India.Arie calls out Justin Timberlake and Jimmy Fallon for stealing from her
The singer came out swinging on social media when she heard about the late night show's post-Super Bowl skit.
Justin Timberlake has been rubbing a lot Black folks the wrong way lately and it seems his latest victim is India.Arie.
The “I Am Not My Hair” singer has taken issue with a skit JT starred in on The Tonight Show after his boring big Super Bowl halftime show performance. In the skit, Timberlake teams up with the show’s host, Jimmy Fallon, to “sing” their way through a conversation. The skit is entitled “Songversation,” the same title as Arie’s fifth studio album released in 2013.
A sacred meaning
India.Arie maintains that she has also used the word “songversation” in her tours and insists she “cultivated” the term.
READ MORE: Access Denied: Justin Timberlake’s Prince ‘tribute’ does not reinstate his cookout invite
The Grammy-winning artist believes the word is “sacred” and that the title of Tonight Show skit is disrespectful. Arie accused Fallon and Timberlake of appropriating the word and she took to Twitter to go all the way off in a series of posts that make clear she’s not to be trifled with.
https://twitter.com/indiaarie/status/960484880651038720
https://twitter.com/indiaarie/status/960485445170814978
https://twitter.com/indiaarie/status/960490737593913344
https://twitter.com/indiaarie/status/960494843578540032
https://twitter.com/indiaarie/status/960492734766338049
https://twitter.com/indiaarie/status/960502846033678336
READ MORE: India Arie speaks out after being swatted by Lady Gaga’s security at the Grammys
Now that India.Arie has gone on record that she’s personally offended by the skit, we will have to wait and see if Jimmy Fallon or Justin Timberlake decide to respond.
So far, it seems Twitter fans are squarely in her corner.
@jimmyfallon @jtimberlake🤦🏽♀️🤦🏽♀️🤦🏽♀️🤦🏽♀️my favorite artist in the whole wide world woke up feeling disrespected this morning…#Songversation is a movement of light, love and realness…turning it into a bunch of badly sung jokes is just 🤦🏽♀️🤦🏽♀️ https://t.co/tZBGYiZVci
— TeeTee (@neek_uhh) February 5, 2018
Unacceptable. Apologies are in order . Her works are healing art for the world. https://t.co/Dyo4kOr0My
— 1stLady aka Dj 1stLady (@CeibaChavez) February 5, 2018
https://twitter.com/YNB/status/960500906570670081
Timberlake backlash
While Jimmy Fallon usually manages to stay above the fray (except that time he got dragged for normalizing then candidate Donald Trump and petting his hair), this is just the latest in a long list of sins against Black culture Justin Timberlake has been involved in recently.
There was outrage last month over Timberlake’s Man of the Woods album release and listening party reportedly scheduled to be held at Prince’s Minneapolis estate, Paisley Park.
It wasn’t just the location that Prince fans were upset about, it was the fact that JT would be serving alcohol at his party, despite the fact that Prince was a devout Jehovah’s Witness and abstained from drinking.
Prince fans were also quick to point out on social media that Timberlake had dissed Prince in the past on Timbaland’s 2007 song, “Give It To Me.”
In response to Prince’s statement that “sexy never left” in response to f Timberlake’s hit, “Sexy Back,” Justin sang, “We missed you on the charts last week/ Damn, that’s right you wasn’t there/ Now if se-sexy never left, then why is everybody on my s**t/ Don’t hate on me just because you didn’t come up with it.”
Needless to say, JT’s Prince tribute during his lackluster Super Bowl Halftime show and his failure to bring out Janet Jackson to make amends for #Nipplegate didn’t go over well and this latest offense against India.Arie is just another reason to side eye the star.
