Erykah Badu Pleads Not Guilty to "Window Seat" Charge

Erykah Badu has pleaded not guilty to a disorderly conduct charge stemming from her controversial "Window Seat" music video, which featured the New Amerykah Part Two singer stripping down naked while walking through Dallas' Dealey Plaza. Hundreds of Dallas residents, some of them children, watched Badu's video shoot, and while no one called police at the time, as Rolling Stone previously reported, the police actively sought witnesses to step forward in order to charge Badu after the video became a viral sensation. One witness finally complained earlier this month, telling officers "she and her two small children were offended," leading to the Class C misdemeanor charge, which carries a $500 fine. Rather than simply pay the fee by mail, however, Badu opted to challenge the charge, Dallas Morning News reports.

Badu's "Window Seat" video combined Matt and Kim's "Lessons Learned" clip, in which the duo ran around New York's Times Square naked, with allusions to the assassination of John F. Kennedy, which also took place in Dealey Plaza. Badu has since said she chose Dealey Plaza because it was one of the most popular places in Dallas.

As Rolling Stone previously reported, Dallas officials sought to use the "Window Seat" case as a catalyst to springboard changes to the city's "no permit necessary" laws for video shoots. So far, Badu has not commented on her plea on her very active Twitter.

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Song Stories

“All Along the Watchtower”

The Jimi Hendrix Experience | 1968

Jimi Hendrix got hold of Bob Dylan's early John Wesley Harding tapes and in late 1967 recorded a version of "All Along the Watchtower" with the Experience in London. Dissatisfied with that first development, Hendrix brought those tapes with him to New York in early 1968 when he began work on Electric Ladyland. Eddie Kramer, Hendrix's engineer at the time, told Rolling Stone that Hendrix "was still looked upon by his basically white audience as the mammoth black guitar hero. There was a constant fight within him to expand himself." Hendrix's successful take on Dylan's work has long been recognized by the songwriter. "I liked Jimi Hendrix's record of this and ever since he died I've been doing it that way," Dylan wrote in the liner notes to his Biograph box set. "Strange how when I sing it, I always feel it's a tribute to him in some kind of way."

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