Greyson Chance ‘Stands Behind’ Claims Against Ellen DeGeneres: I Wrestled With ‘So Much PTSD’
Greyson Chance is reflecting on the recent claims he made against Ellen DeGeneres in a recent Rolling Stone interview, in which he accused the former television host of controlling behavior over his career when he was a teenager. On Thursday evening, Chance shared a TikTok video addressing the article, saying, “I stand behind all of it.”
“I’ve been wanting to tell this story now for multiple years and was repeatedly told not to. But the truth is, what you saw on TV and what was sort of pitched out to the mainstream just wasn’t what was happening behind the scenes,” Chance said in the video. “And I think now that I’m 25 and I’m older, I can recognize that what happened to me as a kid was not cool. It was not okay.”
In his interview with Rolling Stone, Chance said DeGeneres “completely abandoned” him once his music sales dropped as he turned 15, despite DeGeneres allegedly telling him that she would “protect” him after she signed him to her Eleveneleven label. He also described her as a “hidden eye” over his career.
“I’ve had to wrestle with so much about PTSD and so much of that trauma, as I’ve been growing up as a musician, and as I’ve been fighting in the industry, to continue to make music and to still do this,” Chance said in his TikTok.
Chance addressed the people who have categorized him as “ungrateful” for speaking out about DeGeneres after she helped give him his start in music.
“I’m sure people will have a lot to say about the article and how I maybe appear ungrateful for her efforts in the beginning. And the truth is that I am grateful for her giving me a start,” Chance said. “But I’m more grateful to myself for the moments when I got dropped and everything went awry when I was a kid. I’m thankful for 15-year-old me that picked up the pieces and kept on going and kept on fighting.”
He added, “I am so continuously inspired by people that tell the truth and that muster up the bravery to tell the truth when it is difficult, when it’s not convenient, and when it’s painstaking. That’s why I did this. I needed to tell the truth. And now it’s finally out there.”
Chance said in an Instagram story that he felt a “tremendous weight off of my shoulders” after sharing his truth, saying his new album Palladium forced him to “reconcile with everything I went through as a kid.”
To Rolling Stone, Chance accused DeGeneres of becoming “domineering and way too controlling” over his work. “My whole week, my whole month, my whole year could change [with] one text message from her,” Chance said. “That was horrible.”
Through a rep, DeGeneres declined to comment to Rolling Stone for the original story, though a source close to The Ellen DeGeneres Show told Us Weekly that the TV host had a different “experience” with the singer.
“He has taken this time, as he is launching a [new] album, to go after Ellen with opportunistic claims,” the source told the tabloid. “Ellen and the team went above and beyond and sometimes careers just don’t take off.”
Chance released his album Palladium about “protecting your instinct, your heart, your soul” on Thursday.
“The first part of my career, I owe a lot of thanks to her and to that team. But the reason why I’m here today talking about an album, I owe fucking nothing to her,” he told Rolling Stone. “Because I was the one that had to pull myself up. She was nowhere to be found.”
