JoJo Siwa Finds 'Guilty Pleasure' In Doing the Most - But Why?

As I’ve said more times than I can count, the art of stunts, tricks, and clownery to grab attention and make headlines isn’t necessary when you possess genuine talent. In the case of former kid star-turned-current cringey queer queen JoJo Siwa, the jury is still out on whether the 21-year-old has staying power beyond the jeers she’s now receiving from critics and haters alike. But are those jeers deserved for Guilty Pleasure, her first offering to the world beyond child entertainment?

To be fair, Siwa wouldn’t be a part of the current pop culture landscape had she not possessed a modicum of talent. A trained dancer since she learned how to walk, the Omaha, NE, native, shook and shimmied her way to the hearts of millions on the second season of Abby’s Ultimate Dance Competition, a 2013 spinoff of Lifetime’s Dance Moms, hosted by choreographer, instructor, and wheelchair Karen extraordinaire, Abby Lee Miller.

Her fifth-place ranking on AUDC was good enough to carry JoJo, then 10 years old, over to Miller’s flagship series for the show’s fifth season in 2015. Two years later, execs at Nickelodeon snatched up the bright-eyed, hairbow-loving preteen to become the go-to for the adolescent girl demographic of the network. The rest is history.

After banking millions upon millions of dollars in children’s toys and entertainment, and a turn as the host of a namesake competition series with 2021’s Siwa’s Dance Pop Revolution, the energetic young star was ready to grow up. That same year, JoJo, then 18, made the brave choice to come out as pansexual (she now identifies as queer). The announcement was mostly well received – save for execs at Nickelodeon, whom JoJo says have since blackballed her.

Now several years removed from a flurry of appearances on Dancing With the Stars, So You Think You Can Dance?, and The Masked Singer, JoJo Siwa, the adult, now 21, has channeled all of her energy into the music field. With the shift came a new look and a new attitude. Gone were the rainbow-colored hair accessories, multihued ponytails, and bright clothing. In its place was… well, something akin to Gene Simmons.

At the 2024 iHeart Radio Music Awards this April, the world was introduced to JoJo Siwa 2.0. Rocking a black mesh bodysuit that was rhinestoned within an inch of its life and Kiss-inspired makeup, Siwa declared that she was in a new era, one where she didn’t care what anyone thought of her.

“People are afraid of things they don’t know,” she told reporters on the red carpet. “New things can be very, very scary [for people]. I feel like a lot of child stars started as a character then they grew into an adult as themselves. Whereas for me, I’ve always been myself. So, to make this transition while being true to myself, while being artistic, has been interesting to figure out. But I think we’ve nailed it and I think it definitely makes a massive statement.”

Realistically, JoJo’s “massive statement” was more of a tease of things to come. That night’s head-turning look, we would soon learn, was one heavily featured in the music video for her upcoming single, “Karma.”

Released on April 5, “Karma,” the song, was instantly panned by everyone with working ears. It was deemed disingenuous, dated, and wholly desperate from the first listen. Written by famed pop collective Rock Mafia, who are known for penning a good chunk of Miley Cyrus’ early discography (including, according to some, this very song), “Karma” wasn’t as bad as you’d think. The observations of being dated were correct, but it mostly fails for being both bold and not bold enough to reintroduce the former child star with.

The video, which, unfortunately, most have seen by now, didn’t help matters. No one ever wanted to witness JoJo Siwa grind against another person; male, female, or otherwise.

It would get even worse when not long after, an earlier and more lively recording of “Karma” by pop girl wannabe Brit Smith hit the internet. It bested Siwa’s take by miles, even though Smith’s version had been recorded 11 years before. To Smith’s credit, her version was produced by the legendary Tim “Timbaland” Mosely. It was also released by its full title: “Karma’s A Bitch.”

Adding insult to injury, many insisted that Siwa had been peddling “Karma” around as an original song she wrote. She never actually did, for the record, but she did state the track had been floating around her camp for three years before its release – which may have been the reason behind the confusion.

“Originally, I was scared of the lyrics,” JoJo shared with Billboard in an interview published online on April 10. “I was 18 years old. I didn’t want to say ‘bitch.’ I didn’t want to say ‘I was a bad girl,’ because I wasn’t [one].”

Smith would later defend JoJo’s take on “Karma,” explaining that Siwa hadn’t stolen the song and that she was proud there were now two versions of the tune for folks to enjoy.

As the negative hype surrounding “Karma” started to settle, Siwa kicked it back into gear with the most braggadocious statement of the millennium.

In conversation with Billboard News reporter Tetris Kelly, Siwa relayed how she told Columbia Records execs that she planned to not just break into the world of contemporary pop, but create an entirely new genre of music.

“It’s called ‘gay pop,” she said with a laugh. “It’s like K-pop, right? But you know, it’s gay pop.”

The uproar was swift and harsh. Gay music lovers demanded that JoJo pick up a history book and apologize to Elton John expeditiously. Gay pop icons Tegan and Sara took to TikTok and said nothing, but spoke volumes. Siwa would clarify her comments a week later. She meant well (“I am not the inventor of gay pop. But I do want to be a piece of making it bigger than it already is. I want to bring more attention to it”) ,but the damage was done… and the cringe had just begun.

In the weeks following, Siwa would lean further into the spectacle side of fame. In the middle of a set during L.A’s Pride In the Park, she chugged vodka from a bottle - or at least appeared to - before telling a heckler in the crowd that she had a “bigger dick” than him (to be fair, the response was both justified and kind of hilarious).

