Earlier this week, Apple Music announced that they would host an exclusive interview between Mary J. Blige and Hillary Clinton, and advertised it with a slightly baffling clip of Blige sitting down and singing Bruce Springsteen’s “American Skin (41 Shots)” to the Democratic nominee for President. She faced some backlash for it due to its cringe-worthiness, but explained it to the Associated Press as such:

I wanted to incorporate the song in the show because the lyrics resonated with me so deeply and so heavily because of all the shootings and police brutality and I never got a chance to say anything. I’m a singer first …so that’s the only way I can express myself and …the only way I can get that reaction from (Hillary) is to sing it. I didn’t warm up … I just sang …It was organic and that’s how it went. And hopefully, I believe she felt it, I think she did.

The full interview is available now — it’s the first episode of Blige’s new Apple music show, The 411 — and the clip seems less baffling in the context of a half-hour-long interview where the two of them have an honest heart-to-heart. You can watch the full thing below.