When Jennifer Lopez released her Orlando charity single, “Love Make The World Go Round,” it appeared that she would break the trend of charity songs becoming flops. The song immediately climbed to the top of the iTunes charts and stayed there for almost a week. Lopez also performed the song with Lin-Manuel Miranda on Today .
The song received an overwhelmingly good response on Twitter.
Everyone needs to hear this beautiful song and it’s message because this world needs to realize what it has become. https://t.co/m7EbS2xaTq
— bianca (@osnapitzbiancaa) July 8, 2016
Love is love is love is love is love. Thank god for @Lin_Manuel and @JLo and this song on a day like today. https://t.co/CTO3ORLlUf
— Kaitlin Menza (@heykmenz) July 8, 2016
The song debuted on Billboard’ s Hot 100 at No. 72 this past week, and it looks like that’s where the song will peak. The Orlando tribute song has completely fallen off the iTunes chart, and is barely being played on radio stations. Perhaps love can make the world go round, but the world isn’t showing love for Jennifer Lopez, despite her good intentions. This is the second wave of bad news that comes for Lopez, who faced a backlash for tweeting the phrase “All Lives Matter” soon after her performance on Today . The Independent summarized the controversy .
“Jennifer Lopez has prompted a backlash across social media for a tweet which appeared on her account including the ‘All Lives Matter’ hashtag. The tweet was accompanied by an image of Lopez, 46, performing her Orlando benefit song alongside Lin Manuel-Miranda at a concert commemorating the victims of the Orlando shooting.”
The article adds that after the post ignited a firestorm on Twitter, Lopez immediately deleted the tweet. Some argued that Lopez did nothing wrong and did not deserve the backlash. Perhaps the backlash against Lopez’s phrase hurt the chances of “Love Make The World Go Round,” especially since the song plummeted right after the controversy. As the Daily Star reveals, Lopez talked about the controversy.
“When asked if she was surprised about the backlash, J-Lo told the Press Association: ‘We originally did a song for Orlando. I was only trying to be inclusive. It was about this, and I didn’t want to not say it was about this, but I also wanted to include everything that was going on. I didn’t realize there was such sensitivity to it in that moment which is why I decided to take it down.’”
Lopez added that her message has always been about love and including all the senseless acts of violence. She believes “love” is the answer for all of it. Lopez is still facing quite a backlash on Twitter.
Jennifer Lopez now joins such artists as Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera in well-intended charity song efforts that haven’t made much of a difference. Christina Aguilera released a fundraising single called “Change” to benefit the victims of the tragedy in Orlando. The song rose to the the top ten on iTunes when released, but immediately plummeted down. According to Entertainment Weekly , Aguilera even performed the song on Jimmy Kimmel Live.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BRkX9ndqMU
However, Aguilera’s song didn’t even make Billboard ‘s Hot 100 and some even accused her of using the Orlando tragedy to stage a pop music comeback. Then, Britney Spears released the fundraising single “Change,” which features other artists.
“Britney Spears, Adam Lambert, Gwen Stefani and Selena Gomez are a few of the contributors to a new single that pays tribute to the victims and families of the Orlando massacre. Proceeds from the star-studded track, titled ‘Hands,’ will be donated to the Equality Florida Pulse Victims Fund, the LGBT Community Center of Central Florida and GLAAD,” wrote Rolling Stone columnist Brittany Spanos.
“Change” failed to make an impact on iTunes and Billboard . One train of thought is that people don’t take fundraising singles seriously anymore, especially since they are viewed as publicity stunts by the artists who release them. Why do you think Jennifer Lopez, Christina Aguilera, and Britney Spears failed with their charity singles? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section.
[Photo by Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images]
