Celebrity
The Response To Zendaya’s “Tiny Toe Dip” Back Into Music Means So Much To Her
“I still really love it.”
Long before she played Euphoria’s Rue Bennett, Zendaya dropped a self-titled debut album, which would be both her first and her last (to date). Despite the positive response to the 2013 project and its lead single, “Replay,” Zendaya primarily shifted focus to her acting career, only releasing one-off features and singles, including 2017’s “Rewrite the Stars” (with Zac Efron) from The Greatest Showman. In Euphoria’s second season, the Emmy winner again reminded viewers of her vocal skills, releasing two new tracks, “I’m Tired” (with Labrinth) and “Elliot’s Song” (with Dominic Fike) — both to rave fan reviews.
It turns out Zendaya was also listening, and on Friday, March 4, she tweeted a message of appreciation for the response to her new songs. “I stepped away from music quite a while ago, for a number of reasons,” she wrote, “but I still really love it, so the kindness and support I’ve received the past few days just for a little tiny toe dip back into some music means the absolute world to me..thanks<3”
During a November conversation with Issa Rae for A Sip, Zendaya revealed the reason why she put her singing career on pause was based on business disagreements. “I stepped away from music on purpose because of bad contracts, to be honest with you,” she explained, also citing a greater degree of privacy in the acting profession. “Acting allows for a character for people to fall in love with. But also for my own anonymity and a life of my own, which music doesn’t really afford. When you’re a music artist, it’s your face all the time. It’s you. So that’s another thing. That kind of scared me about music — it’s like not really being able to have as much of a life.”
Zendaya also previously referenced contractual issues in a 2019 Paper magazine interview. “If anyone asks my number one advice, for [the entertainment] industry in general but mostly the music industry, it’s look over those contracts, every single word, and don’t sign anything that isn’t worth it to you,” she warned. “You are worth more than they will say that you are.”
At the time, Zendaya further explained that though she enjoyed singing — and hopes to one day write songs for other people — she’d chosen acting due to a lack of agency in the music industry. “I think the [music] industry takes a little bit of passion away from you,” she added to Paper. “It sucks you dry a little bit. What I thought I wanted, it’s not what I want anymore, [especially] when I think about what I had to deal with in the music industry.”
So while a full-length follow-up to 2013’s Zendaya doesn’t seem to be in the cards anytime soon, she at least hasn’t closed the door completely. For now, fans will have to savor the multihyphenate’s contributions to the Euphoria soundtracks, which could even get a new update soon. After Zendaya co-signed Kid Cudi’s request to jump on an “I’m Tired” remix (“Yoooo! What a dream that would be…” she wrote on Feb. 28), Labrinth also tweeted his approval: “Let’s open a new dimension.”
Stay tuned.
