What’s the backstory on Taylor Swift’s new collaboration with Ice Spice?

Back in February of this year, possibly when he was already fooling around with Taylor Swift, Matt Healy was a guest on The Adam Friedland Show, hosted by NYC comedians Adam Friedland and Nick Mullen. During the conversation, Healy and the two hosts mocked Harry Styles for “queerbaiting,” mocked Japanese accents, mocked Scottish accents and they “joked” a lot about Ice Spice. From Paper Magazine:

Accusations of racism partially stem from Healy telling the two hosts about the time he had messaged American rapper Ice Spice, which led to group-wide speculation about her ethnicity. Friedland and Mullen first joked about the rapper being of Inuit descent, then Chinese and finally Hawaiian, mocking the accents of the last two groups mentioned. Let the record show that Ice Spice is Dominican and Nigerian.

Fellow musician Yungblud seemed to condemn the comments made about Ice Spice, tweeting: “love listening to three privileged white dudes sit around and objectify a young black female artist who’s blowing up.”

Inflammatory remarks about the Scots language and the mocking of both Scottish and Japanese accents were also present in the episode, with Healy asking to hear an impression of a Japanese person working in a concentration camp. The frontman is heard laughing along before eventually joining in.

[From Paper]

After the backlash, Healy apologized to Ice Spice on stage during one of The 1975’s concerts. Well, this is the deeply problematic man who has successfully dickmatized Taylor Swift. Swift is in frantic damage control because she doesn’t want to be called a white-feminist Karen who will date racists just because the sex is good. So guess who has a new collab with Ice Spice??? From Taylor’s Twitter:

Um. SO much to tell you. I’m a massive fan of this brilliant artist and after getting to know her I can confirm: she is THE ONE to watch. So delighted to say that Karma Featuring the incredible
@icespicee_ will be out TOMORROW night at MIDNIGHT ET as a part of the new Midnights (Til Dawn Edition) deluxe album that you can pre-order now…

In addition to Karma Ft Ice Spice… You asked for it, we listened: Lana and I went back into the studio specifically to record more Lana on Snow on the Beach. Love u Lana

I don’t blame Ice Spice for collaborating with Taylor. After all, Taylor has gotten Kendrick Lamar to drop into a song before too. Black artists love the exposure Taylor gives them, and so be it. It’s transactional, and I hope Ice Spice gets new fans from this. But yeah… Taylor is desperately trying to change the narrative away from “Matt Healy is a racist POS and wtf is Taylor thinking?” She’s not slick.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

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62 Responses to “What’s the backstory on Taylor Swift’s new collaboration with Ice Spice?”

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  1. Pointillist says:

    🐍🐍🐍🐍🐍

    Stay away from her and her 👻 boyfriend.

    • KFG says:

      Yep! Taylor is awful

    • Lux says:

      They are so freaking daft. Do they not realize that insulting Ice Spice is hardly the only thing for which Hatty Mealy needed to apologize and make amends?

      He needed to apologize to the Scottish, Japanese, Chinese, and Inuit communities (and now that she’s doing his bidding/had been aiding and abetting him with her imprimatur of going public, so does Taylor). Not that he will stop being a racist/misogynist/antisemitic, but if their collective PRs don’t realize the problem is way deeper than what happened with Ice Spice, they are doomed in every way possible. Shoo Swatty, don’t bother us..!

      • Shawna says:

        Laughing about interned Japanese-American citizens?! Just when I thought he couldn’t get worse.

  2. Emily says:

    I am a Swiftie who often defends Taylor because I think as a young woman she was given a lot of flack for a normal amount of dating. While she was with Joe, she showed a lot of growth in her lyrics.

    I can’t with this. It’s an obvious PR play. So so obvious and disingenuous. I’ve stopped listening to her music the last month because this sh*t with Matty is immature and gross (insulting to Joe and their relationship, insulting to every group her new boyfriend has made offensive comments about).

    • Anna says:

      I’m a casual Swiftie in that I like her music but I try to keep away from knowing anything about her, and this nonsense is why.

    • Tara says:

      I would not consider myself a Swiftie, but I agree with you on every point. I her music and love Evermore, which I think was her most lyrically interesting and mature album. It indicated what appeared to be real growth. Although I used to listen to it at least once a week, I am currently boycotting it and her music.

