Lizzo is addressing the reception to her latest album, Bitch, which made headlines this month after failing to chart on the Billboard 200 despite her previous album, Special, debuting at Number Two with 69,000 equivalent album units earned in 2022.
Of course, public perception of the Grammy-winning artist has changed within the few years between albums. In 2023, her former backup dancers accused her of sexual harassment, creating a hostile work environment, and fat-shaming in a lawsuit that has yet to be settled. During a recent interview with Zachary Hourihane, a.k.a. the Swiftologist, on his podcast Proto Pop, Lizzo opened up about fans and the music industry perceiving Bitch as a commercial failure and how she felt as she saw the numbers on her latest project filter in.
When asked how she felt following the album’s release, Hourihane requested a “real answer, not a PR line.”
“I’m not going to rush you. There’s no rush for you to fall in love with the music, honey. I’ve never been that girl. I think right now — this is the non-PR — I hurt my own feelings,” Lizzo replied. “I was really stressed and I was really sad for a few days. Because I was like wait a minute, this is some of my best stuff. I want people to find it. I had to come to terms with the fact that not only is the music industry different, in the last three years — and we need to talk about that and we need to talk about the radio aspect that I got my ass chewed out for, but it’s happening and it’s true — but also my relationship and my connection musically with the world is different.”
The artist said that she’s “had to mourn that.” Ultimately, she decided to “shake it off and move forward.” She added, “That’s why I’m in this studio today because, well, what are you gonna do? You have to keep going.”
Bitch dropped on June 5 and within its first week, the album sold 2,649 copies and brought in just under 2.7 million on-demand streams, according to music data company Luminate. In its second week, sales dropped to 650 units, while streams dipped to just under 900,000.
Elsewhere in the conversation, Lizzo and Hourihane discussed the “Khia Asylum” — a controversial term used online to refer to formerly successful pop stars who have faded from the spotlight. The phrase has been criticized for being misogynistic in nature, as mainly female pop stars are targeted by the term. “First of all, I was so shocked when people kept saying Khia because it’s about Khia, the rapper, ‘My Neck, My Back.’ We still talk about her, her record,” Lizzo said. “I think that is even backhanded in itself to name it after this extremely talented, incredible pillar in the Black community and in Black rap music. Then it’s this weapon that targets only women, and a lot of Black women.”
“I think it’s a tool to bully artists and have power over them. It probably used to mean something but now I think it’s nonsense,” Lizzo continued. “I feel like I can’t be in the Khia Asylum. I have Grammys and world records in music. I have Number Ones. I have a diamond record. I am a successful artist.”