When former Disney star Anneliese van der Pol took to TikTok to joke about the That’s So Raven spinoff Raven’s Home being canceled after she was fired from both series, Siwa took to the comments to blast the actress.

“Six seasons and now, a spinoff,” she wrote. “I think they’re doing just fine.”

The woman behind Chelsea Daniels sharply reminded JoJo to respect her elders.

“Put some respect on my name, little girl,” van der Pol responded. “I walked, so you could ‘dance.’”

Speaking of “dance,” Siwa also kept doing that thing from the “Karma” music video everywhere she went.

You know the thing. No one needs to be reminded of the thing.

Internet sleuths and YouTube drama channels surmised that JoJo’s radical rebrand and the mess that followed could be a ploy to divert from some serious claims. In February, Rolling Stone published a shocking expose on the current state of XOMG Pop!, the young girl group JoJo and her mother, Jessalyn Siwa, banded together via Siwa’s Dance Pop Revolution. While it stands to chance that the media-primed starlet has been playing us all to distract from the heinous allegations, at least some of her actions were meant as promo for Guilty Pleasure.

Released back in July, the five-song EP has ironically been drowned out in the wake of Siwa’s questionable antics. “Choose Ur Fighter,” originally planned as the second single from the project, did get some attention early on, but for reasons both negative and familiar.

In a now-deleted TikTok video, Emeline Easton, the original singer-songwriter behind “Choose Ur Fighter,” went after Siwa’s camp for giving the song to their artist without her input or permission. Similar to “Karma,” JoJo was not in the wrong for accepting a track from her label that was once sold to the highest bidder. Still, this didn't stop anyone from noting JoJo as a music thief.

And now, for something completely shocking. JoJo’s rendition of "Choose Ur Fighter" is… dare I say, slightly better than Easton’s.

JoJo manages to match the dark and broody mood of the original take but, most importantly, has fun doing so. That isn’t to say Easton’s version is bad – it’s not – but the best cover versions come from those who find ways to make the song their own. JoJo, for all of the outcry, understood the assignment perfectly.

“Some of my exes are no one, some of my exes have fame,” both singers state in their versions. However, JoJo’s additional cheeky whisper of “you’re welcome” at the end of her lyric is the right note for someone who most likely has assisted in boosting their former lovers’ public reach.

Additionally, changing Easton’s raunchier delivery of “Some of them fucked me like heaven” to “Some of them loved me like heaven” paints a clearer picture of heartbreak from the perspective of a 21-year-old who hasn't had many public relationships. It also sets the song up for possible radio play. Whoever came up with the decision to change that particular lyric made the right choice.

Leaning into the collective cringe she’s had a hand in, JoJo chose to pivot to the title track as the official second serving from the EP. Once again, fortune favors the brave.

Easily the best offering on Guilty Pleasure, the electropop banger evokes vibes of another great bop by a former kid star - Lindsay Lohan’s “Rumors." JoJo’s vocals, while not the strongest of the bunch (but are acceptable), even closely mimic Lohan’s at certain points of the song. Millennial and Gen-Z gays will eat this up if they’re willing to take a bite.

“Balance Baby,” another upbeat track, includes a rap-adjacent second verse that's perfect for a future RuPaul's Drag Race Lip Sync for Your Life baby-queen battle. Siwa is a bit out of her element on this one but makes up for what she lacks with an energetic, albeit assumingly unintentional, nod to the late Anna Nicole Smith in the chorus (“Trimspa, baby!”). It’s hard not to like this one.

The closest we get to a ballad on Guilty Pleasure is “Yesterday’s Tomorrow’s Today,” another offering composed by Rock Mafia. The issue here is that the song doesn’t appear to know what kind of song it wants to be. Equal parts cynical, inspirational, and romantic(?), the only thing it should’ve been was discarded from the tracklist. Sorry not sorry. And don’t even get me started on the sea shanty melody that plays over the chorus. What even was that?

“Karma” closes out the EP and again, it’s not horrible, but it’s been done before and so much better.

So, were JoJo’s antics worth the price of admission to the Guilty Pleasure party? Not really, especially as no one seems to be talking about the music (other than yours truly) or JoJo, for that matter.

Word of mouth pushed “Karma” to the TikTok Billboard Top 50 a week before its release, but it failed to break past No. 22 on the Billboard Bubbling Under Charts following the official drop. An attempt to raise the shock and "eww!" factor with the music video for “Guilty Pleasure” barely made a blip on social media, other than whispers of a errant tampon making an appearance during the final dance break (it was actually a feather from Siwa's costume). Throw in the displays of JoJo purposely amping up her energy to go viral again (seen below), and it all seems moot.

Clear mistakes have been made with the JoJo Siwa rebrand, but one stands out. Unlike once-young entertainers before her, Siwa completely abandoned her original fan base to be embraced by those who only barely knew her beyond Nickelodeon. Even Bangerz-era Miley Cyrus, who JoJo has repeatedly noted as the inspiration for her rebrand, knew the importance of bridging former Hannah Montana fans to the MTV crowd. Cyrus had controversies also, but her fan base repaid her loyalty by keeping her head above water long enough to survive each one. No one appears to be doing that for JoJo.

Time will tell if Siwa wakes up and changes her game plan or sticks with the stunts. Guilty Pleasure may not be the strongest show for someone who wants to prove they’re not a girl, not yet a woman, but there is a lane for her in gay pop, or wherever she chooses, if she stops using the fast-fading flair of controversy to get ahead. Remember how all of Lil Nas X’s controversies eventually came back around and dragged him to the seventh layer of pop hell, a.k.a. Mid-ville?

Well, karma’s a… you know the rest.