Singer Lauryn Hill has been sentenced in the US state of New Jersey to three months in jail for tax evasion and three months of home confinement, after pleading guilty last year.
She failed to pay taxes on about $1.8m (£1.2m) of earnings between 2005-07 but all the money had been repaid when she was nevertheless sentenced to jail.
In a statement to the judge, Hill said she had intended to pay the taxes but could not after withdrawing from public life and ending her music career to raise her six kids, five of whom she had with Rohan Marley, the son of Bob Marley – Zion, 14, Selah Louise, 13, Joshua Omaru, 10, John Nesta, nine, and four-year-old Sarah. She also has an 11-month-old old with another partner.
“I am a child of former slaves who had a system imposed on them,” Hill said in court. “I had an economic system imposed on me.”
Hill told the judge she lives “very modestly” considering how much money her music — she has sold 16 million records — earned for other people.
“Someone did the math, and it came to around $600 million,” she said. “And I sit here before you trying to figure out how to pay a tax debt? If that’s not like enough to slavery, I don’t know.”
“This wasn’t a life of jet-setting glamour,” she said. “This was a life of sacrifice with very little time for myself and my children.”
“I didn’t make music for celebrity status,” she told the court. “I made music for artistic and existential catharsis, which was not just necessary for myself but it was also necessary for the generations of oppressed people who hadn’t had their voices expressed like I was able to do it. Music is not something I do from 9 to 5. It’s a state of being, and like a doctor who delivers babies, I’m on call all the time because that’s the kind of work this is.”
Hill revealed in a message posted to her Tumblr account last month that she’s been working on new music.
“It has been reported that I signed a new record deal, and that I did this to pay taxes. Yes, I have recently entered into an agreement with Sony Worldwide Entertainment, to launch a new label, on which my new music will be released,” Hill wrote. “And yes, I am working on new music.”
On her website, LaurynHill.com, she posted this message plus a link to a new release on iTunes:
“Hello All:
Here is a link to a piece that I was ‘required’ to release immediately, by virtue of the impending legal deadline. I love being able to reach people directly, but in an ideal scenario, I would not have to rush the release of new music… but the message is still there. In light of Wednesday’s tragic loss (of former label mate Chris Kelly), I am even more pressed to YELL this to a multitude that may not understand the cost of allowing today’s unhealthy paradigms to remain unchecked!
– MLH”
Link to new single: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/neurotic-society-compulsory/id644961710
In this Youtube video of a performance, I think the lyrics here express exactly what is going on:
Lauryn has previously said regarding contemporary Hip Hop “I see a lot of potential. I also see a lot of lost potential” and
“if you trace black music back and watch the pattern you know, see how these black folks found this incredible music that comes from a place of expression, and how it gets co-oped and commercialised and compromised and bitten and appropriated and taken – my struggle has always been to prevent that from happening, and to maintain the soul in everything that I can possibly do”
“The reason why Hip Hop had such a strong voice was because it was a defiant message for a while. It was basically the voice of the voiceless. once you become the voice of the corporate, you become a different creature”
I pray that Lauryn Hill keep strong while imprisoned is not only in jail but by the system that is trying to control her and her message.
1ncredible 