Auto-tune crooner T-Pain may be responsible for the evolution of Hip-Hop music in the early 2010s but according to fellow musician Usher Raymond, he ruined the genre.
Watch: T-Pain reveals what Usher told him
In a snippet taken from a Netflix series This Is Pop, T-Pain opened up about the root cause of what became a four-year depression.
In 2013, the I’m Sprung star was on a flight trip to the BET Awards with Usher, who was a close friend of his at the time. According to T-Pain, a flight attendant rocked him out of sleep, informing him that Usher wanted his audience.
Little did he know, the Confessions singer had a few blunt words to unbottle from his chest.
“Usher was my friend. I really respect Usher. And he said, ‘I’m gonna tell you something, man. You kinda f****d up music,'” Pain recalled.
Usher’s brutal confession sent his friend into a deep state of depression that went on for four years.
A highly revered vocalist with a cult following of women who would trade anything for a glance to be cast their way was informing T-Pain who, at the time, was already faced with harsh criticism for his mechanically adjusted voice (harken back to Jay-Z’s Death of Autotune), that he was the reason music lost it’s true essence.
“‘Yeah man you really f****d up music for real singers.’ I was like, ‘What did I do? I came out and I used Auto-Tune.’ He was like, ‘Yeah, you f****d it up.’ I’m like, ‘But I used it, I didn’t tell everybody else to start using it,’” T-Pain added.
Here’s the clip where T-Pain spoke candidly about the heartbreak Usher caused him:
I hate how the world did T-Pain. pic.twitter.com/6Ib9dzHTjY
— FKA Carly Beth (@LoggingInIsBad) June 21, 2021
Social media guns after Usher
As soon as the snippet landed on social media, it took off. It seems Usher can’t catch a break from taking backlash, be it from snide comments he made about Nicki Minaj, to the infamous ‘usher bucks‘ that ruined the reputation of a Las Vegas stripper.
Here are some of the reactions we picked out from the trending topic:
Usher put T-Pain into depression by saying autotune f*cked up music and then went and released “OMG” a song full of autotune that went No.1. This man a whole demon
— Wow (@wowistaken) June 21, 2021
T-Pain is one of the nicest most genuine people I’ve met and everyone at Adult Swim loves him, he’s family. Usher, Jay Z, Kanye, and Future (among many others) owe him an apology. He’s a pioneer and they weren’t ready. That’s on THEM. https://t.co/XpCrHWHGxz
— SPIRAL CURSE DEMARCO (@Clarknova1) June 22, 2021
First of all, why Usher sending some flight attendant to 1. wake up T-Pain while he sleeping and 2. tell him to get up & go see that fool Usher in another section of the plane?? What kinda bush is that?!? pic.twitter.com/0OZ1wdAxI8
— Chris Tina (@LisasTurtle) June 22, 2021
usher raymond the mf 4th said what to T-PAINNNNN??? pic.twitter.com/osnuRGqIbO
— SPINDELLA (@allednips) June 22, 2021