Last year’s courageous move by young Czechoslovak singer Karin Ann, who expressed support for the LGBTQ+ community and minorities during a live performance on Polish state television TVP2, sparked an avalanche of similar actions in Poland. Famous ex-Spice Girl Melanie C cancelled her New Year’s concert in Poland due to the harsh crackdown on the LGBTQ+ community there. Her American bandmates, the Black Eyed Peas, did perform on New Year’s Eve, but wore rainbow armbands as part of their costumes. In both cases, all Polish media remind us that the first artist to do something like this was Karin Ann.
Karin Ann then pulled a rainbow flag out of her purse during a performance of her song “Babyboy”, wrapped herself in it and said, “I would like to dedicate this song today to LGBTQ+ and minorities in Poland. I know you don’t have it easy. I wish you to feel safe, I am here for you, I love you and thank you.”
On the fact that her famous colleagues followed up her gesture a year later, she says: “It’s worrying what’s happening in Poland. That’s why I’m glad that others have joined my voice, together we have a chance to change things,” says the singer.
Singer Mel C has said on her social media and in the media that she can’t perform somewhere where the views and attitudes of the community so fundamentally diverge from hers. Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas said they wanted to support people and groups who face hateful behaviour from mainstream society with their performance.
Karin Ann, who was the first Slovakian woman to be cast by the world’s largest music streaming platform Spotify on a giant billboard in New York’s Times Square as part of its Spotify Equal programme and was voted Discovery of the Year in the Czech Republic’s Ladder music poll, has opened for Imagine Dragons and My Chemical Romance in the past year and has also played sold-out concerts for British singer YUNGBLUD and American star LP. On January 27, 2023, after a creative hiatus of almost half a year, she releases a new single “for a moment”, on which she collaborated with Mitch McCarthy, winner of 2 Grammy nominations and collaborating with such stellar names as Olivia Rodrigo and Meghan Trainor.
