Ice Spice fans were furious when Matty Healy made racist comments about her earlier this year — but she says the drama is all in the past.
“When I had heard that little podcast or whatever, I was so confused. Because I heard ‘chubby Chinese lady’ or some s–t like that, and I’m like, ‘Huh? What does that even mean?’” the 23-year-old rapper told Billboard in an interview published on Thursday, September 28. “First of all, I’m thick. What do you mean Chinese? What? But then they apologized or whatever. And the whole time, I didn’t really care.”
Ice added that she saw Healy, 34, at a Fashion Week party earlier this month, and the duo officially made up. “He was like, ‘Hey, you OK?’ and I’m like, ‘Of course,’” she recalled. “He apologized to me a bunch of times. We’re good.”
Healy came under fire in February after he poked fun at Ice during an appearance on “The Adam Friedland Show.” He joined in as the podcast hosts mimicked Chinese and Hawaiian accents and said Ice sounded like an “Inuit Spice Girl” or a “chubby Chinese lady.” The episode was later pulled from Apple and Spotify after listeners decried the comments as racist.
That same month, Healy issued a public apology to Ice via Instagram. “I just feel a bit bad, and I’m kind of a bit sorry if I’ve offended you,” he wrote. “Ice Spice, I’m sorry. It’s not because I’m annoyed that me joking got misconstrued. It’s because I don’t want Ice Spice to think I’m a d–k. I love you, Ice Spice. I’m so sorry.”
Three months later, Healy told The New Yorker that the backlash “doesn’t actually matter,” adding that he didn’t think anyone really cared what he said. “Nobody is sitting there at night slumped at their computer, and their boyfriend comes over and goes, ‘What’s wrong, darling?’ and they go, ‘It’s just this thing with Matty Healy,’” Healy said in May. “That doesn’t happen.”
When The New Yorker’s writer argued that “maybe it does” matter, Healy doubled down. “If it does, you’re either deluded or you are, sorry, a liar,” he said. “You’re either lying that you are hurt, or you’re a bit mental for being hurt. It’s just people going, ‘Oh, there’s a bad thing over there, let me get as close to it as possible so you can see how good I am.’ And I kind of want them to do that, because they’re demonstrating something so base level.”
The controversy escalated in part because Healy was then dating Taylor Swift, who released her “Karma” remix with Ice in May. In early June, however, Us Weekly confirmed that Swift, 33, and Healy had called it quits.
One month later, Healy admitted he has some regrets about things he’s said in the past. “I was always, like, trying stuff and some stuff I got right and some stuff I got wrong,” he said during his concert with The 1975 in London. “But, do you know what? There’s a lot of things I’ve said, jokes that I’ve made, you know what, there’s probably a couple of f–king songs I’d take back if I had the chance.”
Healy announced on Tuesday, September 26, that The 1975 is taking an “indefinite hiatus” from shows after they wrap up their current tour, which ends in Europe in March 2024. “We love coming to this place and playing for you guys whenever we have the chance, and it’s wonderful you’re all here,” Healy told the crowd at the band’s Sacramento, California, concert. “It’s wonderful to have you guys with us tonight.”
