Kesha sent a powerful message to JoJo on Thursday, assuring the former teen superstar that no matter what trials and tribulations she’s gone through in her career, she’s a powerful woman who can’t be broken. “I wanna shout out to @iamjojo & say I’m proud of you,” Kesha wrote to JoJo a day after the singer announced the Oct. 14 release of her first full-length album in more than a decade, Mad Love.
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Currently embroiled in her own label fight following a lawsuit against former mentor/producer Dr. Luke that she has said is preventing her from releasing new music, Kesha tweeted that she’s been following JoJo’s story and feels her pain. “Ur STRONG,” she told the now-25-year-old singer who first broke through in 2004 with the No. 1 smash “Leave (Get Out),” but whose career progress stalled after 2006’s The High Road due to conflicts with her former label.
“They can’t break you and they don’t own you,” Kesha counseled.
I wanna shout out to @iamjojo & say I’m proud of you. Been following your story. Ur STRONG. They can’t break you and they don’t own you. —-
— kesha (@KeshaRose) July 29, 2016
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JoJo returned the love a short time later, tweeting, “Hi wonderful woman. Our voices are OURS. We cannot be made to sit down & shut up.” She also wished Kesha a great time on her tour and reassured the “Tik Tok” singer that she’s on her team as well.
Hi wonderful woman. Our voices are OURS. We cannot be made to sit down & shut up. U have the victory! All my LOVE. https://t.co/nJh1P5JkHF
— JoJo. (@iamjojo) July 29, 2016
. @KeshaRose have an AMAZING time on tour! Soak in the epic love your fans have for U + how many of us are on ur team. — thinking of you. xX
— JoJo. (@iamjojo) July 29, 2016
The outreach from Kesha came on the same day that an interview with JoJo appeared on Popsugar.com‘s “Pretty Unfiltered” web series, in which the former teen star discussed some of the traumatic things that happened to her early in her career. “Here’s something that I agreed to do that ended up messing with me psychologically,” JoJo told host Kirbie Johnson. “I was under a lot of pressure with a company I was at previously and they wanted me to lose weight fast. So they got me with a nutritionist and had me, like, on all these supplements, and I was injecting myself — this is a common thing ‘the girls’ do all the way — it makes your body only need certain calories, so I ate 500 calories a day. It was the most unhealthy thing I’ve ever done.”
JoJo said she felt that if she didn’t follow the dangerous diet — which contained far less than what is considered a healthy amount of calories per day — that her album would not come out and her career would be over. “Which it didn’t! So it’s not like it even worked!” she said.
In January 2014, Kesha entered a Chicago-area rehab facility for an eating disorder that her mother, Pebe, described as bulimia. According to her lawsuit against Luke, at one point he allegedly called her a “fat f—ing refrigerator” during a shoot for the “Die Young” video.
Kesha hasn’t released a new album since 2012’s Warrior, arguing that her contract with Luke is preventing her from working with another producer, a claim her label, Sony Music has denied. In February, a New York Supreme Court justice denied the singer’s request for a preliminary injunction to release her from Luke’s Kemosabe Records and her suit in California accusing Luke (born Lukasz Gottwald) of rape and other abuse was put on hold due to a contract provision that requires any disputes to be handled in New York rather than Los Angeles.