Singer Tinashe intimated that she regrets her previous music collaboration with R. Kelly and Chris Brown, which incited a vicious clapback from the famously mercurial Breezy.
As Tinashe revs up her media tour in preparation for her new album, she recalls how her previous label pressured her to collaborate with notorious artists, starting with R. Kelly on the single “Let’s Be Real Now” on The Buffet album.
“I literally block out that R. Kelly song from my mind. I forget that it even exists,” she said. “That is so embarrassing. That is so unreal that I even have a song with R. Kelly. That’s so embarrassing. I was so young, too, which is crazy because I feel like I did that song when I just signed to that label … I was probably like 20 … That was crazy.”
Tinashe, 30, whose real name is Tinashe Jorgensen Kachingwe, also said that her former label RCA decided that she would collaborate with Breezy on the 2015 track “Player.”
“Especially when it comes to singles, for example — that song with Chris. That was a song that we all wanted to be this big moment, this big single,” Tinashe said. “So I feel like, in their mind, they were like, ‘You need the support.’ He was their biggest artist that they had on rhythmic radio at the time. To me, I was like, ‘Well, this is a pop song. So, I really don’t feel like we should put Chris on it.’ That doesn’t compute to me, but I don’t know.”
Not long after Tinashe’s interview went public, Brown stormed onto his social media platform to flame Tinashe.
“Name five Tinashe songs or die … Everybody dead,” Breezy barked on Twitter.
Brown followed that post up with an equally inflammatory statement. “What’s more embarrassing is that she worked with all these people, and not one of us could save her career.”
There were many on the platform formerly known as Twitter who slammed Brown for going off on Tinashe when they didn’t believe she threw any shade at him.
See, this Tinashe Chris Brown “controversy” is why I am never giving any social grace to anyone who has not earned it. She was as diplomatic as one could be when Zach Sang asked about how she felt to have worked w R Kelly and Chris Brown. She didn’t say anything bad about Chris.
— Twyla ✨ (@orangemoonmagic) September 17, 2023
Chris Brown fell for the big white letters instead of watching the whole Tinashe interview. Unfortunate.
— SieNote (@NOPussBoys_) September 17, 2023
