Sound And Vision: Celebrity Feuds — Pop Is a Battlefield, World War II

posted in: Music News • Pop

“Take back Vanessa Redgrave
Take back Joe Piscopo
Take back Eddie Murphy
Give ’em all some place to go”

” Tom Petty, “Jammin’ Me” (1987)

“Fuck Tom Petty!””Eddie Murphy

Oh, those crazy stars! What will they say next? And will they ever learn? What a tangled web they weave when they start to take pot shots at each other.

Celebrity feuds have existed since before the dawn of the pop charts. Eminem owes much of his early notoriety to cutting down to size the likes of Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, ‘N Sync and Moby in videos and on record. Meanwhile, off the record (though always totally for attribution), Katy Perry has never met a fellow chart-topper she wouldn’t slag off.

But lately, stars keep colliding and disturbing the peace in the music galaxy. Liam Gallagher just filed suit against his brother Noel over the latter’s claim that Liam pulled out of a high-profile Oasis gig in 2009 due to a hangover and over comments Noel made blaming Liam for the demise of the band. But then brothers in arms have engaged in verbal”and occasionally, physical” combat since the heyday of the Kinks, which featured the dueling Davies, Ray and Dave. Chris and Rich Robinson of the Black Crowes, William and Jim Reid of the Jesus and Mary Chain, and Kings of Leon‘s Followill brothers have the battle scars to prove it.

Up-and-coming rapper Tyler, The Creator is continuing the musical tradition of talking first and thinking later”unless his political incorrectness, often at the expense  of fellow performers, is actually a calculated bid for maximum exposure. Having sealed his notoriety at the August 28 MTV Video Music Awards by winning Best New Artist for his “Yonkers” clip, he may have gay people as well as Bruno Mars, B.o.B and Paramore’s Haley Williams to thank. His crude comments condemning all of the above”in and out of song”have contributed as much to his fame as his sales, which, up to now have been middling. Advice to Tyler: Threatening to “stab Bruno Mars in his goddamn oesophagus” might get you attention, but it’s no way to endear you to the millions of fans who go gaga over Mars’s silly love songs.

It was at the VMAs in 2009 that Kanye West led the march onto the battlefield, firing the loudest shot in the last two years of artist-on-artist combat when he went up against Taylor Swift onstage. It’s not like she was the first person to win Best Female Video undeservedly, but West’s outburst, which was more about him than it was about Swift, or Beyoncé, who he thought should have won the VMA moonman, incited the counter-ire of Katy Perry, Kelly Clarkson, Pink and Adam Lambert, all on Twitter. Now, it seems, no star is safe from verbal assault. Lady Gaga spends as much time dodging barbs (from Perry, from M.I.A., from Madonna fans who think she’s just a poor imitation) as she does stirring up controversy. Then again, in the world of music, you’re nobody until somebody hates you”or disses you good.

Taylor Swift must be the star among stars then. After the West run-in, Perry, ostensibly in her defense, compared her to a “kitten.” And recently, Carrie Underwood threw more verbal darts in Swift’s direction: “She has her own brand of pop-country music and has her own fan base. [But] I’m not the kind of person that, if you make me mad, I’m going to write a song about you later,” Underwood sniffed. Meow!

Speaking of dueling divas, depending on whom you ask, UK pop star Cheryl Cole lost her judging gig on Simon Cowell’s upcoming U.S. The X Factor either because her British accent was too unintelligible to the average Yank or because she and fellow judge Paula Abdul just couldn’t see heavily mascara’d eye to heavily mascara’d eye.

Over on the set of Glee, creator Ryan Murphy, who, apparently, hasn’t met a celebrity he wouldn’t polarize to prop himself up, slammed Kings of Leon for refusing to allow him to use the band’s hit “Use Somebody” on his show. His pet guest star Gwyneth Paltrow had already hurt Lindsay Lohan’s feelings for daring to make fun of her during her first appearance on Glee last year. Now the actress and sometime singer (Lohan, not Paltrow) is focusing her rage on Pitbull for declaring that he’s “got it locked up, like Lindsay Lohan” in his recent No. 1 hit “Give Me Everything.” She’s suing the rapper for an injunction and damages, claiming the lyrics have hurt her professionally and emotionally. Good luck with that one, Lindsay!

At least Justin Beiber takes his hits in stride. No pop star this side of Taylor Swift takes more of a licking than he does. And apparently, he kept on ticking after Miley Cyrus so perfectly lampooned him while recently hosting Saturday Night Life. As far as I know, she was laughing with him, not at him, and they’re cool. As for Kanye West, the most sensitive guy in the business, he must finally have learned how to take a joke. How else to explain why Josh Groban’s “The Best Tweets of Kanye West” spoof  on Jimmy Kimmel Live! last December didn’t end in fisticuffs.

I suspect it’s only a matter of time before Christina Aguilera, once again scaling the Hot 100, thanks to Maroon 5, takes aim at Kelly Osbourne for calling her a “fat b***t” on E!’s Fashion Police. But what an easy target Osbourne would be! I’m still holding out for the day when Aguilera and Spears finally put on their battle fatigues and let the bad blood spill where it may.

Wouldn’t that be far more entertaining than anything either of them could possibly come up with in the recording studio?