K. Michelle may tell a joke but she rarely tells a lie and in her latest interview on Club Shay Shay, she got real about her relationship with actor Idris Elba.
Though the pair were mum about their relationship in real time, they did admit to dating after the called things off in 2013. According to K. Michelle, their love story inspired her album Anybody Want To Buy A Heart? and that they still hold one another in high regard. However, it was the public’s response to hearing the pair were linked that caused her the most pain.
“I never exposed that. We did everything together, but people thought that I was not good enough,” she said. “To hear Charlamagne tha God say, when y’all found out that Idris loved K. Michelle, it was like turning wine into Arbor Mist… that’s hilarious. Go ahead, laugh. No, it was hilarious, but you gotta understand for a young Black girl, for y’all to do this… that man has never denied me. My biggest selling album, to this day, that still charts, is about me and him.”
She continued,
“He doesn’t, we don’t, play them games about each other. Idris was amazing. He was an amazing man. I am so sick of y’all…Idris would do fine in Memphis. Accent and all. You talking about a DJ that was in the streets and in Hackney…I don’t care how fine, how Denzel y’all want him to be.”
Despite their painful split that led to beautiful music and critical success for K. Michelle, she says that Elba is ok in her book.
“I have nothing bad to say about Idris,” she said. “We went through what we went through. I sent my album to him first. And he said, ‘This is a masterpiece. I hate that we’ve gone through this.’ “
In usual K. Michelle form, she gave her hilarious insight on many topics including rumors that she bleached her skin, her feelings on Jack Harlow’s “R&B” era and how Anita Baker pulled up on her to put her in check.
“I was working with Ne-Yo and I had an edible and I was wildin’ out so bad,” she revealed. “And Anita Baker DMed me and said ‘you are so gifted, I need for you to shut up’. And I said ‘well, you don’t care about me’ and she said ‘give me where you’re gonna be’. I’m sitting there with Ne-Yo and all of a sudden Anita Baker is like ‘I’m here’. She came in and she got me together.”
One thing about it, K. Michelle is a modern griot. She is always going to have a good story to tell and an amusing way to tell it. And we love to see exes with a good rapport despite their past experiences.