POP STAR SURVIVOR Kesha’s journey
The singer finds her voice again after battling an eating disorder and squaring off in court over sexual assault allegations
The pop star Kesha roared onto the scene 10 years ago, infamously rap-singing about brushing her teeth with a bottle of Jack Daniel’s on her braggadocio breakout hit ‘TiK ToK’. Tapping into the millennial zeitgeist, she earned a reputation as a wild child, unleashing a string of you-only-live-once party anthems, from ‘Your Love Is My Drug’ to ‘Blow’. But the party came to a record-scratching halt in 2014 when the star entered rehab for an eating disorder and sued her producer and record label executive Lukasz ‘Dr Luke’ Gottwald, 46, alleging he drugged and raped and emotionally abused her for a decade. Dr Luke denies the allegations and has countersued for defamation and breach of contract. Their bitter lawsuit culminated in a 2016 hearing in a New York City courthouse, where Kesha sobbed as a judge dismissed her request to be released from her contract. The judge then later dismissed Kesha’s claims, and she remains contractually tied to the producer, whose lawsuit is ongoing.
But the turmoil of the past few years is finally in her rear view. “You can go through s--t and come out the other side swinging,” Kesha, 32, says now. “I want people to know that you don’t have to be defined by your past or be a prisoner of something that you had to go through – you are allowed to find happiness.”
Indeed, Kesha made a triumphant return
with her 2017 album Rainbow, which earned two Grammy nominations. And now the singer – who is launching her Kesha Rose Beauty makeup line – will return to her fun-loving roots with her fourth LP, High Road, due out January 10. “On the last record, I had a lot of serious things to address,” says Kesha. “But now I’m ready to be joyful and happy and make people feel good with songs that capture my love of life, like: Don’t let tomorrow get in the way of having an amazing time today, because you just don’t know how long you have on this earth.”
Raised near Nashville, Kesha (full name: Kesha Rose Sebert) grew up in a musical household with single mother and songwriter Pebe Sebert. After finding success behind the scenes (she’s written hits for artists including Britney Spears), Kesha found overnight fame when ‘TiK ToK’ topped the Hot 100 in January 2010. Over the next three years she rose to ubiquity, becoming a champion for LGBTQ fans while delivering a slew of hits from her albums Animal and Warrior.
Despite the success, Kesha struggled with her party-girl persona. “There is a double standard. People acted like I was Satanic because I was talking about drinking whisky,” she says of flak she received for her image, “but women are allowed to be human beings who go out and party and have sex – it doesn’t mean you’re a bad person.” In 2014, after notching another No. 1 with ‘Timber’ (her collaboration with Pitbull), Kesha revealed her life wasn’t as glittery as it appeared when she sought treatment for bulimia and took on Dr Luke. But beginning with her 2017 hit ‘Praying’, in which she appeared to allude to her alleged victimisation – and her resilience in the face of it – the star is determined to move on. “You can be joyous even if you’ve gone through tragedy,” she says of her current outlook.
Her struggles with a negative body image are also behind her. “In my 20s it was all about how I looked,” she says of confronting her issues. “Now I focus on my soul and my spirit, what my body and mind needs.” She practises self-care by spending time with her partner of six years, writer Brad Ashenfelter, as well as her family and her cats. She’s also learned the value of simply being nice to herself. “I have little mantras on my mirror, like, ‘You’re the s---’ because my therapist told me to – and it makes me laugh,” she says. “Being full of love and happiness is the point of life – I can’t take myself too seriously.”
“I’m ready to be joyful and happy”