Chris Brown Reacted After Tinashe Said She Regrets Their Collab

If you have taste, you know the singer Tinashe. She’s behind hits like “2 On,” “All Hands on Deck,” and my personal fave, “Cold Sweat.”

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She recently appeared on the Zach Sang Show, where she was asked about her previous collabs with R. Kelly and Chris Brown, who have both been subject to abuse allegations.

Tinashe appeared on Kelly’s 2015 track “Let’s Be Real Now.” She worked with Chris the same year on her song “Player.” Kelly is currently serving a 30-year sentence on racketeering and sex trafficking charges. Meanwhile, Chris pleaded guilty to assaulting Rihanna when they were dating in 2009, and has faced a bevy of other accusations since, which he’s denied.

Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images“You think I wanted to [do those songs]?” Tinashe said of their collabs. “I literally block out that R. Kelly song from my mind—I forget that it even exists.”

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She said, in hindsight, it’s “so embarrassing” and “unreal” that she ever worked with Kelly, given his long and well-documented history of abuse. “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,” she continued, referring to RCA Records.

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Zach then said Tinashe must have “lack[ed] a lot of control in that situation… if any,” to which she replied, yes, “one thousand percent.”

Bryan Steffy

“Especially when it comes to singles. Like for example, that song with Chris, that was a song that… we all wanted it to be this big moment—this big single. So I feel like in [the label’s] mind, they were like, ‘You need the support.’ And [Chris] was like their biggest artist that they had on rhythmic radio at the time.”

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She said to her, it didn’t make sense musically to put Chris on that particular song. “I was like, ‘Well, this is a pop song, so I really don’t feel like we should put Chris on it like that. I don’t like that. That doesn’t compute to me.’”

Tinashe might have been on to something because, as The Grio notes, the song performed pretty poorly after its release. It never even made the Billboard 100 chart.

Scott Dudelson / Getty ImagesChris seemed to take offense to that because he posted this on IG:He also reposted this message about a “hate campaign” against him……and appeared to say that Tinashe’s career is “non-existent.”

Twitter: @breezyrelated

People didn’t really understand it because Tinashe’s issue was about her former label forcing them to do a pop song together — not with Chris himself.

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One person said it was “just childish.”

The Zach Sang Show / The Shade Room / Twitter: @MixCultureFlow

Another mused that if they had a “gun to the head, I couldn’t name you 5 Chris Brown songs, but I could name 5 crimes he’s committed,” which earned over 40,000 likes.

Twitter: @orangemoonmagic

Twitter: @NOPussBoys_

Twitter: @icy_nashe

Tinashe hasn’t publicly responded to Chris, but we’ll see if she does.

If you or someone you know is in immediate danger as a result of domestic violence, call 911. For anonymous, confidential help, you can call the 24/7 National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 (SAFE) or chat with an advocate via the website.

If you are concerned that a child is experiencing or may be in danger of abuse, you can call or text the National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-422-44531-800-422-2253 (4.A.CHILD); service can be provided in over 140 languages.

If you or someone you know has experienced sexual assault, you can call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE, which routes the caller to their nearest sexual assault service provider. You can also search for your local center here.