{"id":685584,"date":"2026-07-11T06:33:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T06:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/685584\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T06:33:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T06:33:12","slug":"lizzo-answers-her-critics-im-a-fat-black-happy-girl-they-were-always-going-to-try-to-tear-me-down-lizzo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/685584\/","title":{"rendered":"Lizzo answers her critics: \u2018I\u2019m a fat, black, happy girl \u2013 they were always going to try to tear me down\u2019 | Lizzo"},"content":{"rendered":"

On 30 July 2023, Lizzo<\/a> finished a 10-month world tour. She had played 80 shows across North America, Europe, Oceania and Asia, selling more than 853,000 tickets and grossing $86.3m. The rapper turned pop star was on top of the world. Then everything came crashing down.<\/p>\n

Two days later, three of her former dancers alleged that they had been subject to sexual harassment, a hostile work environment, religious and racial discrimination and fat-shaming on the tour. Two had been sacked, and one resigned. After the accusations, there was a huge pile-on from mainstream media and social media. And it seems to have gone on ever since. Lizzo, whose real name is Melissa Viviane Jefferson, disappeared. We were told that she was busy recording the follow-up to her huge hit album Special. But there were also rumours that she\u2019d had a terrible breakdown.<\/p>\n

Last month, the new album, Bitch, was finally released. The reviews were disappointing, and the sales even more so. After her two previous albums had each shifted more than a million units, Bitch failed to make the top 100 in either the US or Britain. It seems that the world was not prepared to forgive Lizzo, whether the allegations were true or not.<\/p>\n

Today, she\u2019s in Los Angeles and we meet by video link. Just as her publicist warns me about topics that are off-limits because of specific legal issues, Lizzo bounds on to the screen, sporting new honey-blond curls, but still with the irrepressible energy of old. She could just as easily be addressing a festival crowd as me and her publicist. \u201cI can\u2019t talk about that, whatever you\u2019re talking about! Hehehe!\u201d She throws her head back and roars with laughter. \u201cWhat\u2019s up y\u2019all? I\u2019m gooooood.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of all the downfalls in the music biz, Lizzo\u2019s is one\u00a0of\u00a0the saddest. She seemed to be such a force for good. She had just stolen the show at Glastonbury<\/a> in 2023, was fabulously talented and the most surprising of role models \u2013 a 325lb, classically trained, sonic sex\u00a0bomb. Lizzo was an old-school preacher with a very modern message about body positivity, sex positivity, diversity positivity; who shook her ass and flaunted her flute in\u00a0the face of the world, and showed us that anything was possible.<\/p>\n

double quotation markYou get to a level of celebrity when your fame overshadows your art. And I\u2019m there!Lizzo at Glastonbury in 2023. Photograph: Samir Hussein\/WireImage<\/p>\n

She represented a culture in which old boundaries and expectations had been vanquished, and we were largely free to be what we wanted to be, so long as we did it with kindness. And then came the allegations. Were they malicious, made to destroy the reputation of a woman who seemed too good to be true? Or was Lizzo a fraud? Could the woman who reclaimed the word \u201cbitch\u201d to proclaim her self-worth in Truth Hurts (\u201cI just took a DNA test, turns out I\u2019m 100% that bitch\u201d) really merit that description in the old-fashioned sense?\u00a0Was\u00a0the artist who celebrated her natural curves in Tempo with the mantra \u201cThick thighs save lives\u201d really a fat-shamer?<\/p>\n

Last December a judge ruled that the fat-shaming allegation did not have enough merit to proceed to a\u00a0civil trial. But we are none the wiser about the other claims. All we know is that Lizzo has insisted that there is no substance to them and has refused to settle out of court. And that it has taken a hell of a lot out of her. In an\u00a0essay she wrote last year on her Substack<\/a> she confirmed she became \u201cdeeply suicidal\u201d and for a\u00a0while had \u201ccut off her loved ones\u201d.<\/p>\n

