Arlo Parks responds to inclusion on High Snobiety's 15 Female Rappers List

Politely acknowledging that the publication have missed the mark by including her on their list, Arlo Parks took to Twitter to encourage black artists to "make whatever you want to make regardless of the boxes that people try and fold you into", noting that they are "on the right path" regardless.

At this moment in time, her response appears to have fallen on deaf ears, with High Snobiety responding to it with: "<3".

This feature is just a small example of publications trying to box artists into categories that do not fit their sound, simply judging them stereotypically by the colour of their skin.

Apparently I’m on @highsnobiety’s list of 15 female hip-hop artists…all I will say is that if you are a black person make whatever you want to make regardless of the boxes that people try and fold you into - you’re on the right path pic.twitter.com/gBVc8ZzhlD

— Arlo Parks (@arloparks) April 4, 2023

Rachel Chinouriri is another artist who has been vocal about this in her career thus far. She has widely spoken about how artists such as Coldplay and Daughter have been a strong influence on her sound, but yet she still finds herself categorised into the wrong genre – often being labelled as R&B or Soul.

My music is not RnB
My music is not Soul
My music is not alternative RnB
My music is not Neo Soul
My music is not Jazz

My influences are Indie, electronic/alternative and pop music

Black artists doing indie is not confusing

How tf do ppl listen to So My darling and think “RnB”

— rachel chinouriri (@rachelchinourir) January 23, 2022

In an Instagram post following the tweet posted last January, she went into further detail, providing a statement on how being mislabelled has affected her.

"When I was 18 I started putting pictures of myself to my music artwork and sometimes I regret ever doing that," she begins. "Before then it was always “indie” or “alternative” or even “electronic”. Then it became… “You sound like a white girl”, “I can hear influences of soul”, “This is kind of RnB”, “Neo soul?”, “This is white music”".

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