Christian P. Pewitt Blogs: R. Kelly Answers Critics With 'Admit'

Tuesday, July 24, 2018

R. Kelly Answers Critics With 'Admit'

R. Kelly has released “I Admit,” which superficially addresses sexual misconduct allegations against him. In the new 19-minute song, released on Soundcloud, Kelly touches on a range of subjects, including the allegations of luring women into a “sex cult” and accusations that he preys on under age women

Despite the name of the song, Kelly doesn’t really cop to any of those things.

In the song, Kelly denies many of the allegations against him, including the claim that he’d organized a “sex cult.” The accusations, first leveled against Kelly by veteran music journalist Jim DeRogatis, alleged that Kelly kept a stable of young, “brainwashed” women at his homes in Atlanta and Chicago as sexual “pets.”

n May, a BBC documentary spoke to one of the alleged pets Kitti Jones, who described being groomed by Kelly. Jones claimed that Kelly created a controlled environment, where the women needed to request permission to use the bathroom and were prevented from speaking to family. Kelly has denied the allegations.

In “I Admit” Kelly called out DeRogatis, suggesting that the journalist had been persecuting Kelly to benefit his own career.

“trying to destroy me for 25 whole years
Writing the same stories over and over again
Off my name, you done went and made yourself a career”

Kelly also addressed allegations that he has an unhealthy interest in underaged women, a charge that has dogged him since 1994 when he was accused of secretly marrying the singer Aaliyah, who was 14 at the time.

Kelly was also prosecuted in 2002 after a video surfaced that appear to show him engaged in sexual acts with an underaged girl. After a long trial, he was acquitted by a Chicago jury.

At the same time, police in Florida searched his home, where they alleged that they found 12 videos which appeared to show Kelly performing sex acts with underage women, but the charges were later dropped due to a lack of probable cause for the search warrants.

In “I Admit” Kelly touched on these allegations but didn’t quite deny them.

“I admit I fuck with all the ladies
that’s both older and young ladies
But tell me how they call it pedophile
because of that, shit is crazy,”

Kelly’s ballad also touches on his financial and legal woes, in which he largely seems to view himself as a victim.

"Now the truth in this message is I’m a broke-ass legend,
the only reason I stay on tour is ’cause I gotta pay my rent
I never thought it would come to this, to be the most disrespected artist
So I had to write a song about it
Because they always take my words and twist it
Believe me, it’s hard to admit all this.”