*Yolanda Adams is opening up about the criticism she’s received over the years for her sense of style.
Speaking to PEOPLE about her new album “Sunny Days,” the platinum-selling Gospel singer addressed the online bullying she’s experienced for wearing form-fitting clothing.
“I didn’t know there was a thing of ‘you can’t wear this’ and ‘you shouldn’t wear that’ and ‘you need to cover your head’ and stuff like that,” Adams said. “So when people started saying, ‘I don’t know about that [dress],’ well…okay. And now all of a sudden, these are the same people who are now fans. And they’ll say ‘I’ve been with her since day one.’ No, you didn’t. Cut it out. Because I remember!”
In the gospel and Christian contemporary music scene, female artists are expected to dress modestly. However, during her rise to fame in the ’90s and early 2000s, Adams’ fashion trends shifted from baggier styles to more form-fitting outfits.
“Because I do not have the typical gospel singer body, I think that it was easy for me to just pick out what I wanted and then just wear what I wanted,” she explained. “Again, I didn’t grow up in a household where we had stipulations on what we could wear, what we couldn’t wear, what we could listen to, what we couldn’t listen to in my family.”
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When Adams wore a cleavage-baring gown to the 2016 Stellar Awards, fellow gospel artist Erica Campbell took to X to show Adams amid backlash, writing, “Did the saints really have a problem with Yolanda Adams dress at the Stellars.” She added, “we have to focus on our souls and not get caught up in the exterior of a person.”
Adams’ physical beauty and tall stature also once had Steve Harvey swooning. “Yolanda sho’ is sexy” at the 2005 Celebration of Gospel,” he said, per PEOPLE.
“For him to say that, I knew he was joking. I knew he was kidding,” Adams said. “But for him to say that, it caught me by surprise, but then I started reading what people were saying too, you know, commenting on it.
“It’s like, ‘yeah, she sho’ is fine. I wish she was my wife.’ No!” she continued. “Those kinds of things. And then, of course, you had the ones that [said], ‘well, I don’t know about her dressing with her shoulders out and stuff.’ Ma’am, it’s the Shrine Auditorium. It is not 3rd Baptist Church on the other side of Ecclesiastes Road.”
READ MORE FROM EURWEB.COM: Yolanda Adams Opens Up on Season 2 Drama, Gospel Music, and Confrontations in BET+ Hit Series ‘Kingdom Business’ | WATCH