I tell her I saw her at Glastonbury in 2023 and that she was fantastic. She says she knows she was: \u201cEverything was fantastic at Glastonbury.\u201d She sips from her iced coffee. It was such an amazing time for you, I say. \u201cIt\u2019s\u00a0always an amazing time for Lizzo.\u201d Well, I suggest gently, perhaps the past three years have been on the tough side. Silence. After you\u2019d been so celebrated, things got a little difficult, I suggest. More silence. The raucous belly laughter has gone. I ask how she\u2019s coped. \u201cErmmmm. You get to a level of fame and celebrity when your fame overshadows your art. And I\u2019m there! Ha!\u201d She laughs, but this time there\u2019s not much humour\u00a0in it. \u201cI never signed up to be just a famous person. I was always, like, I\u2019m going to make art for ever. So when my fame precedes me as an artist it can be\u00a0uncomfortable, because people care more about what I said than what I made.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019m baffled by the fulsome answer she gives to a\u00a0question I\u2019ve not asked. It feels like we\u2019re shadow boxing. I\u2019m beating around the bush, and she seems to be hiding in it. I ask what she means by her level of fame preceding her art. \u201cWell, you know, I will put out music and the critique of it is never really about the music: it\u2019s more about me. And I think that comes with being this level of famous. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s unique to me. There\u2019s \u2018I don\u2019t like this person\u2019. And it\u2019s, like, why? It\u2019s not because they made a bad song; you just don\u2019t like them. And now you don\u2019t like their song. It\u2019s an interesting phenomena, but now I\u2019m settling into it.\u201d<\/p>\n

We appear to be having two different conversations. I\u2019m talking about the impact of the accusations and she\u2019s talking about the impact of fame. Gradually I realise that for her they are one and the same thing. She believes the allegations about her behaviour and the way she treated the three dancers came about because of her fame. And now she believes that critics have reviewed Bitch purely through the lens of the scandal.<\/p>\n

double quotation markBeing cruel is trendy and acceptable. We\u2019re seeing it at the top of our society, from the leaders of our society, all the way down to comment sections Photograph: Shaniqwa Jarvis\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Did she ever think she\u2019d have to face up to all this?<\/p>\n

\u201cFace up to what?\u201d she snaps.<\/p>\n

The level of fame and the scrutiny, I say. Suddenly the euphemisms, allusions and coded references to what happened are gone. Now her answer is as direct as you\u2019d expect from straight-talking Lizzo. \u201cNo, I don\u2019t think anybody does. Everything was unexpected. The\u00a0Grammies, unexpected. The number ones, unexpected. The fame, unexpected. The public scrutiny, unexpected. The one thing I did expect was being a fat, black, happy girl, they were going to try to take that away from me. They were always going to try to tear me down. I always knew, from when I\u00a0was a non\u2011famous person, that that makes people uncomfortable. So I kind of signed up for that part.\u201d<\/p>\n

It feels like you\u2019re fighting back on Bitch, I say. \u201cNo,\u00a0I\u00a0don\u2019t think I\u2019m fighting. I am responding. My album is very honest. It\u2019s a real reflection of me and the world right now.\u201d She quotes from a song called A\u00a0Toast: \u201cI hope it makes you happy \/ To hurt somebody else \/ And when you lose it all \/ I hope you find yourself\u201d. The lyrics could be applied equally to the world at large,\u00a0friends who betrayed her, or the people who made the allegations against her. And this is how she would want it \u2013 an all-purpose assault on what she regards as gratuitous nastiness.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe live in a culture where everybody is racing to get the top comment, and the most hurtful comment wins. We\u2019re in a business of hurting each other. I think everybody was so careful about the way we spoke about others, and everybody was holding people accountable for the last few years, and now the pendulum has swung in the opposite direction. Being cruel is trendy and acceptable. And I think we\u2019re seeing it at the top of our society, from the leaders, all the way down to comment sections. We\u2019re seeing cruelty at an all-time high.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last year Lizzo threatened legal action against the Trump administration after it used her song About Damn Time for a military-themed parade in Washington DC. I ask her if she thinks Trump\u2019s America and the Maga movement is a reflection of this cruelty. She says it goes beyond Trump.<\/p>\n

