Oof, Bebe Rexha is NOT HERE for misleading titles and fake rivalries.
We’re all well aware of the dangers of having our words used against us. Even more so when your every word could mean the difference between helping a situation or adding fuel to the fire. Unfortunately, even when you are as careful as you can be, it’s difficult to stop people from picking and choosing what they deem “media-worthy.” This seems to be the case with Bebe Rexha’s careful handling of the alleged feud between artists of Albanian heritage Rita Ora and Dua Lipa. Over the weekend, British tabloid newspaper The Sun posted an article with the title:
“Rita Ora and Dua Lipa’s feud will NEVER end, even though I tried to help, reveals Bebe Rexha”
The 31-year-old ‘I Got You’ hitmaker was having none of it though, taking to Twitter to call the article an “awful story” made up about her “friends and women” she admires. She went on to deem the article “toxic gossip” that “is malicious and NOT ******* TRUE!”.
Following her tweet, the publication site has changed the title of the article to on relating to her Grammy miss back in 2019 (Rexha had been nominated in the ‘Best Country Duo/Group Performance’ category thanks to her collaboration with Florida Georgia Line on ‘Meant To Be’). Nevertheless, Rexha’s comments on the alleged feud are still in the article. This was apparently said in relation to Bebe Rexha having wanted all the singers with Albanian heritage – Ava Max, Dua Lipa and Rita Ora – to collaborate with her on her latest project, Better Mistakes. According to the article in The Sun, Rexha is described as believing that the collaboration would “never happen because of the feud between Dua and Rita.”
“I have really tried. I don’t know what’s really going on there or what the drama is. I’ve tried to always be the peace-keeper and bring the girls together . For me, I would really love to do something together but I’m not sure that will ever happen. And I won’t say any more about that.”
Rexha went on to comment on the toxic nature of the music industry – and the media, as an extension – that sees women often pitted against each other in an industry that sees more men than women make it big.
“It’s sad that there’s an unspoken competitiveness because I see it as, ‘How awesome is it that we all have our own levels of success?’ I would love for it to happen because I know all of these girls individually and they’re all awesome chicks.”
Speaking to the LA Times, the singer talked about ‘Baby I’m Jealous’ and how it reflected a real moment in her life (where she felt like her then-boyfriend was doing some shady stuff on the Internet, making her kind of jealous of the girls that he liked the pictures of).
“Yeah, but I don’t like being jealous. As a woman in this industry, I was taught this competitiveness, and when I wrote the song I was going through that — comparing myself to everybody, which is so unhealthy. […] [The music industry is] the most toxic industry there is.”
She’s definitely come a long way since, as she discusses with Fly FM’s Dan in an instalment of #FlyInterviews –
*Cover image credits: @dualipa / @beberexha / @ritaora