Céline Dion fans were outraged that Rolling Stone omitted the Canadian superstar from its new list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time. But instead of just complaining about it on social media, some die-hard Céline-iacs have decided to take their outrage to the next level.
On Friday, a group of Montreal-based Céline fans known as The Red Heads organized a protest outside the New York City offices of Rolling Stone, and their actions were documented and shared online. Footage posted on The Red Heads’ Facebook page show the fans waving signs with messages like “The Power of Celine,” “How Can You Forget Celine?” “Celine is #1” and “We Want a Recount.”
According to Variety, the fans, who’d driven the six hours from Montreal for the protest, chanted, “Justice for Celine” while blasting her hit “That’s the Way It Is” on a portable speaker. Another sign, referring to Celine’s hit song for the movie Titanic, read, “Rolling Stone you’ve hit an iceberg.”
Red Heads president Line Basbous, who helped organize the protest, told Variety, “The list is completely illegitimate. We wanted to support her and make sure that Rolling Stone hears the voice of the fans. The list is ridiculous.”
Rolling Stone‘s response was to cover the protest on its online front page and suggest that the entire thing “was an organized stunt.”
What’s certain is that the protesters are self-aware. On January 3, Basbous told The Journal de Quebec that she was “very amused” by the response to the list. She added, “We love it when Céline is talked about … we are very proud of the reactions, the popular uprising and the backlash.”
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