Explaining her side. Sia defended herself against accusations from Taylor Swift fans that she had worn blackface in a performance from years prior.
“For the swift fans trying to make out that I would ever do blackface please see this video. I was painting myself into the backdrop, it was a pre cursor to the wig…” the “Chandelier” singer, 43, tweeted on Tuesday, July 2, along with a link to a YouTube video from a February 2011 show at the Thebarton Theatre in Torrensville, South Australia.
Though Sia is difficult to make out in the clip, she can be seen singing “Never Gonna Leave Me” with short black hair and a dark piece of cardboard attached to her back.
The response didn’t go over well with some: One fan posted a Maury Povich meme that read, “The lie detector test determined that was a lie,” and another wrote, “Sia apologize to Taylor already.”
The backlash began after several photos of the Grammy nominee’s visage covered in black paint began making the rounds on Twitter.
“It’s Sia in the corner wearing blackface while she proclaims her support for scooter,” one wrote, with another quipping, “Sia why did you do blackface.”
On Monday July 1, the songwriter threw her support behind Scooter Braun amid his feud with Swift, 29, over his $300 million purchase of her former label, Big Machine Records, which included Swift’s entire music catalog.
“You’re a good kind man @scooterbraun I hope this passes quickly,” Sia tweeted. “I love you keep going.”
The “Bad Blood” songstress lashed out at Braun, 38, following his purchase of her Masters with a Tumblr blog post on Sunday, June 30. “I learned about Scooter Braun’s purchase of my masters as it was announced to the world. All I could think about was the incessant, manipulative bullying I’ve received at his hands for years,” she wrote. “Scooter has stripped me of my life’s work, that I wasn’t given an opportunity to buy. Essentially, my musical legacy is about to lie in the hands of someone who tried to dismantle it.”
The celebrity manager has not yet publicly responded, though he has reposted multiple messages of support from others.
Braun’s wife, Yael Cohen, slammed Swift on Sunday, however, claiming that the musician had passed on the chance to purchase her own music. “You were given the opportunity to own your masters, you passed,” she wrote on Instagram. “Interesting that the man you’re so ‘grossed out’ by believed in you more than you believe in yourself.”
Swift said in her blog that she was given loopholes to jump through in order to be able to make a deal. “For years I asked, pleaded for a chance to own my work,” she explained. “Instead I was given an opportunity to sign back up to Big Machine Records and ‘earn’ one album back at a time, one for every new one I turned in.”
Swift’s lawyer, Donald Passman, told Us Weekly in a statement on Tuesday that his client was not given the courtesy to buy her songs without stipulation: “[Big Machine founder] Scott Borchetta never gave Taylor Swift an opportunity to purchase her masters, or the label, outright with a check in the way he is now apparently doing for others.”
