What H.E.R.'s 'Fight For You' Really Means

R&B artist H.E.R. — whose stage name stands for Having Everything Revealed — may have kept her identity a secret at first, but her talent is impossible to keep under wraps. Per Pitchfork, the Grammy-winning singer nabbed her first Golden Globe nomination on Feb. 3, 2021 with her single "Fight For You."

Fans likely heard the track in the 2021 film Judas and the Black Messiah, which centers on the role FBI agent William O'Neal played in Black Panther Party activist Fred Hampton's tragic death. In keeping with the revolutionary themes of the movie, "Fight For You" is an anthemic call to social justice inspired by Hampton's moving life story.

What fans might not know is that Judas and the Black Messiah very nearly missed out on H.E.R.'s vocals. According to the Los Angeles Times, the period drama was originally slated for release in August 2020, and without that delay, "Fight For You" would not have featured in the soundtrack. As H.E.R. has lent her voice and platform to the Black Lives Matter movement, even penning the song "I Can't Breathe" in the wake of the protests, this collaboration seems meant to be! 

No doubt people are eager to tune into the Golden Globe Awards on Feb. 28 to see how things pan out — but in the meantime, here's a deeper look at the lyrics of "Fight For You."

'Fight For You' features a universal message

With lyrics like, "Freedom for my brothers" and "Freedom 'cause they need us, free from how they see us, freedom won't you free us," it's clear that H.E.R.'s "Fight For You" zeroes in on the Black Panther Party's fight for justice. Even the funky melody fits the retro vibe of the 1960s and 1970s, when Fred Hampton's story took place (per Hot New Hip Hop).

However, H.ER. was quick to address the fact that the song's message can resonate with anyone. "The verses, just talking about the struggle and talking about that pain and what it means to be fighting for someone or something... I think everybody is fighting for someone," the singer explained to the Los Angeles Times

As H.E.R. puts it, the single "embodies the mentality and the fight that I think we [the Black community] are fighting today," but the story of the fighting human spirit spans generations, demographics and races. "There's a lot of things that the song and the lyrics represent," the star added (via the Los Angeles Times). Sounds like fans can listen to the lyrics through the lens of their own life experiences, and after all, isn't that what art is all about?