A few days after being publicly told to remove the song from all platforms by Dancehall artiste Spice, Producer Michael’ Askell’ Fairman is adamant that he will not be doing so.
Three days ago, Spice released a statement via her Instagram account in which she had asked for the song, “Solid Ground“, which she has been working on with Pastor Stephen Blake over the course of the last two years, not to be released. However, contrary to that request, the pastor and his producer still released the single.
“Take out mi voice out a yuh song and gwan in Jesus name,” Spice declared. She also said, “Stephen, you claim to be a man of God. I asked you privately not to release this unfinished demo that we started working on from 2020 and you still continue to clout chase because of your own church sister.”
Since that proclamation by Spice, both men have come under heavy criticism, but producer Fairman is standing by his claim that he will not be removing the song collaboration with Spice and Pastor Blake.
“First of all, it’s a great production. Second, it is a positive song. Why would anyone want to pull a positive song? If it was a raunchy song, then I could understand; but then again, a raunchy song would not see Pastor Blake on it,” he stated in a recent interview.
He identified that prior to the release of the song, which was being worked on for a few years, everyone involved with the production was made aware of its impending release.
“It wasn’t a demo. This was a completed project,” he said. “I have no plans to retract the collab. It can do great things if it gets the combined efforts of the artistes working together.”
It was widely publicized that Pastor Blake had long wanted to do a collaboration with Spice and had stated this publicly following the meeting he had back with the self-proclaimed Dancehall Queen in 2019.
He had also mentioned that there is a strong meaning behind the song and its release came at the right time in the midst of some female artistes in the industry being involved in a continuous ‘war of words.’
“I had put it out there that I wanted to do a song with her that speaks out against temptation and that is what Solid Ground is.”
However, following the turmoil that ensued in the aftermath of the song’s release, Pastor Blake has fired back, stating that he was not made aware of Spice’s disapproval until after the song was released on Friday.
“Sometimes we don’t understand why these things happen, but I believe if God is for me, who can be against me. At the end of the day, God did see and know all this was going to happen,” he stated.
