Last week, I covered Miley Cyrus’s Billboard interview. As I do with nearly every interview, I culled down the quotes to what I thought were the most interesting and noteworthy statements, which was difficult because Miley always talks out of her ass and even though she insisted she hadn’t been high for weeks, she talked like she was either high or really burned out. All of that is my explanation for why I didn’t even include this section of the interview, where Miley talked about why she’s no longer into rap or hip-hop these days:
Billboard: Did folk singer Melanie Safka [with whom Cyrus performed in 2015] influence you?
Miley: She did, and I grew up with her. But I also love that new Kendrick [Lamar] song [“Humble”]: “Show me somethin’ natural like ass with some stretch marks.” I love that because it’s not “Come sit on my d–k, suck on my c–k.” I can’t listen to that anymore. That’s what pushed me out of the hip-hop scene a little. It was too much “Lamborghini, got my Rolex, got a girl on my c–k” — I am so not that.I was torn on whether I was going to work with certain producers that I really like. But I feel if we’re not on the same page politically … My record is political, but the sound bite doesn’t stop there. Because you can write something beautiful and you know E! News will ruin our lives and say, “This is a political record.” Because then I’m the Dixie Chicks and I’m getting my album smashed in the streets, and that’s not what I want. I want to talk to people in a compassionate, understanding way — which people aren’t doing.
She goes on to detail how she’s moving back to her country roots and she has a lot of nice things to say about Blake Shelton, and basically the whole Billboard piece was a blaring advertisement for “Miley’s ‘Ratchet White Girl’ Phase Is Over, Now She’s Back to Pop-Country.” Because of course it was just a phase. Of course none of it was real and authentic to who Miley is. Miley culturally appropriated a “black identity” and now she’s shedding that skin. That was the point of the Billboard piece: Miley’s “racial tourism” is over and now she barely listens to rap music and she will otherize and denigrate it. Well, Miley would now like to clarify. She posted this on Instagram:
When articles are read it isn’t always considered that for hours I’ve spoken with a journalist about my life , where my heart is, my perspective at that time, and the next step in my career. Unfortunately only a portion of that interview makes it to print, & A lot of the time publications like to focus on the most sensationalized part of the conversation. So, to be clear I respect ALL artists who speak their truth and appreciate ALL genres of music (country , pop , alternative …. but in this particular interview I was asked about rap) I have always and will continue to love and celebrate hip hop as I’ve collaborated with some of the very best! At this point in my life I am expanding personally/musically and gravitating more towards uplifting, conscious rap! As I get older I understand the effect music has on the world & Seeing where we are today I feel the younger generation needs to hear positive powerful lyrics! I am proud to be an artist with out borders and thankful for the opportunity to explore so many different styles/ sounds! I hope my words (sung or spoken) always encourage others to LOVE…. Laugh…. Live fully…. to be there for one another… to unify, and to fight for what’s right (human , animal , or environmental ) Sending peace to all! Look forward to sharing my new tunes with you soon! – MC
Whatever, Miley. She’s now going to be a tourist in alt-country-pop until she outgrows that and tries something else. To be fair, many artists go through phases, and this is all very Lady Gaga-esque (Gaga is even doing alt-country-pop right now). But still… Miley trying to “adopt” a black identity to sell music was just a phase and she’s over it now, you guys.
Cover courtesy of Billboard, additional photo by WENN.
I’m shocked. You should see my face.
BYE GIRL, Save it, Keep It, Throw it in the trash.. and while you’re there…..
The Point is, the people that live breathe love like do that Neither invited your interloper ass nor needed your Opinion on the worthiness of their culture/sounds/dances Therefore you exiting something not built for you is really a relief to us all that actually care about that kind of thing and also not something we can take off Like you and Rachel after a good sugar scrub, do
Preach! Just said the same thing right below you, but it’s not showing up.