Photograph: Shaniqwa Jarvis\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to talk about American politics. I\u2019ve talked about it a lot. I do think the world is unrecognisable. I\u2019m not speaking about any specific political party, I\u2019m speaking in general.\u201d She points out that A Toast was written in 2021. \u201cThat was before I met\u00a0anyone who made legal claims against me. I\u00a0was already having these crazy revelations; there\u2019s a certain amount of fame and success that will reveal the people\u00a0around you.\u201d<\/p>\n

She insists that the critics are wrong to search every song for references to the allegations. Actually, she says, the overwhelming sense of betrayal is much more personal. \u201cWhat people don\u2019t know is that most of the sad songs on this album are about a friendship breakup that was not public at all.\u201d She talks about Like a Crime, addressed to someone who \u201cBroke my heart and stole my life\u201d. \u201cThat song is about a friend who I was very close with and I employed them and believed in them and they were extremely abusive and lied about me. It was one of the hardest friendship breakups I\u2019ve ever had. I really loved this person, and they secretly hated me and I don\u2019t know why.\u201d<\/p>\n

Did she ever have it out with them? \u201cThe last time we spoke it was, like, \u2018I\u2019m thinking about you, I love you, I hope everything\u2019s OK\u2019, and I was, like, \u2018Oh, I love you too.\u2019 Then a year later they were on the internet talking about how horrible a person I am, and I was so confused because I was, like, \u2018I thought we were good.\u2019 That was the most hurtful thing I\u2019ve experienced in a\u00a0long time.\u201d\u00a0Was this one of the dancers who made the allegations? \u201cNo. This person has no legal claims; they just joined a hate train.\u201d<\/p>\n

Inevitably, she says the tone of Bitch is different from previous albums. Beforehand, she says, there was a\u00a0feelgood element to her music. Sure, she sang about her struggles, but she would always emerge from the depths triumphant. She says the 2019 song Soulmate about lost love is a typical example. \u201cIt\u2019s, like, I\u2019ve got my heart broken, but in the chorus I save myself every time. It\u2019s, like, \u2018Don\u2019t worry, girl, because you\u2019re still feeling good as hell.\u2019 On this album, there\u2019s no resolve. There\u2019s no soft \u2018But I\u2019ll be OK\u2019, because sometimes that\u2019s not the reality. Sometimes you\u2019re not OK for a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the past, she has said she was never quite the happy-go-lucky personality she has been packaged as. It\u2019s not that the happiness is fake, more that it has been offset by periods of deep depression. Even between 2018 and 2021, when she enjoyed her first success, there were times when she couldn\u2019t see the point of facing another day. It\u2019s overcoming the lows that have made the highs so joyous, she says.<\/p>\n

double quotation markI grew up as the swot. As a black girl I wasn\u2019t the norm. I was such a nerd Photograph: Shaniqwa Jarvis\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Lizzo grew up in Detroit, Michigan, and then Houston, Texas. Her parents, Shari Johnson-Jefferson and Michael Jefferson, were Pentecostalists and she was raised in the Church of God in Christ. The pair ran a\u00a0mortgage business until the 2008 financial crisis. Shari\u00a0sang and played organ in church, but early on Lizzo\u2019s parents believed pop was the music of the devil.\u00a0When she was 10 they moved to Houston, and a less orthodox lifestyle. She says her father started to dream of creating a Jackson 5-type family band even though there were only three children \u2013 Lizzo and her older brother and sister.<\/p>\n

The young Melissa Jefferson was a geek and a swot. \u201cI\u00a0was a bookworm. An overachiever. And I was bullied in middle school.\u201d Was she big? \u201cYeah, I was a big girl. But you know in Houston, Texas, everything is big. So it\u2019s not that \u2018Oh my God!\u2019 to be big. I think for me, it\u00a0was, like, I grew up as the swot. As a black girl I wasn\u2019t the norm. I was such a nerd. I was always reading manga comics and books, and I played the flute and was in a\u00a0marching band. I didn\u2019t wear my hair in cool styles. I\u2019d\u00a0wear my hair in little sweaty buns, and I\u00a0wasn\u2019t friends with any of the cool kids. I was very, very about books. I\u2019d\u00a0literally walk into halls reading a\u00a0book. I\u00a0think that\u2019s mostly what I was bullied for. Just being different.\u201d<\/p>\n

