Chappell Roan never shies away from making a statement.
While accepting the award for best new artist at the 67th annual Grammy Awards, the "Good Luck, Babe!" singer highlighted the difficulties of building a stable — let alone profitable — career in the music industry.
"I told myself if I ever won a Grammy and I got to stand up here in front of the most powerful people in music, I would demand that labels and the industry profiting millions of dollars off of artists would offer a livable wage and healthcare, especially to developing artists," Roan said.
Roan alluded to her first record contract with Atlantic, which signed her as a teenager, and the shock of getting dropped by the label — a setback that forced her to leave Los Angeles and move back to her home state of Missouri, where she worked at a drive-thru to support herself.
"When I got dropped, I had zero job experience under my belt, and like most people, I had… quite a difficult time finding a job in the pandemic," Roan said.
"Record labels need to treat their artists as valuable employees with a livable wage and health insurance and protection," Roan continued. "Labels, we got you, but do you got us?"
The problems that preoccupied Roan's speech are more widespread in the industry than many fans may realize.
As Business Insider previously reported, modern artists face a seemingly endless array of bureaucratic, strategic, and financial obstacles to making a living — from the eye-popping upfront costs of touring or recording an album to the countless unpaid hours of social media self-promo and meager payouts from streaming giants like Spotify.
Indeed, Roan's fellow best new artist nominee Raye told BI last June that she was still "breaking even."
The 27-year-old British vocalist, who recently worked with Beyoncé on "Cowboy Carter" and opened for Taylor Swift's multi-billion-dollar Eras Tour, explained that musicians are faced with unseen expenses at every turn. This is especially true for those who forgo the major-label system.
"You're getting paid X to do Coachella, and then you spend double the amount that you got paid to do the show on the show itself, because you want to do a great show," Raye offered as an example. "And you have to pay musicians, and the singers, and everyone what they deserve."
Like Roan, Raye has a troubled history with record labels. She butted heads with executives at Polydor, who signed her at a young age, and publicly asked the label to release her from her contract in 2021. The company obliged, and Raye released her first album as an independent artist, "My 21st Century Blues," in 2023.
Roan found a different way forward. After working to refine her craft and building an audience on TikTok during the pandemic, Roan signed a new contract with the label imprint founded by her producer, Daniel Nigro. Amusement Records distributed her debut album, 2023's "The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess."
The album climbed to No. 2 on the Billboard 200 last year, second only to Taylor Swift's "The Tortured Poets Department," and received a Grammy nomination for album of the year. Roan's "Good Luck, Babe!" was also nominated for song of the year and best pop solo performance.