YES! This is exactly why I have zero patience for people talking about ‘cultural appreciation’ when people pull this bull****. Hannah over here just wanted to edge up her image, and took the parts of black culture she thought would do that-and then when she’s done with this phase of her life she wants to talk about how it’s so vulgar. Like your post 2012 career wasn’t made through twerking (and I use that term loosely) on wannabe Beetlejuice on that stage and defiling a foam finger.
She does my head in I swear
YAS QQ preach! Miley can go ahead and cancel herself and toss her person in the dumpster. You used black music and bodies when it suited her. Now she’s “grown” and done with the culture. Definition of a culture vulture
This broad ALWAYS irked my spirit and itched my back teeth.
What’s ridic is Pharell keeps working w/ these fools just to get thrown under the bus by them aft the checks clears & they drop off the charts. Thicke crushed him like a pop can in court, but then he swore this “obvious child” loooooved hip hop when she got the whistle blown on her flagrant foulness early on & now she’s acting like she’s just heard it 3 weeks ago. But where is Pharell now? – working w/ that racist chick from 5th Harmony. Unfortunately our look & culture is available to highest bidder and readily disposable to ourselves.
She makes my teeth itch.
Preach!!!!
She can miss me with relating her drugs and edginess to ‘black culture’. This child was smoking salvia and posing nude before hitting 18 and being betrayed by her WHITE friends. Black folk took her in and gave her hit after hit and a great album but of course they have to make way so she could get her man back!
But I’m not worried for her country bumpkin ass. Even when she had 2 big hit singles (We can’t Stop, Wrecking Ball) her sales were still poor (less than 300k). That’s like Britney Spears on decline numbers! Then she released that free album because we all know that would not have sold at all as she’s not Madonna meaning she can’t switch styles that quickly, act like it’s authentic and profit from it.
Just like Gaga and Perry, the audience will grow tired of this boring toned down shtick and she’ll be scrambling for another hit. I’m sure she will have no issue adding a rap verse here or there when she realises nobody curr about her white basic ass.
And I believe karma will hit her hard when Liam will use her for all she’s worth and then dump her. The only reason why she’s pushing this image, is for his basic controlling broke cheating ass. She got her man back and she’s intending to keep him this time. As soon as his IMDB is filling up again, the man will surf out of her life just like he did before and hook up with some non-A list hot chick who doesn’t make him feel insecure and she can whine a about it on an album that truly reflects her true self: White Noise
And only white people are surprised by this “turnaround.” Sorry, but people of color always knew that Miley was just passing through (to get mentions and money).
This white person isn’t surprised, make money by co-opting a genre and than criticize it after you made your cash. Ridic
UMMM HMMM we BEEN KNOWING
I would be surprised if ANY person, black or white, thought Miley was doing anything but attention whoring. Granted I don’t know the white people that you do but that is a very sweeping statement. I think, typically , adults recognize Mile’s behavior (and others like hers) for what it is.
This.
We all knew it was a phase.. but I wonder what all those rappers that rushed to embrace her think of her suddenly acting all “I don’t knok her” lmao.
Because it was all about a contract for a certain amount of songs and nothing more. People in Hollywood accept payment for a marriage and get divorced when the payments stop. This is how it works with collaborations and “friendships” as well. Nothing new here.
I agree with Lafawnda, I don’t think any of them are surprised or even care. Some folks, including Miley, made some money and everyone knew that’s all this was about.
Miley is guilty of cultural appropriation in the past.
That being said, I don’t think anything that she said was necessarily wrong. HIp hop and hip hop culture continue to be problematic vis a vis misogyny and homophobia and I don’t think it should get a pass just because those behaviors and attitudes are ingrained in the culture.
Right because country music (which is what she’s going back to) has none of those problems
I think modern country is a LOT less misogynistic than rap right now.
I would say there’s plenty of homophobia in the country culture. Heck, even Blake Shelton-one of the biggest country stars in the world-has made homophobic comments. And he’s never really suffered any major backlash for it. People just laugh it off and say he’s just a good ol’ redneck who doesn’t mean any harm.
+1
And they were “ingrained in the culture” before she appropriated such culture. In fact, she was guilty of the same BS while she was appropriating the culture.
