In conversation with Prima Queen: the world’s most wholesome rockstars
My sister currently lives in New Zealand. We text a lot, usually dumb updates on something nice we’ve had to eat or drink. She’s also going to Glastonbury Festival this year, so I’ll send her song recommendations and update a Glasto playlist for her as well. But if you were to read our conversations, aside from the last names on both contacts matching up, there probably wouldn’t be a whole lot to suggest that we’re related or as close as we are.
That all changes when we start speaking over the phone instead of texting. When this happens, it’s usually as one of us is tired from having been up for hours, and the other equally tired, having only just woken up. These conversations, which always involve our disgruntled mum at the centre of them, trying to get genuine information from both of us, tend to erupt in us both talking over one another, making fun of each other and generally having the same chaotic feel that we’ve always had growing up.
If you were to hear this conversation, there would be no mistaking us for siblings. There’s a comfort and familiarity in the clumsiness of our conversations that is reserved only for relatives. Or is it? Speaking with Prima Queen, I feel like my mum during one of those long-distance family video calls. Louise Macphail chats from her car in an IKEA car park, while Kristin McFadden speaks from her room, and the two laugh, joke, and cut one another off constantly in a way that feels reminiscent of siblings.
“It’s hard on Zoom, when we’re not together, to see who’s gunna speak,” says Macphail.
“Maybe we should raise our hands?” adds McFadden.
“You can go first.”
“No, no, you.”
“OK…”
If you’re ever struggling to define the word “serendipity,” use Prima Queen as an example. Born on opposite sides of the world, the two came together by chance and are now gifting the world with the music that results from their friendship. Macphail admits that meeting McFadden was akin to the feeling of falling in love at first sight, as from the moment they met, she knew they would wind up playing music together.
“I was on a songwriting course in London and Kristen joined halfway through on a study abroad,” she said. “I was tryna find people to start a band with, and then this lady came over from America. I thought, ‘I need to be in a band with her’.”
“I’m from Chicago originally,” added McFadden. “I was going to University in Ohio, but for my third year, I wanted to do something in another country, and I wanted to try something totally different. I had been to London once before, and I loved it, so I figured why not just try to live in London for a semester? That’s where I met Louise, but I came in halfway through her course. It’s kind of fate, we weren’t even supposed to be on the same course, but mine got cancelled, so I came anyway.”
“Thank god she did,” laughs Macphail. “It made me think that, like, love at first sight really does exist […] I just knew we were sort of going to be together forever. I remember calling my mum and she was like ‘Oh, you need to chill out’, I was like, ‘You don’t get it mum, I think it’s for real’.”
The two brought out the best in one another, both personally and creatively. On the first day they met, they were tasked with writing a song, and this set the foundation for the rest of their friendship, one that exists both because of a mutual adoration for one another and an even bigger adoration for the music they make.
“There was an exercise where we had to join up and be partners,” remembers Macphail. “We had to go up into a room together, and we wrote this really silly song, and it was really funny. I just remember that we laughed a lot and I was like, ‘Yeah, we have chemistry’. I feel like we both taught each other a lot about different types of music in that period. I remember it was so exciting listening to all this new music that I’d never heard before. That summer was just amazing.”
“Six months, and then I had to move away.”
“And then it was so sad.”
“Yeah, I cried the whole plane ride back,” said McFadden, looking back on the journey to the States after a magic six months in the Big Smoke, “I don’t think I’ve ever become close to someone that quickly. Thinking back, it was only six months, that’s crazy, but we were spending every day together, basically.”
Prima Queen were too street-wise to know that a creative connection like that doesn’t come around too often, and as a result, they started making music remotely long before it was cool. Days were filled up with out-of-sync video calls, voice messages and texts, all trying to piece together what would wind up being some of the duo’s first songs.
“I had to go back to school,” said McFadden, “Uni as you say. I had one more year.”
“As you say,” giggles MacPhail.
“As you say. I would say school […] I had one more year, and that was back in Ohio. We were texting every day and video calling, writing songs…”
“…Sending voice notes on WhatsApp,” interjects MacPhail, “And then I remember when it was covid, I feel like a lot of people and bands found it really difficult, that period of time writing together, but we sort of thrived like that. We write like that now. When we’re writing a song, we’ll do voice notes and sort of give each other homework.”
So, how did these songs come out? Well, it was clear to anyone who listened that Prima Queen had something unique. Their first singles like ‘Eclipse’ and ‘Chew My Cheeks’ were a lot of fun to listen to while also deeply emotive. Now, two years later, on the verge of their debut album, The Prize, it’s clear the duo have simply been working on their craft, getting better at writing and playing together, to the extent that they’re now responsible for one of the best albums in 2025 so far.
I could bore you with the technical reasons as to why this record is great, but there’s already a review out for that, and let’s face it, if you’ve made it this far, you’ve either listened to or are going to listen to the album. Instead, here’s my take on why it works so well as a piece of music: Prima Queen have a very wholesome story about how they met, became friends, started a band and are now doing well off the back of it all, and this album is a sonic representation of all of that.
With every song, we are given glimpses into their friendship. On the surface level, these glimpses are spotted in the quality of their music, given their friendship was built on making music together; however, deeper than that, through songs like ‘Ugly’ and ‘Spaceship’, we are fly’s on the wall to personal conversations, late night talks gossiping about a new fling or pouring your heart out over heartache. The vulnerability on this album is only that which can exist between best friends or siblings, and by being able to listen to it, whether it was intended or not, we are taken on a lovely journey that highlights the power music can have on relationships.
The pinnacle of all this is the titular track ‘The Prize’, the only piece written during the recording process. After years of writing together, Prima Queen had more than enough material to put a record together. However, while finalising the album, this anthemic ode to self-love and recognising your self-worth sprang out of nowhere. It was the song that tied everything together, and it represents the duo saying that while there may be breakups, bad times and stretches of self-doubt, they continue to love each other and be grateful that they met. Music and everything else aside, it’s that friendship the duo cherish more than anything, and that’s what The Prize represents.
“It felt like it was missing from the album. We were trying to think about what sort of tied the whole thing together and were looking for themes but because we’d written it over such a long period of time, it wasn’t like we’d come at it like ‘This is a concept album’, it was an accumulation of lots of different life experiences over the past few years,” said McFadden. “But then it was like, ‘The Prize’ was almost our subconscious being like, ‘This is how we’ll tie it all together, and this is the conclusion of it’.”
She continued, “We loved it, it felt like it was gifted upon us, because we went in the studio and it kind of appeared […] It’s cool to look at it as a body of work because it’s so many different things that sometimes feel really disconnected, and then when you put them all together, you realise it’s quite connected.”
It was apparent that The Prize represented the theme of the album the moment they wrote it. The only song that could represent what this record stands for was a track that epitomises how our friends can bring out the best in us.
“It was such a eureka moment because we didn’t have a name for the album and we were really struggling to think of one,” McFadden concluded. “We knew we really wanted it to be, kind of, exactly what it is, but we didn’t know what it was yet. Then the song came and we were like, ‘Oh my god, here it is’. The reason we couldn’t think of it was because it was a missing piece.“