    • Ellie says:

      THIS is what is bothering me so much! During her ”low key years” with Joe she made gorgeous songs and wrote amazing, complex lyrics. There was real growth and maturity in her songs and it seemed like she was in a really good place.

      And now all of a sudden we are back to 2016 messy drama Taylor. I will always love her music but I’m a little disappointed.

  3. Nubia says:

    She really could have been a million guys before this one to get under Joe’s skin. What a mess!

    • Plasma says:

      Maybe any semi-normal guys don’t want to date her anymore and the only dudes she can get nowadays are trash ones like Matty?

      • Nubia says:

        I don’t think any respectable A lister will go near her again. She will only attract people who have something to gain and she is in charge.

  4. OriginalLeigh says:

    What will Taylor do next? Feature the Black women who were exploited in Matty’s favorite racist torture porn flicks as backup dancers in her next video??? She is absolutely a “ white-feminist Karen who will date racists just because the sex is good,” and she is just using Ice Spice. So disappointing and gross…

    • Fifty-50 says:

      This. More than disappointing— vile.

    • lanne says:

      Actually, that might be a good idea, if only for the material benefit for those exploited women. If she’s using Uce Spice, I hope Ice Spice uses her right on back. It’s definitely damage control though. What is it with these women who are willing to destroy their hard-won reputations over some mediocre man? Is being associated with a known racist worth it? Does she think it makes her “edgy” or cool? It doesn’t. It makes her another foolish woman willing to do harm to her own image for a man who will likely contribute nothing worthwhile to her in return. And she won’t be able to say, “I didn’t know any better.”

      Perhaps when she reaches her “I told you so” moment, so many other women who sacrificed their good names for the temporary company of a worthless man will think–oh crap, I shouldn’t do that!

      I can imagine the song Taylor will get out it: Let’s call it “They told me so”

      The chorus could go something like “They told me so, but I didn’t listen, they told me so but I was just wishin–”

      The Gh—- Ga—– women could be the backup dancers for that song. With a verse by Ice Spice. Total taylor redemption move. Does she have an album called Redemption yet?

  5. Spillthattea says:

    She’s so disgusting I’m running out of adjectives. Her PR has gone completely off the rails and can no longer hide just how henious she really is.

  6. Anne says:

    Tree Paine is def earning her paycheck. How long does it take to do a collab like this? I need a timeline.

  7. girl_ninja says:

    Taylor is such a user and she has no issue using and then disposing of people. Sure we all have our demons and we all struggle but this woman is just gross. And I don’t think that she’s dickmatized, she’s trying to get a hold and control the narrative as to how SHE is perceived.

    • Spillthattea says:

      💯 This. Spot on.

    • MF says:

      She’s always been fixated on how she is perceived. It’s all over her music and interviews and whatnot. I find her tiring because she’s a deeply self-involved person.

  8. Tanesha86 says:

    I’m so glad folks see through this BS. Taylor and her disgusting boyfriend are garbage

  9. Jais says:

    Um. I don’t like how she started this post with um. Sometimes, that works, usually when followed by a joke or bafflement of some sort. That’s not the context here. It’s not cute. Wrong tone and insulting considering the context.

    • SAS says:

      Yeah, there’s something very *wink wink nod nod* about it. Like “I know and you know that besides talking about watching violent, degrading, racist pornography, my boyfriend is ALSO strongly associated with racist and demeaning comments made earlier this year about this following amazinggggg artist!!!”

  10. SAS says:

    What a mess. Why add these as some kind of insecure edits to her current album rather than just releasing new music?

    The ice spice thing is sooooo fucking calculated and peak White Feminism. Surely she’ll be a featured guest on tour for the public to take as implied forgiveness of the garbage bf. So twisted.

    • Coco says:

      Because she just using Ice Spice as a prop to fix her image. She might not be with Matt by the time she releases a new album, so she wouldn’t need a Ice Spice to deflect from there racism.

    • Polly says:

      I think in Taylor’s mind this makes her look supportive when actually it just makes her look unbelievably two-faced.

  11. Haus of Cats says:

    This woman is so BORING. I don’t even know why I read stories about her.

