Kesha’s mum addresses Jeffrey Dahmer lyric controversy

Kesha’s mum, who co-wrote her controversial song 'Cannibal', has finally spoken out over its 'insensitive' lyrics.

Taking to TikTok, Pebe Sebert addressed the backlash surrounding her daughter's 2010 hit song that references notorious serial killer and cannibal, Jeffrey Dahmer.

The unsavoury lyrics about the killer were called out following the release of Netflix’s true crime drama, Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.

Kesha wrote the song with Pebe, Joshua Coleman and Mathieu Jomphe, and although the track didn’t do particularly well upon its release, it had something of a re-up back in 2020 thanks to TikTok.

Given the title, it won’t come as a surprise to hear that human-on-human consumption features heavily in the song, and supposedly all that cannibalism is a metaphor for Kesha’s tendency to plough through boyfriends. 

"Your little heart goes pitter-patter, I want your liver on a platter," the lyrics sing.

“Be too sweet and you’ll be a goner, yeah, I’ll pull a Jeffrey Dahmer. I eat boys up, breakfast and lunch, then when I’m thirsty, I drink their blood.

“Carnivore, animal, I am a cannibal. I eat boys up, you better run."

Now her mother has addressed the lyrics on her TikTok channel, saying that the star was 'too young' to know who the killer was.

"At the time, Kesha and the other writer were too young to know who Jeffrey Dahmer was," she explained.

AFF/Alamy Stock Photo

“Literally, the way it happened is, I had this rhyming program called MasterWriter for songwriters, we were looking for a rhyme for ‘goner.'

"And the suggestion that pulled up was Dahmer, so that's what they used, which is honestly a way simpler explanation than we had in mind."

Pebe went on to explain that 'it was a tongue-in-cheek, funny song'.

"It was not actually about cannibalism… I’m sorry to anybody who’s lost a family member in this tragedy."

UNILAD has reached out to Pebe for comment.

Kesha isn't the first star to have old lyrics dug up following the crime drama's release; Katy Perry was the first star to face backlash for her 2013 hit 'Dark Horse', in which one lyric went: “She's a beast/ I call her Karma/ She eats your heart like Jeffrey Dahmer.”

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