Musician/singer Damon Albarn (AFP via Getty Images)
(Picture: AFP via Getty Images)Damon Albarn’s recent quotes on Taylor Swift’s songwriting have resulted in a swift backlash (excuse the pun) from the singer herself, long-time collaborator Jack Antonoff and even Albarn himself. However, Albarn’s criticism was not directed at himself (as it probably should have been), but the media which he said had reduced his conversation about songwriting he presumably thought was high level to “clickbait”.
Albarn was most likely aware when he sat down with the LA Times that the conversation was on the record and is directly quoted by pop music critic Mikael Wood as saying: “She doesn’t write her own songs,” in reference to Taylor Swift. When challenged on the statement by Wood, who accepted that the 32-year-old singer co-writes some of them, Albarn reportedly doubled down on at least the gist of his criticism, saying: “That doesn’t count. I know what co-writing is. Co-writing is very different to writing.”
He went on to add: “I’m not hating on anybody, I’m just saying there’s a big difference between a songwriter and a songwriter who co-writes.” At what point here Albarn thinks he’s been misquoted by the paper about his views on Swift or songwriting is not clear. Perhaps he was just trying to make a point that he prefers “darker — less endlessly upbeat” music of Billie Eilish which he mentions later in the conversation, but it still doesn’t change what the former Blur frontman said about the Shake It Off singer.
While a lot of people have legitimate criticism to make of the media – and the industry at large hasn’t adapted that well to the online age and the declining revenues that they’ve brought – it seems disingenuous and damaging to good reporters and journalists to just blame the “clickbait” media when you’ve said something that you’d rather not. Albarn would be better served by accepting that he didn’t know too much about Swift’s songwriting process before criticising her in an internationally renowned publication, rather than blaming said publication for simply reporting his quotes.
