Lady Gaga has made new physical copies of her 2013 album Artpop available for preorder, only this time without the original album’s R. Kelly collaboration, “Do What U Want.”
The new vinyl and CD versions of Artpop are listed on Gaga’s website, due out November 11th, and both versions leave the single “Do What U Want” off the tracklist. An older vinyl version of Artpop that includes “Do What U Want” is still featured on the website, but is listed as “sold out.”
Several other former collaborators of Kelly have distanced themselves from the R&B artist in the wake of Surviving R. Kelly, released this past January, which highlighted the full extent of the sexual abuse allegations against him. But this will be the first time that an artist has done a full re-release of their album to remove his involvement.
Earlier this year, Lady Gaga vowed to remove “Do What U Want” from streaming platforms — a move similar to Chance the Rapper, who recently pulled his 2015 R. Kelly collaboration “Somewhere in Paradise” from streaming — and wrote an apology for his involvement with Artpop, calling the allegations against him “horrifying” and “indefensible.”
“As a victim of sexual assault myself, I made both the song and video at a dark time in my life,” she wrote.
