Lady Gaga is re-releasing the artist’s third studio album next month, 2013’s “Artpop,” albeit seemingly without the record’s only tune to feature disgraced R&B singer R. Kelly.
Online retailers taking advance orders for the record do not list the track, “Do What U Want (With My Body),” as among those included on the album, NME first reported Tuesday.
The song is the only tune on the original Artpop record to feature Robert Sylvester Kelly, better known as R. Kelly, and the only one omitted from the new version’s track listing, according to pre-order pages on both Amazon and HMV.
Mr. Kelly, a 52-year-old Grammy Award winner, was indicted in 2002 on child pornography charges but was ultimately acquitted. He was widely shunned by fellow artists following the release in January of a docu-series that depicted him as a serial sexual predator, “Surviving R. Kelly,” and he was jailed on related charges several weeks later.
He has since been charged with a string of federal sex offenses and remains in custody pending trial. He has pleaded not guilty.
Lady Gaga, a fellow Grammy winner born Stefani Germanotta, denounced Mr. Kelly after the release of the series and subsequently had digital versions of the song scrubbed from online streaming services.
“I’m sorry, both for my poor judgment when I was young, and for not speaking out sooner,” she said at the time.
The newest version of “Artpop” is available on CD and vinyl starting Nov. 11, a little more than six years since the original record’s release.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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