With “Vices,” Sara Beth Turns Self-Destruction Into Self-Awareness

There’s a difference between writing about bad habits and actually interrogating them. Sara Beth does the latter, and that’s exactly why her new release “Vices” hits harder than most “confessional pop” floating around right now.

If you first clocked Sara Beth on American Idol, forget the sanitized TV edit version. What she’s building post-show is sharper, messier, and way more honest. The Sacramento-based singer-songwriter has quietly stacked a catalog that doesn’t aim for viral fluff. It aims for truth, even when that truth is uncomfortable. “Vices” is uncomfortable in the best way.

This song doesn’t pretend addiction is edgy or aesthetic. It doesn’t dress self-destruction up in neon lighting and TikTok hooks. Instead, it lives in that gross, familiar space where you know something isn’t good for you and still reach for it anyway. The chorus line “Nicotine for breakfast” isn’t clever for clever’s sake. It’s blunt. It’s ugly. It’s real. Anyone who’s ever started their day with something they wish they didn’t need immediately feels seen.

What makes “Vices” land is Sara Beth’s refusal to play the victim or the hero. She’s not begging for sympathy. She’s not offering a redemption arc. She’s sitting inside the contradiction, the shame, the comfort, the genetics, the learned behaviors, and letting it exist without resolution. That 4 am self-loathing she talks about? You can hear it. Not theatrically. Not melodramatically. Just honestly.

There’s also weight behind the writing. Sara Beth grew up around addiction, and that context matters. “Vices” isn’t just about nicotine or alcohol. It’s about inheritance. About wondering whether you’re wired this way or shaped this way. About resenting your own coping mechanisms while still depending on them to get through the day. That internal dialogue, half-mocking, half-justifying, is the song’s backbone.

Sonically, “Vices” keeps things stripped enough to let the words breathe. Her vocals don’t oversell the emotion. They sit right where they need to. Controlled, raw, and slightly worn. That restraint is part of why the song works. It trusts the listener to lean in instead of being spoon-fed a breakdown moment.

Sara Beth’s momentum isn’t accidental. With over 2 million followers across platforms and more than 4 million independent streams, she’s clearly connecting, not because she’s chasing trends, but because she’s speaking in a voice people recognize as their own. Tracks like “Closer to 30” and “Me Problem” already hinted at this direction: self-aware, emotionally literate pop that doesn’t talk down to its audience.

Her own words about the release say it best. She hopes people feel “understood and less alienated or alone.” And honestly? That’s the job. Addiction isn’t just about substances anymore. It’s screens, validation, consumption, distraction, whatever poison gets you through the day. “Vices” doesn’t judge which one you pick. It just acknowledges that most of us are picking something.

In a pop landscape that loves pretending everything is either aspirational or healed, Sara Beth is choosing honesty over polish. “Vices” isn’t a solution. It’s a mirror. And sometimes that’s way more powerful, anyway.

‘Vices’ doesn’t offer a redemption arc or a clean takeaway. Was it important for you to leave the song unresolved, the same way real addiction usually is?

This song was never about resolution. The song was meant to embody the seemingly helpless moments that make us feel like we need our vices. So I guess, yes, it was important to leave it unresolved. This song wasn’t written to relate to people in recovery/wanting to recover; it was meant to be real and vulnerable and more about the people who are in that cycle currently. It’s more of an empathetic “gentle accountability” message.

You’ve been open about growing up around addiction. How do you separate what you learned from what you feel is just wired into you, and does that distinction even matter anymore?

For me, I look at my upbringing as an example that addiction is a slippery slope that everyone (even good people and people who don’t have a family history of addiction) needs to be mindful of.

A lot of artists aestheticize self-destruction. You do the opposite and almost mock it. Was that a conscious rejection of how addiction is usually portrayed in pop?

Honestly, I’ve never thought about it that deeply. I have always used humor to cope, and that just bleeds into my music, I guess.

You went from American Idol visibility to building something very unfiltered on your own terms. What did you have to unlearn after that experience to make music like ‘Vices’?

I was on American Idol for such a short stint of time before I decided it wasn’t for me and walked away from the show. I don’t feel like Idol really ingrained anything in me that I had to unlearn. It did teach me that media is seldom an honest portrayal of who people really are, though. So I wanted to make sure my story was told authentically on my own terms after experiencing the opposite for a short stint.

Do you think we’re finally in a moment where pop can talk about addiction without turning it into a cautionary tale or a brand, or do you still feel pressure to soften the truth so it’s ‘digestible’?

I think people are craving connection vs perfection these days, and pop music is a great example of that. I definitely feel like pop has become more honest, and there’s almost a level of “it’s not that serious” these days (which I’m a big fan of). With every year that goes by, many things that used to be considered more taboo become more normalized.