All eyes are currently on Chappell Roan as she squares off against the harmful demands of her newfound superstardom, but the music industry has been chewing up and spitting out young female singers long before the Gen Z artist ever conceived of her project. In the mid-2010s, Kesha suffered through one of the most publicized legal disputes of the modern pop era, as she attempted to extricate herself from a contract that bound her to abusive producer Lukasz "Dr. Luke" Gottwald. Enjoying her hard-fought freedom almost a decade later, the "JOYRIDE" singer is now trying to "shift this shit" and "dismantle [the industry] piece by piece and shine light into every corner… to [make] sure it never happens to anybody ever again."
But while she did expound on some vague plans to create a digital platform where "artist’s safety is prioritized" (it's unclear whether that will be a Spotify clone or some sort of social media thing), her legacy can already be felt in a much more tangible way. Chappell Roan may be your favorite artist's favorite artist, but it sounds like one of her favorite artists is Kesha, who "was so lovely to me after my Lollapalooza set." Speaking of her record-breaking crowd at the Chicago festival, the "Good Luck, Babe!" singer told Elle in a recent Kesha-focused cover story that "maybe only five other people there understood what that’s like. Kesha came to talk to me after, and it felt like a big sister was helping me through it. Me and Reneé (Rapp) were crying because we felt like we were seen in a way we never had been before."
Over the past few months, Roan has received as much scrutiny as celebration for daring to erect actual boundaries around her private life to protect herself from the sort of abuse Kesha is hoping to stamp out. While this effort has yielded mixed results, Roan has consistently shouted out the extremely long list of (mostly female) stars who have reached out to voice their support. "I’m not trying to name-drop,” she told Rolling Stone last month. "I’m trying to tell you there are girls who are good people, who are helping other girls out. I’m name-dropping them because people just need to know that people are good people."
In Roan's view, Kesha is clearly one of them. "Kesha has always stood up for women and what she believes in, and that’s very inspiring," she also told Elle.
Reneé Rapp, who brought out Kesha during her Coachella set this past April to perform a cathartic, anti-Diddy rendition of "TiK Tok," also shared that the artist "raised an entire generation of ‘fuck the man’-like girls," a group she counts herself among. "Kesha certainly doesn’t put up with any shit, and I most definitely don’t put up with any shit."
There's certainly a long way to go to create lasting change in the industry, and—no matter what Kesha's digital platform turns out to be—Roan and Rapp won't be the last to suffer. Still, by sticking to her guns in an even less friendly era, the artist managed to teach at least two young women that it's possible to be a superstar and be who they are all at once. DJ, turn that up.
