paper girls

Mya Angelique

June 28, 2025

Review by: Danielle Holian

In paper girls, Mya Angelique doesn’t merely arrive, she unfurls, like a hand-folded note passed in secret, trembling with truth. At just 15 when she penned much of this debut, the rising pop artist crafts a world as intimate as a bedroom mirror and as expansive as a coming-of-age movie montage. What she offers isn’t just music; it’s a soft rebellion, a stitched-together scrapbook of ache, clarity, and glitter-glued survival.

The EP opens with “sixteen”, a striking initiation into the world Angelique builds, one where self-worth and longing often blur. It’s a portrait of girlhood, equal parts shimmer and bruise, where every note carries the hush of a secret you were never meant to hear aloud. The track aches quietly, but powerfully, evoking the whiplash of growing up too fast. From this moment on, you’re not just listening, you’re remembering.

“quick-brush” follows like a sigh behind a closed door. Its strength lies in its restraint, a hushed lament painted in watercolors. The insecurity and erosion of self-worth it captures don’t wail, they whisper. It’s this delicate vulnerability, so rarely given room in pop music, that gives the track its lasting sting.

But it’s the title track, “paper girls”, that anchors the EP’s emotional core. Here, Angelique turns perfectionism into poetry. The fragility of the metaphor, girls as paper, creased under pressure, could’ve folded in lesser hands. But Mya lets it flutter, then catch fire. Her voice soars delicately, then crashes back down, drawing a line between beauty and burden, between being seen and being understood.

And then comes the pivot. “the boy in the band” is an indie-romantic interlude, feather-light and irony-laced. It’s charming, cinematic, and clever, the kind of track that plays during a spontaneous rain kiss or the slow realization that he was never worth the heartbreak. Angelique has a gift for satire wrapped in sincerity, and this track proves it.

The tonal shift continues with “the comedown”, which peels back all pretense. The song sits in the silence after the scream, in the shadows of glitter and noise. Sparse and stripped, it’s less about melody and more about mood, evoking the emotional hangover of teenage intensity with eerie precision.

But it’s “teenage girl nationality” that might just be her mission statement. Equal parts battle cry and diary entry, it’s fearless, funny, and furious. Angelique reclaims girlhood as an act of resistance, where mascara is warpaint and heartbreak is heritage. The lyrics slice and soar, laying bare the absurdity and glory of growing up as a girl under the microscope.

And then, like the softest aftershock, comes “glitter”. A closing track that doesn’t try to resolve the chaos, it sits with it. There’s a shimmer here, but it’s the kind that catches in your throat. Comparison, self-doubt, and the ache of not being enough dance beneath a veil of quiet beauty. It’s the EP’s final breath, and it lingers long after the last note.

In paper girls, Mya Angelique has created she’s drafted a love letter to the in-between. It’s an emotional map of adolescence, wrinkled and tear-streaked, but radiant in its honesty. She doesn’t shout to be heard; she bleeds in cursive. Each track folds into the next like pages in a diary you’ll never forget reading.

paper girls is streaming now, and be sure to follow Mya Angelica on social media to see what she has up her sleeve next.