Did it bother her or did she think it was a positive? \u201cI\u00a0turned being different into my superpower. I\u00a0remember being like, \u2018You think I want to try to be cool with you. I don\u2019t want to be cool with no fucking bully. I\u2019m good: I have my besties for life.\u2019\u201d She was strong? \u201cI\u00a0didn\u2019t think of it as strong. It was just who I\u00a0was. And then the summer before high school I stopped reading books so much and started rapping and being the class clown and a little smartass.\u201d<\/p>\n

Did that make her more popular? \u201cIt definitely made a difference. I would never consider myself the most popular girl in school, but after that I was friends with all the cool people, with all the basketball players and the cheerleader girls.\u201d So it was a big change? \u201cWell, I was still in marching bands, but luckily I was best friends with the coolest girls in marching bands.\u201d<\/p>\n

Did she ever think she\u2019d end up as a professional classical musician? Her pupils dilate, as they tend to do when she gets passionate. \u201cYes! My absolute dream was to be a principal flutist in an orchestra or the ballet.\u201d She studied classical music on a scholarship at Houston University, but dropped out when her father became ill and the family started struggling for money. Her parents moved to Denver, but she stayed in Austin and ended up homeless, living out of her car for six months. Michael died in 2009 of complications following a stroke. He had been her inspiration and driving force. She lost her hope and her way, and gave up on classical music.<\/p>\n

She began singing, applied to a job advert for a lead vocalist and joined a prog-rock group called Ellypseas. In 2011, she moved to Minneapolis and formed Lizzo &\u00a0the Larva Ink, an electro-funk duo with Johnny Lewis, followed by rap groups the Chalice and GRRRL PRTY. In 2013, she made her first solo album, Lizzobangers. Her pacy rap and stream-of-consciousness rhyming over minimalist electronic beats was compared to Missy Elliott and Outkast. The album was highly praised but not commercially successful. In 2016, she signed to Atlantic Records, and a\u00a0new, more commercial Lizzo evolved. Her third album, Cuz I Love You, was brimming with radio\u2011friendly R&B\u2011pop anthems such as Juice, Tempo and Truth Hurts. She became a star. And then came Special in 2022, which solidified her status.<\/p>\n

Lizzo winning an Emmy in 2022. Photograph: Christopher Polk\/NBC\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

If she could choose now between being a world -famous pop star or principal flautist in an orchestra, what would she opt for? \u201cIn 2026? That\u2019s tough! I think there are pros and cons to both. It kind of equals out.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Really? Most people would assume you\u2019d pick world\u2011famous pop star, I say. \u201cYeah, but I\u2019ve seen it\u2019s not all that it\u2019s cracked up to be. I never really wanted to be famous.\u201d What are the downsides? \u201cFame doesn\u2019t solve any problems. Fame doesn\u2019t make you happier. Fame doesn\u2019t cure depression. Fame doesn\u2019t make your friends any more real. And fame doesn\u2019t guarantee you success. It\u2019s just something that happens to you. I\u2019m\u00a0grateful for the financial freedom I have, but I also know that fame alone ain\u2019t the cure-all you think it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rather than transforming your life, she says, fame simply amplifies what is already there. \u201cI think everything we have, we have. So fame amplified my anxiety, depression, some of my joy. Fame amplified some of the bad habits of people around me that maybe I wouldn\u2019t have seen if I hadn\u2019t been this famous.\u201d What\u00a0does she mean? \u201cI just mean that if your friend was fake before fame, becoming famous shows just how fake they are. Hahaha!\u201d<\/p>\n

