Taylor Swift and Beyoncé have been touring the world over the past few months, breaking records at every stop and making history with two of the most impressive concert shows ever produced. Despite being completely distinct artists, the comparisons between the two are inevitable given their legendary status within the pop music world and history. For all of us fans of the two, who can recognize each of their different strengths and weaknesses, the discourse has been exhausting.
A recent Twitter/X user, not content with the vitriol that is already being spewed every other way by Swifties and the Bey Hive, decided to set the “Anti-Hero” multi-platinum singer up with an unflattering dancing video. Captioning it with “Beyonce can’t do this im [sic] sorry,” the netizen who is clearly a Beyoncé fan was trying to get those who took the video and his claim seriously to come down on Swift.
The digital footprint of this terrible online debate comparing Beyoncé and Swift is already way too long for what the subject demands, yet this person thought it made sense to lengthen it further. The answer seems quite obvious to those willing to look at the question objectively. It’s as simple as this: Beyoncé is arguably the greatest living performer, and Taylor Swift is arguably the greatest living songwriter. Listen to Ms. Tina.
This is not to say that Swift can’t perform, even if her dance moves aren’t comparable to those of someone like Beyoncé. Swift herself is well aware of this and sings about it in her hit song “Shake It Off”. However, anyone who can lure an entire stadium with just a guitar, a piano, and her voice, can’t be written off as having no stage presence as the above tweet seems to imply.
Likewise, Beyoncé has a keen musical sense and has produced and written some modern masterpieces across her seven studio albums, and others like The Gift and Everything Is Love. The lyrics in Renaissance especially are on a whole different level for the artist, but there’s no denying Taylor Swift has a special way with words and an ability to write simultaneously relatable and complex lyrics that have captivated audiences for decades.
As someone who attended Beyoncé’s concert in Marseille, France last June, has tickets for Taylor Swift’s 2024 shows, and has been a diehard fan of both for years, I can assure you the public attends the Eras Tour and the Renaissance World Tour expecting two completely different, yet equally incredible experiences. While Beyoncé thrives on minutely precise performance, enhanced by pristine vocals and immaculate staging, Swift, not just on stage, but in the way she markets herself, is all about the connection with fans, relatability, and a girl-next-door image that drives the parasocial relationship she maintains with her audience.
You attend a Beyoncé concert expecting perfection, and a Taylor Swift concert expecting imperfection — not in the sense the above tweet might indicate, but in the doors that that unpredictability opens up for connection. Both are immersive 3-hour-long experiences put on by two women at the absolute top of their game, doing something no one has ever done before. But, as is always the case with female artists, instead of appreciating that feat, the internet has chosen to pit them against each other.
Published: Aug 22, 2023 12:24 pm