I get what you’re saying. I don’t listen to a lot of mainstream hip-hop, in part because of all of the misogyny. What bothers me about Miley, though, is that in this interview she specifically stated that she’s hoping to appeal to Trump voters.
So, let’s get this straight. First she appropriates black culture to get attention and establish herself outside of her Hannah Montanah brand. Then as soon as she’s established herself, she not only disses the genre that made her a star, but then turns around and panders to the racists who discriminate against people belonging to the culture she appropriated. SMH.
If she had simply gone back to country/pop w/out dissing hip-hop or sucking up to Trump voters, she wouldn’t come across as such a user and hypocrite.
What hip hop are you listening to? Hip hop is as diverse as any other genre. Reducing it to its worst actors is exactly the problem.
Exactly. So tired of the double standard, especially when there is PLENTY of positive hip hop out there to chose from.
I agree, WTF. Grant is doing the exact same thing as Miley.
@ Grant, you must be white 😏
All hip hop is misogynistic and homophobic ..really? 😒
@Grant: Homophobia and misogyny are everywhere though. Not to say that those things in a song can’t be called out, but it’s not a hip hop thing. It’s there in pop, metal, rock, and country too. And that’s just talking about music. I think if a survey were to be done we’d probably find that more country music artists, fans, etc. voted for Trump and share the homophobic (and other gross) beliefs of the right than the artists and fans of hip hop.
Oh, she can screw right off.
Everyone called this at the time – she tries on these identities like costumes, and this one was more extreme than most because she had broken up with Liam (remember how she dyed her hair black to look ‘ugly’, because an ex-boyfriend said he liked the old colour?). Now she’s grown out of it, and the identity she has now is her true self, for realz (just like the pot-smoking hippy was her real self, the grills were her real self, whatever she finds cool at the moment is her authentic identity). Remember how she mocked Sinead O’Connor? She’s got a problem with misogyny in rap but was perfectly happy to twerk against Robin Thicke while he sang about how consent was such a blurred line, and was photographed by good old Terry Richardson. Now she’s got Liam again, and she’s trying to get back into the country scene, complete with rolling meadows and flowing pastel dresses. Girl just doesn’t seem to have any real substance or identity to her at all. She’ll move on from this new phase soon enough – hopefully without denigrating any other racial groups this time.
so true. But then I think of her as only in her early 20s……She still has a lot of growing up to do. Which is interesting because she has been on her own for a long time now and she is even engaged to be married, but then she spouts teenage nonsense…
Yes, she has a lot of growing up to do, but what’s annoying to me is that she’s placing all the blaming on hip hop. She’s not owning up to her own shit. Hip hop didn’t make her wear penises on stage, hip hop didn’t force her twerk, and rub her ck!t on stage, nobody forced to do “hip hop”.
She used hip hop as a phase, to get rid of Disney image, she picked hip hop as extreme way to “grow up”. Now she’s back with Liam, it’s beneath her? F**k her.
We all knew that her appropriation of hip hop and black culture was a costume she would use for a short time for her own profit- which is problematic all by itself-but what I wasn’t expecting was for her to trash and denigrate it and hypocritically act like she was above it. She’s one of the worst Hollywood examples of what’s wrong with cultural appropriation. And ‘liberal pansexual hippy girl who lassos Trumpeters over to the left with Sweetness & Country Music’ will not work. Another album to not buy.
K, but isn’t she moving over so her little sister can take her appropriation throne?
Or did I read the hip hop dancers and outfit wrong from that award show?
Ugh…I can’t go online now without seeing a hideous pic of that girl’s face all bloated with fillers. And she’s like 17! She has a nose ring and wears a “GIRL POWER” T-shirt to show you she’s edgy.
The headline reads, “Noah Cyrus Talks About Going from Miley’s Little Sister to NC-17” because what other hook does she have but “I’m not a little girl anymore; let me bend over to prove it to you.”
The whole “NC-17” is REALLY disgusting.