The three dancers filed their joint lawsuit in the Los Angeles County superior court on 1 August 2023 against Lizzo, her management company Big Grrrl Touring Inc and her dance captain, Shirlene Quigley, two days after the world tour finished. Crystal Williams and Arianna Davis had been fired from the tour in April and May, respectively, while Noelle Rodriguez resigned in protest after Davis\u2019s dismissal. Davis and Williams had secured their contracts by winning an audition process on Lizzo\u2019s reality show Watch Out for the Big\u00a0Grrrls. Rodriguez was already a successful dancer who had performed with the biggest names in the industry, including Beyonc\u00e9 and Rihanna.<\/p>\n

What made the allegations so shocking was that they were antithetical to all that Lizzo said she stood for. Davis claimed there were \u201cthinly veiled\u201d criticisms about her having put on weight. Lizzo responded that she hired Davis after she had put on weight and, as the reality show\u2019s title suggested, she was looking for big girls. The dancers accused Lizzo of sexual harassment, citing a\u00a0visit to the erotic venue Bananenbar in Amsterdam\u2019s red-light district and alleging Lizzo pressured them into interacting with nude performers, coercing Davis into touching a\u00a0performer\u2019s naked breasts. Lizzo countered<\/a> that only two of the three women had attended the bar after being\u00a0invited among a party of 17, and that any sexual activity had to be voluntary or the bar would immediately be shut down.<\/p>\n

The three dancers also claimed they were subject to a hostile work environment and in April 2023 were put through an \u201cexcruciating\u201d 12-hour re-audition without breaks. They said they were subject to racial and religious discrimination, claiming black dancers were treated differently and alleging that Quigley aggressively proselytised her Christian beliefs and harassed non\u2011believers. (A unified defence team representing Quigley and Lizzo has refuted all the dancers\u2019 allegations.) The dancers also alleged false imprisonment (Davis said she was detained against her will by Lizzo\u2019s security detail and told she could not leave until she submitted her phone to a physical search) and assault, and that their employment was wrongfully terminated, or, in the case of Rodriguez, that she was forced to resign under severe duress.<\/p>\n

On closer inspection, some of the allegations appear to be about what the dancers felt rather than what they experienced. For instance, Rodriguez said she felt Lizzo might have attacked her after she \u201caggressively approached\u201d her while \u201ccracking her knuckles and balling her fist\u201d, swearing and telling her she was \u201clucky\u201d. Davis said she felt she could not ask to go for a bathroom break in the 12-hour re-audition for fear of being fired on the spot. Lizzo and her legal team have dismissed the claims as fabricated, legally baseless and\u00a0driven by personal grievance.<\/p>\n

What Lizzo does seem to admit to is naivety. Not least when it comes to friendship. From the start of her career she worked with friends, or people who quickly became friends. That\u2019s what she loved about it \u2013 they were \u201cfamily\u201d. When success finally came it did so quickly and on a huge scale. It meant that she was suddenly travelling with a big team, and still she\u00a0assumed they\u00a0were all friends. As she found to her cost, they weren\u2019t.<\/p>\n

double quotation markWhat a shame it would be if I were to stop being as open and loving to people just because some people wanted to make things up <\/p>\n

Has what happened to her shaken her idealism? \u201cNo\u00a0\u2026 \u201d she says uncertainly. \u201cI don\u2019t think it changed that. That\u2019s what makes me me.\u201d Did it change anything? Long silence. \u201cI can\u2019t allow other people\u2019s opinions of me to change me. The only thing that can change me is me.\u201d I think that may be something she would like to believe more than something she does believe. \u201cI\u00a0used to give opportunities to strangers and that\u2019s still a beautiful thing. I get fans come to me at the meet and greets for my album, and they\u2019re, like, \u2018Hey, I really want to do graphic design for you\u2019 or \u2018I\u00a0really want to dance with you\u2019 or \u2018I really want to be your personal assistant if you have any job openings.\u2019 And what a\u00a0shame it would be if I were to stop being as open and loving to people who want opportunities just because some people wanted to make things up about me.\u201d It\u00a0would be a\u00a0shame, but I think she\u2019s aware that there have to be greater professional boundaries between her and her employees.<\/p>\n

