Sugababes’ Keisha Buchanan says she was ‘used as collateral’ when one of the group’s albums flopped

"They used the fact that I'd had things written about me in the past. I was used as a scapegoat."

Keisha Buchanan, founding member of Sugababes, has discussed the negative treatment of her by the press and music industry due to her race.

Speaking on This Morning, Buchanan said that after the relative failure of Sugababes’ sixth album ‘Catfights And Spotlights’ in 2008, she spoke to someone in a “senior position” at her label Island Records who told her she was “being used as collateral”.

“It made sense for the story they wanted to put out because the girls’ album was getting a lot of backlash and it wasn’t doing very well,” she said. “I was like, ‘So that means throwing me under the bus?'”

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Buchanan continued: “It was very clear to me that they used the fact that I’d had things written about me in the past, and I was used as a scapegoat, really.”

Recalling unfair descriptions of her in the press, she said: “It all started when I was about 15 or 16, when Siobhán [Donaghy, original Sugababes member] first left. As young girls do you have arguments, you have disagreements, fallouts, and as far as I was aware it was like sisters falling out.”

Referring to then-bandmate Mutya Buena, she added: “It was journalists would write up the story and instantly take sides, so they took Siobhan’s side and it was like ‘those two rough girls from North West London’. Nobody really asked us what happened and what was our experience.”

Siobhan Donaghy, Mutya Buena and Keisha Buchanan in 2012 CREDIT: Dave J Hogan/Getty Images

Discussing the impact of the press’ comments, for which she said racism was ‘100 per cent’ to blame, she said: “I’m quite critical of myself anyway, so it’s made me even more so, and it allowed me to not really have many boundaries because I feel like if I had these boundaries I would be seen as being aggressive.

“That could be signing onto contracts, if there was something that I felt was a bit ‘oh let me call my lawyers’ it was ‘you’re being difficult’. If it was to do with songwriting where I wanted my share of what I’d written it was like ‘this person’s going to feel very bullied if you do that!’ I always felt under a lot of pressure.”

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Buchanan’s comments follow a statement by former X Factor contestant Misha B, who recently called out the show for pushing an “angry black girl narrative” about her.

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