She only used this racial tourism to help get her more famous back in 2012 and 2013. She herself said in 2009 when she was 16 that ” I don’t listen to Jay-Z or any rap music”. I remember she had gotten off the Hannah Montana fame and was barely famous anymore.
I don’t get why she wasn’t called out for it back in 2012 and 2013. Her career should have suffered from it but it didn’t.
In one interview with that Helmsworth boy for that silly film they did together, he was asked about her music. He said that he is really into hiphop and I think he either named Jay Z or Kanye as a fav. She was sitted next to him and she rolled her eyes. Then she said something like “shes trying to listen to that stuff”. Like you said, a few years later there she was….hugging up on Snoop and saying Will I Made It was her creative soul mate. But to be fair we did call her out. Its just that her base comprises of dumb teenage white girls. They hear what they want to hear.
F*ck off culture vulture
LOL I love how Miley’s idea of a sweet, romantic lyric is ““Show me somethin’ natural like ass with some stretch marks.”
Yeah it’s so bad Miley foh. I don’t remember seeing any hip hop artist prance around stage in a unicorn hat and a strap-on di!do. But guess who I do remember doing that? That’s right one Miley Culture Vulture Cyrus. Girls no one asked for you in hip hop wants you in hip hop. Please go and never return and take igloo azale with you!!
It wasn’t lucrative enough for her. That is the real answer.
The thing is I’m in the same age group as her and while i was at that early teenage phase when i just started getting into mainstream music all that they played on tv channels was hip hop. Hip hop and then R&B was the in thing in mainstream pop culture but the cyclical nature of the industry is that now its fading a little from the top, we had a bit of other things some edm thing then, and bubblegum pop has always been there but never at the top, its just existing like metal and alternative rock or rock for that matter . I can understand that at the height of it it was what she gravitated to personally. I did too. Today I can’t believe i was soo into Eminem. I never paid that much attention to the lyrics either, you know. At the time also i never read about musicians/ celebs personal lives. I just listened to their music so was never aware of everything with him. I fould him real at the time, yeah. It may have been his reality though just was too much for me. It was a phase for me. Until i became aware of myself and everything around me, I started actually paying attention to what these people said and did, i started to lose interest in that mainstream “Lamborghini, got my Rolex, got a girl on my c–k” shit myself . I am aware that theres more to the genre that that and the variety of artists ,of course. But i have generally tapped out from it. So i don’t blame her for getting over a phase.
I feel like she romanticised hip hop when that was what they were mostly playing on the mainstream channels/ and those are the kind whom she became friends with. And put her twist to it. The white trash thing. Cashed in. Preached it like it was her own. Only that was a just as bad which is why everyine responded the way they did. It was not authentic to her. And everyone knows. But shes growing.
Its just that this country thing is also going to be the same thing. Its gonna be a phase. At this stage though she should maybe not just jump into the next genre but find herself?
HAHAHAHAHAHA the ONTD poster who compared her to a college student, complete with year-by-year quote evolution, basically nailed it.
(seriously, this thing deserves to be read)
http://ohnotheydidnt.livejournal.com/106082100.html
Thanks for the good laugh. I used to defend her in her wild days but now I just find her pathetic and I cannot her excused with the “well she is young” phrase.
LOL…so funny yet so cringeworthy at the same time.
I don’t understand why sometimes the black (American) community is always so quick to welcome these white artists who are clearly just using them. In particular it’s the white artists who want to transition to from child to adult stars who always go full on tourist mode, then once they are established they go back home.
I know a check is a check but at some point the community also needs to recognise the part they play and start checking these people at the door.
I mean… you’re making a blanket statement about an entire group of people. Plenty of people spoke out against her and many didn’t support her. We’re not stupid, we saw through her shtick from the beginning and she wasnt welcome. It was the mainstream media that made her new “persona” popular and rewarded her for it, not the black community.
I know that white media and the general public were the ones behind her success – tbh I don’t care about what they do because it’s the same old story on that side of things.
