Sigh. Here we go again. After Beyoncé shared the cover of her upcoming album Cowboy Carter, fans were rightfully fascinated by its symbolism and the events that apparently inspired it. But, of course, there was one commenter who had further thoughts — and didn’t hold back on sharing them.
Azealia Banks, who previously called Beyoncé’s new singles “16 Carriages” and “Texas Hold ‘Em” a “big-time musical grift” (lol, girl, knock it off), went all the way in on the Cowboy Carter cover, deriding it for a lack of creativity. The covers features a beauty-queen Beyoncé sitting side-saddle on a white stallion, clad in a red, white, and blue Nudie suit with a sash bearing the album’s title holding an American flag. Here it is:
Banks declares herself “ashamed at how u switch from baobab trees and black parade to this literal pick-me stuff.” She doesn’t exactly explain what any of that means across no fewer than four Instagram Story slides. Side note: Just those four clock in at a full 900 words — if sis could pitch to an outlet, she could be getting paid to be a hater instead of just doing it for free (however unlikely it’d be that any editor would want to put up with her shenanigans).
There’s a lot to parse here, but it seemingly boils down to Banks’ view that Beyoncé, with all her culture-shifting power, could have yanked the visual aspects of country music closer to an aesthetic like that of her diaspora-dabbling Black Is King imagery. To be clear, Banks called that aesthetic hypocritical at the time, as well. She also picks on Beyoncé (inaccurately) for deigning to collaborate or share her platform with exclusively white artists — which… just, no. No. If you’re going to lie, do it convincingly. You can read the rant in full below.
I’ll take a shot at extracting some meaning from the bloviating above… Azealia Banks is still looking for someone to blame that she tanked her own career with all that mean-girl energy, and enjoys the attention she gets from flaming other artists who are more successful than her. Well, here you go, Azealia. Take it to the bank.
Azealia’s music is infinitely better than any of her cultural commentary and it really irks me that the only time people talk about her now is when she is pretending to be Khia on her IG stories
— Versace Hottie (@evilrashida) March 20, 2024
One thing About Azealia Banks is she will give her critique about another artist’s SUCCESSFUL career, but don’t have one solution for how to get her own career out of the lowest depths of hell… pic.twitter.com/yE8MHf8Glq
— Elliott (@ElLaMond_) March 20, 2024
Took a nibble of the Azealia rant cause I keep seeing “points were made” on the TL and it’s just her projecting cause she let some crooked men in the industry railroad her career. Not quite what’s happening over here sis!
— Bert’s Bayou (@bertsbayou) March 20, 2024
Azealia so funny because she has no idea who’s on that album and is just talking out the side of her neck and y’all like: pic.twitter.com/NwhmZUBGR4
— BROTHERTOTHENIGHT🌕 (@KeesSweat) March 20, 2024