Courtney Love Reacts to Doja Cat Covering Her Song ‘Celebrity Skin’
Rapper Doja Cat and singer Courtney Love have been known for dabbling in various sounds throughout their careers. In early 2022, Doja ventured into uncharted territory once again with a cover of “Celebrity Skin,” the hit song by Love’s old band Hole.
Doja Cat covered ‘Celebrity Skin’ by Hole
In the late 1990s, Hole had already established itself as a successful band. Love had moved on from the untimely death of her husband Kurt Cobain in 1994 and was a rockstar in her own right.
In 1998, Hole released “Celebrity Skin” as the lead single from their third album of the same name. The Celebrity Skin album remains Hole’s most commercially successful project, peaking at number nine on the Billboard 200 albums chart and having sold over 1 million copies in the US.
The song commented on the celebrity machine and everything it entailed — something Love spoke about in the following years in an issue of Select magazine. “Once you’ve stood onstage bleating your schoolgirl poetry, are you going to stay there, when you have the power and ability to give yourself a platform?” she said. “I mean, here’s the celebrity, and we all know it’s stupid and ephemeral, but why not foster it? Why not feed it? Because all that it will do is give the thing that has substance — the art — more power.”
Doja Cat, the award-winning rapper behind hits like “Say So,” covered “Celebrity Skin” in early 2022. The cover was done as part of her Super Bowl commercial with Taco Bell.
Courtney Love responded to Doja Cat’s cover
Doja Cat released the cover on streaming services ahead of the Super Bowl. “I didn’t spend all day in the studio recording this cover for@TacoBell’s commercial for you not to listen to the full version,” she said in a tweet, attaching a behind-the-scenes video of just how she brought the song to life.
Love, meanwhile, was happy that her song was being honored in such a way by a successful artist of today. “Look what me & @DojaCat did with my song,” the rocker said in a tweet. In a follow-up tweet, she emphasized her love for the young femcee and told her that she had officially crossed over into rock: “Add rock goddess to your resume.”
Courtney Love called out Olivia Rodrigo in 2021
Doja Cat has become a favorite artist for Gen Z, as has Olivia Rodrigo, the hitmaking singer from High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. In 2021, after her breakout, Rodrigo released a promo of her wearing a crown and flowers with a tear of mascara running down her face.
Love noticed that the photo contained many of the same elements of Hole’s 1994 album Live Through This, and called out the young singer for seemingly not giving credit where credit was due.
“Stealing an original idea and not asking permission is rude. There’s no way to be elegant about it,” Love said plainly in a Facebook comment. “It’s rude not to be asked.”