I ask if lots of people have stood by her? \u201cSimon, if you do good journalism, you will add that everyone from my tour including all of my dancers all wrote statements backing me up. Literally every single personnel team member, dancer and band member from the tour have all wrote statements talking about what an incredible experience it was being on tour with me. They would all hit up my team, saying, \u2018When is she going back on tour? I\u2019d love to go with her.\u2019 This happened, but it wasn\u2019t reported.\u201d It was reported, just not as fully or as often as she would have liked.<\/p>\n

Indeed, a total of 18 former employees did give statements<\/a> saying that it was a supportive and professional environment. They accused the three dancers of unprofessional behaviour, including arriving for shows drunk (which Davis denies<\/a>).<\/p>\n

I say I could imagine that she\u2019s a tough task mistress \u2013 her shows are demanding and obviously have to be rigorously rehearsed. Does she think the three dancers may have confused being demanding for abuse? Another pause. \u201cI\u2019m being really careful about how I\u00a0answer.\u201d The seconds pass. Eventually she answers, but I\u2019m not so sure this is what she was initially going to say. \u201cI think there were people who were very creative, and they wanted to create a story to make it seem that I\u2019m not genuine. I think it\u2019s a fairytale.\u201d (The dancers\u2019 attorney has stated<\/a>: \u201cOur clients have dozens of independent witnesses who support their stories.\u201d)<\/p>\n

When Lizzo first appeared on the call, I didn\u2019t recognise her. Partly because of the blond curls, which give her a very different look, but mainly because she has lost so much weight over the past three years. Even this has been the source of controversy, with her being accused, unfairly, of rejecting her body positive past. It horrified her. \u201cThere was an article saying, \u2018Why do fat girls who lose weight suddenly hate fat girls?\u2019 and I was the image cover. I was, like, \u2018Huh! So they used me as the image to generate user clicks. And the top comment was, like, \u2018Didn\u2019t Lizzo do something like that to promote her album? She\u2019s far from tiny.\u2019 And I\u00a0was, like, now you\u2019re fat-shaming somebody? Everybody thinks they\u2019re such a good person, but are you really a good person if you\u2019re just going to do the same thing you\u2019re accusing somebody else of doing?\u201d<\/p>\n

Lizzo at the Sydney Opera House in 2020. Photograph: Prudence Upton<\/p>\n

I read that initially you lost weight because of depression, I say. \u201cThere are a lot of reasons. People always want to make it one single headline, one single thing. A lot of things can be true at once. I was in a\u00a0place where my physical weight was causing joint pain and aches. I also got to the point where I came off the internet, and all I had was the studio and my thoughts. So I poured myself into the things I could control. My\u00a0body, my lifestyle. My routines and habits. So, yeah, both of those things are true. And this is who I am today,\u201d she says with a flourish. \u201cI\u2019ve gained 20\u00a0pounds since last year, so everyone can ask me about weight gain, too, if they\u2019d like.\u201d There were claims that\u00a0her weight loss was down to Ozempic, something she denies with a resounding \u201cNo!\u201d<\/p>\n

Does she worry that we\u2019re returning to the body fascism of yesteryear? \u201cYes, there\u2019s a system of oppression that is constantly putting pressure on, especially women and especially women in the spotlight. And that system is unrelenting, and it is determined to make you feel shit about yourself. And it won\u2019t stop until you\u2019ve bought every product and you\u2019ve bought into every lie and turned it in on yourself. That system is working at an all-time high right now. What worries me is the effect it\u2019s having on the people it\u2019s oppressing. We need to criticise the system and the mediums that are doing this and not the people it\u2019s affecting because those people are human beings having a human experience. We should have grace and love and support for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grace and love. Big, important words. Perhaps the world should be showing Lizzo a bit more of both. If\u00a0the\u00a0claims against her are malicious and fabricated, it\u2019s an unimaginable thing to have gone through. And even if there were times she was over-tough, or over-intimate, or failed to draw a clear line between employer and friend, to suggest that she is the opposite of everything she stands for seems cruel. It would destroy so many of us and, you sense, for all the bravado, it\u00a0almost did for Lizzo.<\/p>\n

