UK grime maestro Skepta has apologized and taken down the artwork for his new single after allegations that it referenced the Holocaust.
Skepta is gearing up to release a new album called Knife & Fork — as well as the film Tribal Mark, which will be his directorial debut — and, as part of the rollout, plans to release the new single "Gas Me Up (Diligent)" later this month. On Monday (January 8), he posted the artwork (by artist Gabriel Moses) on Instagram, which is a grainy photographic rendering of a group of men with shaved heads, one featuring "GAS ME UP" tattooed across the back of his scalp.
All of this taken together — the quality of the image, the shaved heads, the men's posture, the tattoo, the title of the song — made for a pretty potent mix that, yeah, could understandably be taken as a reference to the Holocaust, especially with the Nazi practice of tattooing Jewish people in World War II concentration camps and the gas chambers used to kill prisoners at the time. (The slang phrase "gas me up," often used in rap, refers to boosting someone's ego.)
Skepta, however, said that this was not his intention. He apologized on the platform we'll keep calling Twitter last night (January 9), writing that he had removed the artwork (you can still see it here) and promising to "be more mindful going forward."
"I can honestly see how my single artwork without context can be deemed offensive, especially in a time like this, but again that was not my intention," the rapper wrote, explaining that Knife & Fork is about his parents immigrating to the UK in the '80s. Skepta said the art for "Gas Me Up (Diligent)" was meant to reference "Skinhead, Football culture," sharing a screenshot of his moodboard for the accompanying imagery to evoke the era the project was inspired by.
The artist is still planning on releasing "Gas Me Up (Diligent)" on January 26.
Skepta is gearing up to release a new album called Knife & Fork — as well as the film Tribal Mark, which will be his directorial debut — and, as part of the rollout, plans to release the new single "Gas Me Up (Diligent)" later this month. On Monday (January 8), he posted the artwork (by artist Gabriel Moses) on Instagram, which is a grainy photographic rendering of a group of men with shaved heads, one featuring "GAS ME UP" tattooed across the back of his scalp.
All of this taken together — the quality of the image, the shaved heads, the men's posture, the tattoo, the title of the song — made for a pretty potent mix that, yeah, could understandably be taken as a reference to the Holocaust, especially with the Nazi practice of tattooing Jewish people in World War II concentration camps and the gas chambers used to kill prisoners at the time. (The slang phrase "gas me up," often used in rap, refers to boosting someone's ego.)
Skepta, however, said that this was not his intention. He apologized on the platform we'll keep calling Twitter last night (January 9), writing that he had removed the artwork (you can still see it here) and promising to "be more mindful going forward."
"I can honestly see how my single artwork without context can be deemed offensive, especially in a time like this, but again that was not my intention," the rapper wrote, explaining that Knife & Fork is about his parents immigrating to the UK in the '80s. Skepta said the art for "Gas Me Up (Diligent)" was meant to reference "Skinhead, Football culture," sharing a screenshot of his moodboard for the accompanying imagery to evoke the era the project was inspired by.
The artist is still planning on releasing "Gas Me Up (Diligent)" on January 26.