Sitting beside her, I could get the sense that she was more than what you could see at surface level. As we first talked about the process behind “Unluvable,” which debuted alongside a music video with collaborator Anthony Umina, she told me that it was first written when she was 17. Although the song has completely changed since three years ago (one major change in the chorus going from “I’m unlovable,” to “Am I unlovable?”), she still looks back on her younger self who wrote it with empathy. She’s amazed that all her emotions flowed out in one sitting. In a similar way, the music video flowed too, starting as a sample video turning into the full length.

Chloe’s recent release, “Love Me Love Me,” continues her history of relatability, exploring feelings of being tossed aside by your romantic partner. During her time writing it she felt so far away from her partner, that she was the problem and couldn’t even accept that she wasn’t wanted due to the fear of not finding anyone else.

“I stayed in that, which I find interesting because I feel like a lot of people relate to this. When you’re in such a toxic relationship, you think it would be easy to leave, you know, people tell you ‘Leave, they’re not treating you good, leave.’ But it’s not that easy,” Chloe said. “When you’re in that situation, it’s so hard to leave. If it weren’t for him breaking up with me, I’d probably still be with him today. I’d be miserable.”

At this moment, it seemed as though this was the first time Chloe allowed herself to be publicly vulnerable, outside of her music.

Looking back today, she’s able to identify the issues she faced with her partner that she couldn’t see before. She still finds it crazy that in her healthy, new relationship the hardships she faced previously are not normal to experience in a relationship. It’s astonishing that even upon presentation of the song to her past boyfriend, he didn’t have any thoughts to reevaluate the relationship, acknowledging the song was about him. 

“It still blows my mind. Jaw dropped,” she said.

In the past year, Chloe has spent a great deal of time working on making new songs. 

She expands on this, saying, “All my songs are very ‘poppy,’ I’m still trying to figure out where I am. I have a very soulful voice which I don’t think you’d be able to tell from my songs.” 

When she was younger, around 13 to 15, she remembers doing performances singing Aretha Franklin and Beyonce. In one instance at the Los Angeles Taste of Soul Singing Competition, she took third among 500 competitors when she was only 14-years-old. She still holds her performance of Aretha Franklin’s “Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)” close to her as well. Despite it all, she still feels hooked on the upbeat songs she’s committed to making right now.

Chloe’s life of singing started when she was seven, singing in farmers markets and picked up later as she learned more through voice lessons. Her father, Scott Wedge, was always there along the way as he consistently helped drive her to Las Vegas to sing and earn tips to help pay for her singing classes. For an entire year, her life was dedicated to driving to Los Angeles every Friday, sleeping in the car, training with a group called Hollywood Launch and driving straight home. The time it took to sharpen her skills has solidified her strength in stage presence and song choice, leading her to many industry connections.

Although performing for her has grown into a second nature, she still faces the times of anxiety before a show. 

“I’ve noticed that if I’m not tremendously nervous, I do bad,” she said. “I’ll always talk about how my voice is gone, and end up killing it. It’s like a switch flips in my head and I’m just zoned in.”

“At first I’d get sucked into the drama before a performance and I wanted to do everything I could to save her, but every time, she hits the stage and it just clicks, she kills it,” her father said.

Chloe’s competence in her stage performances solidify that she can be set to a high standard and still impress the audience.

 “She just gets out on stage and it’s so beautiful,” her father said. “She’s so professional, she can adapt to anything on the fly, and the audience won’t even know.”

As the sacrifice Chloe put into pursuing music has been a point of internal conflict for her, it appears as a conflict that will pay off. 

“I wanted to be a normal kid. Go to school, ride with the cool kids in the back of the bus. I always wanted to experience that – high school, the lockers, the cheerleaders, the football games. I didn’t care if it was all fake TV stuff. I wanted to experience all of it. I wanted the social life of school, but I lost out on it for music,” she said. 

When speaking with Chloe about her past, it feels as if the past life she had was another person. Even though she may not be the same today, her writing process has remained similar. Chloe has an ability to feel an emotion and be able to put it into words at that moment, which truly shows in the lyrics she writes and the emotion audiences can feel in her voice. 

“During that period of time she wrote some really good music, and I would love for her to put it out. They’re very raw and personal, and they’re so deep,” her father said. “Chloe will tell me how hard it is to want to do that because she’s not in that spot anymore. I feel there’s a lot of young women and men that need help and her songs could really relate to and help them.”

Much of the lyrics in “Unluvable” and “Love Me Love Me” hold true to this. It doesn’t take much for audiences to put themselves in her shoes.

For a while, she was exploring her past songwriting in a segment she had on Instagram and TikTok called “Songwriting with Chloe” where she would take an old song she wrote, dissect it, talk about the state of mind she was in, and sing it. She’s taken a break from it as she felt she was at a point where her appreciation for music faded a bit, despite it being her whole life.

By working retail and clerical jobs during her break, she has gained exposure from the outside world allowing her to appreciate her roots under a new perspective. 

Chloe Wedge is more than just her music. She’s someone who has taken the time to perfect her craft, taking all the experiences she had with a sense of empathy, all without losing sight of her dedication. Her music and her story is more than just real, it’s relatable, and it’s what the world deserves to hear.