The pair performed their new track "Raising Hell."
Tre'vell AndersonIf the music industry has gotten one thing right over the last five years, it’s that the best way to ensure an artist has a bop on their album is to have Big Freedia slide through with a feature. Just ask RuPaul (on “Peanut Butter”), Drake (on “Nice For What”), and the queen herself, Beyoncé (on “Formation”). The latest artist adding on the Bounce legend is Kesha. The pair performed the songstress’ latest single, “Raising Hell,” last night on Jimmy Kimmel Live! It’s an unlikely pairing, but we love to see Freedia getting these coins.
“Big Freedia came on the Kesha cruise, and that’s where we met,” Kesha recently told Rolling Stone. “I’d never been on a cruise before, and I was a little terrified, because I just watched the Fyre Fest documentary. And the first night, Big Freedia played, and I was like, ‘Oh, this is going to be the best four days of my life.’ And it was so much fucking fun.”
The duo got matching tattoos on their hands and Freedia even pulled Kesha on stage to dance.
‘I have a fucked-up knee from when I tore my ACL, and she was like, ‘Sit on the dick!’ And I was like, ‘I can’t sit on the dick. Only my right knee’s working,’” she recalled. “And then by the end of it, we were both like, ‘We have to collaborate. This is too good.’ And then we wrote ‘Raising Hell,’ and I was like, ‘OK, if this is going to maybe be the first single, I really want Freedia on it.'”
“Raising Hell” will appear on Kesha’s upcoming album High Road, which is due out January 10th. The album is slated to include collabs with Dan Reynolds of Imagine Dragons and Nate Ruess of Fun., among others.
When the track first dropped along with a music video, it was critiqued by some for using Freedia’s voice and not her image — which Drake and Beyoncé also did. Drake did circle back and include Freedia in his “In My Feelings” video which he shot in New Orleans, but only after Freedia first contacted him. Beyoncé brought out Freedia during her New Orleans tour stop.
RELATED | Kesha Is Back ‘Raising Hell’ With a New Song and Music Video
Big Freedia and Kesha Twerked on National Television
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