  12. Polly says:

    I’m gonna take a wild guess and say this collab was done recently enough that Taylor was already dating that scumbag and knew about what he’d said about Ice Spice, and that it could be problematic for her when people found out they were together, but not so recently that Ice Spice knew she was collaborating with the gf of a man who had made racist remarks about her. She might not have agreed if she had known. It’ll be interesting to see if she promotes the song.

    • It Really Is You, Not Me says:

      I think you’re right. I wonder if there’s an NDA in place that would prevent Ice Spice from coming out with the timeline.

    • DARK says:

      After his disgusting comments Healy was called out by a UK artist called youngblud and handled that by making a video mocking youngblud so I wonder what made him turn around and make a half ass apology? I ‘m gonna take another wild guess that the swift team asked him to because it would be really awkward for Taylor to have to run into Ice Spice on industry events. This was about a month ago so before it blew up on twitter and just before the boyfriend roll out. Plenty of time to make a remix and I wonder if there was an NDA tied to that remix to make sure Ice Spice doesn’t say anything negative.

    • Misa says:

      I agree. And Ice Spice can’t remove herself because there’s a contract. This is all unbelievably vile.

    • ML says:

      Polly, that is incredibly sad and you are quite probably right.
      Taylor is clearly rehabbing her Swilly Heaft/ Tatty Swealy image, which is beyond gross. If she knew what was coming and did this to get ahead of one of her boyfriend’s many racist utterings, then that is even worse.
      I hope Ice Spice is not attacked by the snake mob and gets what SHE needs out of this.

  13. JM says:

    Someone on Reddit called it reparations and I’m here for that. I hope this gives Ice Spice tons of residual perpetuities and a new level of exposure.

    That said, Taylor. We are right through you. This won’t make up for the fact that you a dating a racist, Nazi saluting, black women torture porn enthusiast. In this political climate no less.

    I used to stream her discography on shuffle as my daily background music. I haven’t played a single song since the hand holding pictures confirmed everything. This isn’t oh he’s just a misunderstood bad guy character flaws. This is we fought civil and world wars over this level of unforgivable.

    • Coco says:

      This is not reparations they are exploiting ice spice being a POC to fix the racist image.

      I don’t know this Ice Spice girl, but I wish she wouldn’t have allowed herself to be used like this.

      • SAS says:

        @Coco, there’s not always a lot of choice involved for less powerful artists when someone with the industry weight of Taylor starts pressing her influence. That’s what makes this all the more gross for me, she put Ice Spice in a supremely uncomfortable and un winnable position.

      • Coco says:

        I know I just hate this for her and I know some of her fans are going to be disappointed in her for “sellout“.

        This should continue to show Taylor fans what type of disgusting person she is, but I know some will use it to deflect the fact that she is a racist.

  14. sevenblue says:

    The sad part is for years and years, Taylor didn’t speak up about anything that is controversial / political. It was sold as she doesn’t want to alienate her fan base, not that she doesn’t believe what is right.
    Now, look at her. She doesn’t give a f*ck about her brand or anything and her PR machine is working overtime to clean up every little thing her smelly-looking bf did. It is apparent she is not afraid of backlash, she just didn’t think that defending minorities or women is worth it.

    • SAS says:

      Yeah it’s damning to see that she is MORE than willing to use that giant platform, but only to help herself.

      Heads up the new Swiftie tune for the week just dropped and it’s that it’s “too dangerous” for her to be politically outspoken, and she’s protecting the fans at her shows from potential gun violence. Like, …

    • Char says:

      Someone said this only proves that she’s not in fact adverse to risk. But not for the sake of minorities/LGBT+++, but for Ratty Healys unwashed ass.

  15. SallyS says:

    Joe so dumped her…. It’s like a whole manic spiralling episode we are witnessing right now

  16. Vanessa says:

    This is classic Taylor she trying to deflect attention from Matty disgusting vile racism she been getting rightfully called out . Now she trying to spin this narrative and her fans are saying oh she had this ice spice collaboration in the works but I think she did this recently to rehabilitate her and Matty image . We all know How crazy her fandom is how quickly her white fans will throw racial slurs towards woman of color if it came out that ice spice didn’t want to do the song with her . She used her whiteness again to bully a woman of color into co signing her white feminist Karen behavior.