The impact of the scandal is clear to see. Nobody could have imagined in 2023 that Lizzo\u2019s follow-up to Special would fail to chart. I ask her if she feels she has pulled through the worst of it, and whether she is happy\u00a0today. \u201cYeah, I\u2019m happy. It\u2019s not unique to go through a sad period in your life. Everyone goes through\u00a0loss, friendship breakups. Everyone\u2019s been lied on. I just experienced it in front of the world. But I\u2019m not going to let anything destroy me. I\u2019m divinely protected and I\u2019m happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

double quotation markI\u2019m the proof that no matter what happens, you\u2019re gonna wake up and have the opportunity to make that day better than the day beforePhotograph: Shaniqwa Jarvis\/The Guardian. Clothing: Feather boa, Taller Marmo. Sunglasses, Port Tanger at Gogosha Optique. Necklace and earrings, House of Emmanuele. Previous images: Coat, Kilian Kerner. Earrings, Lillian Shalom. Pink Top, Pleats Please Issey Miyake. Sunglasses, ZAHA by Naomie Hadida at Gogosha Optique. Dress, Tyler McGillivary. Bra, CUUP. Rings, Lillian Shalom<\/p>\n

As she says, many friends have stood by her \u2013 some famous, some not. In August 2023, just after the allegations were first aired, Beyonc\u00e9 namechecked Lizzo in a performance of her song Break My Soul (\u201cLizzo! I love you, Lizzo!\u201d). SZA weighed in<\/a>, too, saying: \u201cBased on the values and the energy that I see in my friend, I just really think that she\u2019s a beautiful person\u201d. Lizzo has also thanked her boyfriend<\/a>, the comedian and actor Myke Wright, for being \u201cextremely supportive\u201d, saying, \u201cHe doesn\u2019t ask for shit from me, nor does he need shit from me. He pours into me. He takes care of me.\u201d<\/p>\n

She tells me she\u2019s ahead of the rest of the world. While we\u2019re still obsessed with the allegations and the impact on her, she has moved beyond that. \u201cI get it. It is a big thing that happened to me. But it\u2019s so behind me. Maybe it\u2019s not behind the general public or the media, but it\u2019s so behind me.\u201d She points out that the album ends with Goodmorning!, a song that embraces the present and shoves the past back where it belongs. \u201cI\u2019m the proof that no matter what happens, you\u2019re gonna wake up and have the opportunity to make that day better than the day before,\u201d she says now. This is Lizzo, the queen of positivity, speaking. I desperately want to believe her. But I\u2019m not entirely convinced.<\/p>\n

How can she have put it all behind her when the case is still proceeding? A few weeks ago, on Instagram, she\u00a0put\u00a0out an alternative version to the song Bitch, with\u00a0the lyrics: \u201cI fantasise about the trial and exposing\u00a0the lies \/ Then everyone will see that they was plotting on my demise.\u201d<\/p>\n

I ask her if there is a difference between Lizzo and Melissa. Her pupils are now so dilated they have virtually taken over the screen. \u201cThere is now. There\u2019s a huge difference now. Lizzo was my nickname since I was 14 and I was Lizzo to everybody. But now I put Lizzo in the front to protect Melissa.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who have I been talking to today? \u201cYou\u2019ve been talking to Lizzo.\u201d She roars with that familiar larger-than-life laugh. \u201cLizzo, the diva, the pop star.\u201d How different is Melissa from Lizzo? \u201cNot that different, it\u2019s just the stakes are higher. Melissa needs to be protected. Lizzo can go out there and do interviews with sharpshooters like you and can perform on stage and can go on Twitter and be a troll. Melissa needs to be protected. The girl who wants everyone to be happy, the girl who wants to just help, the girl with the pure heart and pure intentions, she needs to be protected.\u201d<\/p>\n

I tell Lizzo it\u2019s been great to meet her. And I tell Melissa to look after herself.<\/p>\n

Bitch is out now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On 30 July 2023, Lizzo finished a 10-month world tour. She had played 80 shows across North America,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":685585,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6491,96,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-685584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=685584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/685585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=685584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=685584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=685584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}