Canadian singer Nelly Furtado has returned from her hiatus with a bang. Furtado has released her new album ‘7’ with the help of her daughter, Nevis Gahunia. Recalling her early days in the industry, Furtado said that magazines used to airbrush her skin to a lighter color and crop down the size of her hips. This would make the singer furious.
Furtado’s parents were citizens of British Colombia before they immigrated to Canada. Her ethnicity has seemingly been the reason for the magazine’s decision to airbrush her skin tone. The singer was so furious over the racism that her anger was also reflected in her music. Here’s what Furtado said of her old magazine editorials.
“I Was Kind Of Angry About It”: Nelly Furtado On Magazines’ Airbrushing Her Skin Color
In an exclusive interview with People, Nelly Furtado revealed that certain magazines would edit her skin color and shape during her early years in the industry. “I have olive skin, and they’d kind of lighten my skin a lot in photos and kind of take my hips down all the time — they would always cut off in editorials,” the ‘I’m Like A Bird’ singer said, adding that she did not like her editorials’ photos.
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Furtado has also spoken up about the magazine’s editing in her 2003 album Folklore. In the song ‘Powerless‘ she sings, “Paint my face in your magazines. Make it look whiter than it seems. Paint me over with your dreams. Shove away my ethnicity.” Clarifying the same, Furtado told People, “By my second album, I guess I was kind of angry about it.”
“I Felt So Lucky And Blessed”: Nelly Furtado Is Grateful To Her Family And Team For Her Success
Nelly Furtado is one of the most successful artists in Canada with a career spanning over two decades. The ‘Turn Off The Light‘ said she is grateful to her family and her team for supporting and guiding her in her musical career.
She told People, “I felt so lucky and blessed. I always had such a good team around me, that was family. My team around me felt so solid and really looking out for my best interests.”
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Furtado also credited a strong feminine presence within her family for making her resilient to face the ruthless industry. “And I think I was just raised right. My mom was really strong, and so is her mom, and her mom, and her mom — a very matriarchal family, in general, on both sides, all my grandmothers, and great-grandmothers,” she said.
“So I was given a really solid kind of sense of assertiveness, I’m going to call it. So that was a good tool for me to navigate the music industry.” She concluded, “And I was given really solid advice from a young age, luckily, from very paternal sort of people around me. So I was lucky, I was one of the lucky ones.”
