along with her. She mentioned deepcut songs of mine she loved and kept saying how f—ed up the lawsuit was, the fact that I couldn’t put out music,” Levesque said of Swift. “I don’t remember if she already knew what was going on from social media or if I’d told her about the situation, but she was — in no uncertain terms — letting me know she was on my side and believed in me.”
Despite Swift’s sentiments, the “Leave (Get Out)” singer also questioned whether the other party attendees felt bad for her. “Maybe they thought I was never going to get out of this limbo. Or that it was too late for me even if I did,” she wrote. “Maybe they could tell I didn’t have the money or the parents who could help dig me out of any holes I might find myself in. Maybe they saw the imposter in my eyes. Then again, perhaps that was all my own projection.”
Levesque released her most recent album, trying not to think about it, in 2021. In recent years, she has put out several singles, a 2020 Christmas album titled December Baby and starred in Moulin Rouge on Broadway. She previously got engaged to actor Dexter Darden in December 2021, but the pair reportedly called it quits a year later.
