Chappell Roan Calls Out Record Labels After Winning First Grammy Award

As the 26-year-old singer took the stage at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles to accept her first Grammy for Best New Artist, the “Pink Pony Club” winner used her time to call out record labels.

“I told myself, if I ever won a Grammy and I got to stand up here in front of the most powerful people in music,” she said while reading from a journal. “I would demand that labels and the industry profiting millions of dollars off or artists, would offer a livable wage and healthcare, especially to developing artists.”

As she said that, the area broke into roaring applause.

Amongst those cheering, was Taylor Swift giving the artist a standing ovation. Swift has also been vocal in the past for struggling artists and for streaming services to pay them more.

Roan then recalled being dropped by her first label when she was a minor and being left without job experience and health insurance.

She then opened up about struggling to get job during the pandemic and battling feeling “so committed to my art” and yet “so betrayed by the system and so dehumanized to not have health [insurance].”

“And if my label would have prioritized artist health, I could have been provided care by a company I was giving everything to,” she added. “So record labels need to treat their artists as valuable employees with a livable wage and health insurance and protection.”

“Labels, we got you, but do you got us?” she concluded.

Elsewhere in her speech, Roan — real name Kayleigh Amstutz — also revealed to the crowd where her stage name comes from.

“Thank you to my fellow nominees, whose music got me through this past year,” she said before adding, “my friends and my family, and — above all — my poppa Chappell, who I named myself after.”

Chappell’s stage name is a tribute to her late grandfather Dennis K. Chappell, who died in 2016 after a battle with brain cancer.

The second part was inspired by the Curley Fletcher song “The Strawberry Roan.”