I would rather focus on what our community can control first hence why I’m always smdh at these producers, artists and industry folks who allowed themselves to be used and paraded in her videos etc. While everyone knew what was up and were side-eying her, they also had no qualms about taking the check and working with her and being seen with her which to the masses looks like the were co-signing her whole schtick.
I know why they do it, but some of these people who work with her (and others of her ilk) are the same ones who will turn around and say x, y and z are appropriating black American culture when they are part of the problem.
White girls made her popular, not the black community. So you can kindly f#ck off with ur nonsense
Honestly, I don’t get what is wrong with it. Me and the people around me both white and POCs absolutely DETEST that branch of hip hop, yet have a great love for conscious artists. Why exactly am I racist because I hate the shit out of a commercial industry based on misogyny, homopobia and the glorification of violence and materialism. My hero has always been James Baldwin, never Snoop Dogg.
Who is calling out or implying that your particular behavior is racist? That’s not even the point being made. #pointmissed.
Miley purposefully used “negative” aspects of hip hop culture to appear edgy. She justified her behavior and even used weak endorsements from the community to co-sign her behavior so she could be more accepted to perform appropriation without compliant. I remember lots of black ppl voicing concern about her actions then and the taint of it and the general reaction was: what’s the problem? Don’t get mad because she’s white? But there isn’t anything wrong with it.
Now she admits never really being down and moving on to a different look, sound, and audience. Her actual quote is that she’s upset that her country fans were put off by her previous behavior. So to win them back she is putting down the very aspects of the hip hop culture she used for money and fame.
I mean, she’s not wrong. Do you ever hear lyrics like this in country music?
“Come sit on my d–k, suck on my c–k.” I can’t listen to that anymore. That’s what pushed me out of the hip-hop scene a little. It was too much “Lamborghini, got my Rolex, got a girl on my c–k”
It is insulting to black people to say that the above is appropriating black culture. It’s just misogynistic which is very prevalent in that genre.
Oh come on! I’m no fan of Miley Cyrus, but this time… She is saying that she doesn’t like the way rap/hip hop headed to try to stay relevant to the bad boys of the suburbs. She is right. It is very often misogynistic, ignorant, nasty, materialistic, hate filled garbage. This cultural appropriation stuff is going too far when one culture can claim the pelvic thrust! Yeah that’s what we called it in the late 1970’s and early 80’s, it wasn’t just a part of the Time Warp it was in a lot of our dances. Balloon pants too… seriously? One culture is going to take responsibility for that horror? Fashions change but stay the same, most stuff in mainstream urban culture is so multi racial it’s not funny.
That’s just absolutely wilful ignorance. Lack of knowledge is one thing. Yet again, enormously patient people try to explain, and it seems you missed it all.
Do you own dogs? Gotta use that whistle!
I see the Miley stans/sympathizers/undercover racist white people are here defending her or thinking hip hop is only about tits, a#s, homophobia, and racism. I’m talking to you guys:
@ Grant, here or there, oxy, thaliasghost, loveotterly, Selena castle
Exactly, as if country music isn’t problematic. Or rock music etc. Not all rap is about the rachetedness. Yeah….she actually said she borrowed the culture as a phase.
1. Never been a fan of hers + cringe whenever I see her.
2. I’m born and bred Ghanaian aka black so there’s that…
Maybe learn how to have discussions without automatically going on the defensive because you might miss some things.
Be quiet tap dancer
I was willing to give her a bit of a pass because we as people are constantly evolving and overtime find ourselves with different tastes in music, movies, books as well different fashion tastes, morals, stances on religion , career aspirations etc. So I think its fine if she no longer wants to portray herself in a overly sexual way or wants to listen to overly sexual lyrics anymore. However, I think she could have done a bit of better job in explaining that and maybe taking more of a general stance instead of mentioning rap specifically. Also, I feel like she was kind of caught in a lie as in her apology/explanation instagram post she says she was specificallya asked about rap. Like, no you were asked about a folk singer and you turned the conversation to the rap.