22nd June, 2021
By Taiwo Okanlawon
American singer Faheem Rasheed Najm also known as T-Pain has revealed how Usher made him sink into a depression.
The music star made the revelation in a new clip from the Netflix series This Is Pop Show.
According to T-Pain, the pair were flying to the 2013 BET Awards when an attendant woke him up and explained that Usher wanted to speak with him.
T-Pain was asleep in first class. “I was awakened by the flight attendant,” T-Pain says in the clip. “She said, ‘Usher would like to talk to you in the back.’”
“Usher was my friend,” T-Pain said. “I respect Usher. And he said, ‘I’m gonna tell you something, man. You kinda fucked up music.’”
The comment took T-Pain by surprise, and he initially thought it could’ve been a joke, but Usher then repeated himself.
He said that Usher then added, “‘Yeah man you fucked 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 fucked it up.’ I’m like, ‘But I used it, I didn’t tell everybody else to start using it.’”
“I don’t even think I realized this for a long time,” T-Pain says, “but that’s the very moment that started a four-year depression for me.”
However, T-Pain later added Usher’s comment is “not as big a deal as he perhaps made it seem.
He tweeted: “I still love and respect @Usher telling that story was in no way meant to disrespect that man. Ppl talk s*** about me 24/7 but when it comes from someone you truly respect it hits very different.”
“I never said f*** Ursh it was a drop in the ocean of s*** I was already going through,” he added.