News

Aug 05, 2023

SZA Sounds Off at Label Over Album Delay

By Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor R&B singer-songwriter SZA is

By Jem Aswad

Senior Music Editor

R&B singer-songwriter SZA is one of the most popular new artists to emerge in the past five years, with nine Grammy nominations for her debut full-length "Ctrl," her work on the Kendrick Lamar-helmed "Black Panther" and a duet with The Weeknd and Travis Scott, among several high-profile features.

While the features — most recently with Justin Timberlake on "The Other Side," from "Trolls World Tour" — have kept her in the public eye, it's been more than four years since she released "Ctrl," and after fans asked her for a status update, she vented about her label, Top Dawg Entertainment, and its chief Terrence "Punch" Henderson on Twitter Wednesday.

"At this point y’all gotta ask Punch. I’ve done all I can do," she replied to one fan, as noted by Complex. She soon deleted that tweet, but another fan asked, "Would you saaay this is an adverse or hostile relationship orrr just out of your hands?"

"BEEN hostile," SZA replied.

Another fan posted a reply from Punch about when a SZA album can be expected —"Soon," Punch responded.

SZA wrote in response, "This is all he says to me as well. Welcome to my f—ing life."

Punch then got into an angry exchange, not specifically about SZA, with other fans (head over to Complex for a blow-by-blow.)

While SZAhas deleted her comments from her account, the top post on her Twitter feed says, "BRB yelling at the wall."

Brb yelling at the wall

— SZA (@sza) August 20, 2020

SZA has long been outspoken about her frustrations with album-release delays, In may she floated the idea of doing a "music dump" of accumulated unreleased material, adding that she's completed around 20 since over the past six years. She also tangled with Punch in 2016 over delays with the release of "Ctrl" and threatened to quit music.

Reps for TDE and RCA, which distributes SZA's releases, declined Variety's requests for comment.