Hold up, wait a minute. On Tuesday, March 8, Kelly Clarkson took to Twitter to clarify prior comments she made about being “blackmailed” by RCA Records into working with producer Dr. Luke.
During a Sunday, March 6, interview with the Kyle & Jackie O show, the “Piece by Piece” singer, 33, slammed Dr. Luke’s character in response to allegations of sexual abuse in his ongoing fight with Kesha over a six-record contract. Clarkson also claimed that she was forced into making music with the famed hitmaker against her will.
“Want to clarify that my current regime at @RCARecords is not the same one who forced me to work w/Dr. Luke,” she wrote. “Peter Edge is rad & a good dude!” (Edge is the current chairman and CEO of RCA Records.)
Want to clarify that my current regime at @RCARecords is not the same one who forced me to work w/Dr. Luke. Peter Edge is rad & a good dude!
— Kelly Clarkson (@kelly_clarkson) March 8, 2016
As Us Weekly previously reported, the American Idol alum’s last collaboration with Dr. Luke (real name: Lukasz Gottwald) was on her hit 2009 track “My Life Would Suck Without You.”
“I only worked with him because, literally, I got blackmailed by my label. They were like, ‘We will not put your album out if you don’t do this,’” she originally said of the experience. “It was a really hard time for me.”
A spokesperson for Gottwald, 42, responded to Clarkson’s allegations by sharing an excerpt from her legendary musical mentor Clive Davis’ 2013 memoir, The Soundtrack of My Life, with Digital Spy.
The section of the book purportedly tells the story of how Dr. Luke and the three-time Grammy winner clashed from the get-go while recording the Max Martin–penned songs “Since U Been Gone” and “Behind These Hazel Eyes” for her 2004 sophomore album, Breakaway.
“Max and Luke are very strong, hands-on producers in the studio. They are intent on getting perfect vocal performances, and are relentless in that pursuit,” writes former RCA Records CEO Davis, 83. “It was hard for Kelly, who had come from the high of winning American Idol and then having a double platinum album. You’re young, everybody recognizes you everywhere you go. It’s heady, and all that attention affects all Idol winners.
“But then suddenly you’re in an entirely different world of making records in a studio, and you have to take direction,” he added. “Kelly didn’t like it. Max and Luke were relentless in getting the right performance of their song. Kelly got her back up, and from her perspective, she had a horrible experience in the studio. She’d never work with them again, she said.”
Still, Clarkson stands behind her assessment of Dr. Luke as a person. “Unfortunately, when you have that poor of character, like, so many artists don’t like you and don’t like working with you,” she said during her Kyle & Jackie O interview. “You know, that’s not normal. I get along with everybody I work with. He’s just not a good guy for me.”
