Is it ok for indie artists from a white middle-class background to cover rap music about the black community’s experience with racism?

It’s one of the loaded questions that’s been raised and aimed directly at Melbourne singer-songwriter Courtney Barnett after the AIR Breakthrough Indie Artist nominee performed a laconic cover of Kanye West’s ‘Black Skinhead’ for Triple J’s Like A Version segment last Friday.

Barnett performed a wry version of the Yeezus single live on air (with her backing band the Courtney Barnetts) and has also been playing the song live in her sets opening for Big Scary on their national tour.

Following online backlash from a Fairfax Media columnist citing the cover as ignorant and potentially racist, the singer-songwriter has responded by saying she “misjudged” her rendition of “Black Skinhead”.

In her Triple J performance, Barnett admits she “doesn’t know much about hip hop,” but is regularly asked about it because of her unique songwriting – with its “very wordy” lyrics, everyday pathos, and off-kilter narratives. She also explained to Triple J Breakfast hosts Tom Ballard and Alexy Dyson, “I’m sorry I had to change some words,” about her ‘Black Skinhead’ cover.

In a post on her personal blog, Australian writer and Fairfax columnist Clem Bastow took great issue with what she deemed Courtney Barnett’s misappropriation of Kanye West’s hit that completely ignored and even undermined its context as an indictment on America’s long-running history of racism.

“This is one of the most infuriating and embarrassing things I have ever seen,” begins Bastow, who takes the 24-year-old musician to task for the comical changes to Kanye West’s rap; “Who cares about a black man’s experience of racism (integral to the song) that you clearly feel uncomfortable singing because YOU ARE NOT A BLACK MAN,” writes Bastow.


Speaking to The Music about the Kanye West cover, Barnett says: “I chose this song because I wanted to challenge myself as a musician, that was my only intention. I respect and admire the original song and artist. My misjudgement was tackling the arrangement of this song without considering the wider context of the lyrics.”

In a formal follow-up piece for Daily LifeBastow further admonished Barnett’s “clueless cover” as a bad idea that’s “indicative of the shallow level of engagement that so many people have with rap and hip hop.”

Likening Barnett’s cover to the Hey Hey controversy, Bastow says it fails to appreciate the social and political context of Kanye West’s “meditation on what it’s like to be a black man in America.” 

“Though it might seem like a harmless bit of fun, in my book,” writes Bastow, “this is nearly as embarrassing for Australia in a global context as the Hey Hey blackface debacle – and people will see and hear it that way.”

The Fairfax writer emphasises that, “this is not to say ‘nobody can cover a rap song ever’, but rather that artists should tread carefully when choosing songs with an autobiographical or political theme to reinterpret if it is miles away from their own experience.”

In related news, Kanye West recently announced a North American tour in support of Yeezus, his first headline shows in 5 years, and took to Late Night With Jimmy Fallon to perform the album’s closing track ‘Bound 2’ with house band and forthcoming Falls Festival headliners The Roots, a children’s choir, a soul singer, and altered some of his own lyrics from ‘bitches’ to ‘chickens’ – coincidentally the same trick Courtney Barnett pulled for her version ‘Black Skinhead’

Courtney Barnett continues her national tour with Big Scary, has just been announced as the opening act for the Billy Bragg Australian Tour 2014, and plays Meredith Music Festival this December, presumably with her ‘misjudged’ Kanye cover dropped from the setlist.

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