  17. Arizona says:

    lol the comments here are always so completely unhinged when it’s about a woman that y’all decided you don’t like (Kim, Taylor, Kate) while freaking out about any time someone says something negative about Meghan, for example. feminists only when you like the person apparently? just saying the most vile stuff and that’s fine as long as you agree with everyone else. 😂 just wildly hypocritical. you can criticize someone without name-calling and being rude, y’know.

    • Coco says:

      The only unhinged comment is yours.

    • Spillthattea says:

      You may want to reconsider your life choices if that’s intellectually possible for you.

    • Sara says:

      Since when does being a feminist mean that you can’t criticise other women?

      • Char says:

        Arizona is obviously talking about the particular strand of feminism that don’t give a shit about the WOC who are abused in the porn Taylor’s boyfriend pays for..

    • Kitten says:

      Weaponizing feminism in an attempt to protect your fave celeb from public scrutiny is pretty yucky, actually.

    • Kelly says:

      Thank you Arizona

    • Gee let me think, why is it that the majority of us here support someone that has been systematically hunted and abused by the press for doing nothing wrong, vs. someone that is transparently trying to manipulate public perception over the fact that she is choosing to be with someone who is on record for his vile racism? Nice try. 🙄

    • Lux says:

      @Arizona, you call US rude, but you know what’s more than a little “rude” (as Meghan rightfully pointed out in her Oprah interview)? Racist comments—something both Kate and Taylor’s beaus have in common. Keen and TayTay also love using POC as props so it goes without saying that yes, we don’t like that and no, it’s not hypocritical to consistently not like privileged white people who use less privileged people of color for their own image and benefit. (Btw, thank you for putting their names together there. I’m starting to see similarities/connecting the dots!)

  18. JanetDR says:

    This is my first exposure to Ice Spice and she is gorgeous! I hope something good comes out of this for her.

    • ME says:

      She is beautiful ! She doesn’t need Taylor. Ice Spice is already blowing up !

      • Char says:

        Hope ice spice uses this for what it’s worth.

        Alison “Karen “ Taylor Swift is a cynical narcissist. Apparently she has a new tune on the new version of midnights that’s being rushed through. “ you’re loosing me”-expecting a diss song of Joe. She apparently can’t wait till the next album to write about because a) she’s a super capitalist and b) she has to control the narrative of why they broke up.

      • ME says:

        @ Char

        Wait, Taylor isn’t her first name? It’s Alison? I guess I learned something new today lol thanks !

      • NotClaudia says:

        No, Alison is her middle name – Taylor Alison Swift.

  19. Ellie says:

    I’m regards to an NDA, yes you would need to sign an NDA before even taking a meeting with Taylor. So Taylor has silenced Ice Spice from saying anything bad with a NDA which is gross but at least Ice Spice will get a bigger platform working with Taylor. I’m a fan of Taylor’s music but this whole this is so gross.

    • swiftcreekrising says:

      If the NDA is a real thing, Ice Spice should drop a new song that is in no way related to this exact issue – or get bigger artists behind her and just drop the dime because Taylor comes out looking like trash if/when the truth comes out.

  20. Melissa says:

    Dear Women,

    STOP doing for men the work they need to be doing for themselves. And it would be nice if the media stop constantly putting that burden on women, too.

    • Spillthattea says:

      She’s not that altruistic. She’s not “doing the work” for anyone. She’s trying to save her own sorry a$$ from bad PR and making it 10000000x worse.

  21. Twin Falls says:

    I’m not invested in Taylor Swift as a person outside of her music but I did not see her burning up everything she’s built over a rebound. People are who they are and it comes out eventually.

  22. Kimberly says:

    When I saw this drama unfolding with Swift I had to come to this site LOL!!!

    What can I say? IF Ice Spice wants to be used then, I’m not offended. She strikes me as desperate for fame and fortune in the music industry & will tolerate almost anything. As for Taylor, little miss innocent was good at fooling those who wanted to be fooled…………The new BF looks a mess (physically) and mentally it aligns with her exterior. DISGUSTING. But if this is what Taylor fancies, then she’s found her equal. WATER SEEKS ITS OWN LEVEL. Not sure if I am quoting this correctly.

  23. Kat says:

    As the legendary Dr Maya Angelou said: When people show you who they are, believe them.