Chappell Roan hits back Hollywood Reporter op-ed – calling for $25k donation match and spotlighting rising artists

Chappell Roan hit back at a controversial Hollywood Reporter op-ed on her 2025 Grammys speech, calling on the writer to match her $25,000 donation to rising artists while also spotlighting some of her favourite rising stars.

• READ MORE: On The Cover – Chappell Roan: the pop supernova who feels like one of the ‘Drag Race’ girls

On Sunday (February 2), the former NME Cover star won her first Grammy at this year’s ceremony. While collecting the award for Best New Artist, she called out the music industry and “demanded that labels in the industry profiting millions of dollars off of artists would offer a liveable wage and health care, especially developing artists.”

In response, Jeffrey Rabhan – a longtime music executive and former Chair of NYU’s Clive Davis Institute – wrote a guest column for The Hollywood Reporter, calling her Grammys speech “misguided” and “uninformed”. Earlier this morning (February 7), Roan took to her Instagram Story to clap back at Rabhan.

The Missouri pop star posted a screenshot of his article, in which Rabhan claimed Roan is “no longer a struggling artist” and should “do something about” the wealth disparity “rather than talk about it”.

“[Rabhan], wanna match me $25k to donate to struggling, dropped artists?” Roan asked, “My publicity is @biz3publicity. Let’s talk.”

At the time of writing, Jeffrey Rabhan has not replied to Chappell Roan.

After promising to “keep everyone updated on the much-awaited response” from Rabhan, the ‘Pink Pony Club’ singer also insisted: “In the meantime, here are some artists that deserve more love and a bigger platform.”

In the following story posts, she shared the Spotify pages of four alt-pop singers: Devon Again, Baby Storme and former NME The Cover stars Hemlocke Springs and Sarah Kinsley.

Chappell Roan shouts out smaller artists following response to former music executive Jeff Rabhan. pic.twitter.com/UVbUUhjgL3

— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) February 7, 2025

Hemlocke Springs rose to prominence with her 2022 single ‘Girlfriend’, which gained over 48million streams on Spotify and earned her space on the NME 100 2023. Denver, Colorado’s Devon Again gained popularity in 2020 for her TikTok covers before releasing her introspective 2021 debut single ‘Suburbia’ that kickstarted her musical career.

• READ MORE: On The Cover – Hemlocke Springs: enter the world of alt-pop’s great new hope

Sarah Kinsley is known for her dreamy pop, as showcased on her last two records: her 2023 ‘Ascension’ EP and 2024 debut album, ‘Escaper’. In Kinsley’s The Cover story, NME described her as “a deeply emotional project borne out of transformational events in the musician’s life over the past year.”

Baby Storme has become a polarising star in the underground alt-pop scene. While being praised for her innovative approach to pop – often integrating rock into it – she also became infamous for calling out Ice Spice last year for being a “colourist” and “fake” friend.

Recently, Halsey jumped to Roan’s defence, calling Rabhan’s op-ed an “absolute personal attack” that was “disguised as critical journalism”.

She continued: “An artist like Chappell who has worked for over a decade is not an ‘instant industry insider’ and to compare the payoff of her actions to those of an industry titan with the power and financial leverage like Taylor Swift, when Chappell hasn’t even spun the block enough times to see the residuals of her long earned but sudden success, is irresponsible for someone with your experience in this industry. Shame on you. Boot licking behaviour.”

In other news, Roan also spoke out in support of trans women at the 2025 Grammys. “It’s brutal right now, but trans people have always existed, and they will forever exist,” she said while on the red carpet. “And they will never, no matter what happens, take trans joy away, and that has to be protected more than anything because I would not be here without trans girls.”

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