When Taylor Swift sang “And we see you over there on the internet / Comparing all the girls who are killing it / But we figured you out / We all know now, we all got crowns / You need to calm down,” and when Beyoncé dedicated an entire section of the Renaissance tour concerts to shouting out the women in the industry who inspire her, they meant it.
Unfortunately for us all, neither of their fanbases actually cared or listened and still proceeded to make us witnesses to the grueling, exhausting, absurd wars about whose record-breaking culture-defining once-in-a-generation world tour was more influential, whose multi-Grammy-winning body of work was superior, who performed better, or (seriously, I’m losing brain cells here) who wrote better music.
Thankfully, the graceful queens that they are, Bey and Tay, probably as exhausted as we all were, took matters into their own hands and decided to make the statement to end all statements. The legendary “Break My Soul” singer – whose world tour is now the highest-grossing of all time for a female artist and who is also releasing a concert movie by the end of the year – attended the premiere of the box office phenomenon that is the Eras Tour movie in Los Angeles on Wednesday evening, dressed in full Renaissance garb to support the only living artist on her level.
Haters are winning the ‘Mute’ challenge right now
Throughout 2023, as the two traveled across the United States (Beyoncé also toured Europe, which Taylor will be visiting in the new year), the online debate ran rampant with Swifties and the Hive struggling for complete dominance of the conversation. What they sadly failed to comprehend, however, was that having two women at the prime of their careers, with the kind of numbers that they were generating, positively changing music history together, was so much more impressive and beautiful to experience than whatever silly kingpin narratives they were trying to concoct.
I’ve spoken extensively in the past about why Beyoncé and Taylor are impossible artists to compare and why we’re lucky to have them both, slaying the game, at the same time, in two completely different genres and formats. So, to have my two favorite artists, who just happen to be the greatest living entertainers, confirm and echo everything I’ve been saying with one simple, yet majestic, gesture, was everything.
The definitive icons of our time (just accept it!)
“I’m so glad I’ll never know what my life would’ve been like without Beyoncé‘s influence,” Taylor said in the brilliant dedication she shared to her Instagram page– a sentence that resonates deeply with me and surely countless other fans of the two artists. Beyoncé and Taylor’s music and careers – which have managed to stay not just relevant but dominant across decades during a time and cultural landscape where durable success is elusive and flimsy – shaped a generation, and certainly shaped me. They have provided the soundtrack to my life, its highest and lowest moments, in the process making it virtually inseparable from their music, who they are as public figures, what they stand for, and how they approach art and their fans.
It’s worthless hoping those silly comparisons and fights will cease altogether, but at least we’ll always have this near-diplomatic act as a handy tool to swiftly discredit them. “She’s been a guiding light throughout my career and the fact that she showed up tonight was like an actual fairytale,” Taylor concluded. Here’s hoping she will extend the courtesy and attend the premiere of Beyoncé’s Renaissance film in December. It’s just as well that that’s also the month Taylor will be taking off from touring in between the Eras Tour’s upcoming South American and European legs.
